Waiting alone in the great, oak-panelled library, with the intensely unknowable shouts of the street hawkers wafting in from outside, the still-proud Princess thought once more of Senator Gwynne, the soldier-lover of her youthful imaginings. He was now, according to the best salon gossip, in the clutches of Oddman Volestrangler and his gang of cutthroats.
   Only in this moment of extremity could it have happened that came the sound of her own name being called, and she leapt to her feet with hope — and alarm — in her eyes. He was here! “Come to me, you sweet little morsel of girl-flesh!” he rumbled.
   At that moment he slid the little ring onto her finger, and as the glow of renewed love gradually overcame her mounting desire for dinner, she woke up. Incredibly enough, it had all been a dream.