Argosy All-Story Weekly, April 19, 1924 — page 47: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

i: We I i 4 | a - . 7 g eS —_——-+-.eoo— Reccnnnseniiiiibineteel ‘ WR rm wer RE a a! vc SS —— i ——— i. site| | — TiS AY IN Ve Ps —epoe p~- rt FROM THE MEMOIRS OF THE QUEEN OF FLORANIA WHAT HAS OCCURRED IN PART 1. HORTLY after reaching her twenty-first birthday Elizabeth, Countess Cleveland, is approached by Baron Leomar, Floranian ambassador to the Court of St. James, with a proposal of mar- riage from the young King Peter of Florania. The royal family. is impoverished and his advisers have impressed the king with the necessity for marrying a woman of wealth. Out of curiosity Elizabeth agrees to meet the king at dinner at the home of the Prince and Princess de Chanterelle in London. She falls in Jove with him, but the king regards her with indifference, considering his marriage a matter of business. Elizabeth, piqued and interested, grad- ually falls in with the idea of marrying him, She learns that he is reported to be,in love with the Princess de Chanterelle. In a moment of impulse Elizabeth, with the help of Bunch, her cousin and confidant, disguises herself with blond wig and make- -up and, posing as a dancing instructress, meets the king when he goes, incognito, to the Flower Garden dance club to indulge in a few care-free hours of dancing, of which he is passionately fond. “Betty Fane,” as Elizabeth calls herself, wins his admiration as his partner in the ‘Sable Night’ waltz, and she agrees to meet him again. CHAPTER IV. A JOB—AND A QUESTION, N the vestibule, which was almost empty as I passed, a man and a woman were talking. They stood in an archway that seemed to lead into some private room. The woman was about forty, inclined to be stout, but with a trim, beautifully cor- seted figure. Her face was handsome, though a little hard. Her copper hair looked dyed. She wore a plain, very distinguished black evening frock. The man had smooth black hair, and wore big, horn-rimmed spectacles. By his appearance and speech he was an Ameri- This story began in the Argosy-Alistory Weekly for April 12. 517 Eomicdoo