Chapter 26

(“There is one thing,” O’Hagan tells me, “which a nobleman of the Grand Duke’s race can never appreciate—the doctrine of aristocratic equality. He must always dominate or be dominated. My ancestor, Patrick, had this from the lips of Cardinal Richelieu—a singularly shrewd observer, Raymond, and a gentleman.”) “I have no intention,” resumed the Grand Duke, “of handing them over to the ambassador.” O’Hagan shrugged his shoulders impatiently, turning his eye-glass upon the speaker with the air of a wise man weary of fo…