The Argosy, March 1907 — page 137: what you’re looking at

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

— * ING OR COUNTERFEIT? : ‘Af he eee ae ee Ne AN Pad 5 vik eG ye hale neh ay mr? i] Pa r a time. must be very careful what we do, villain shall suffer for this. OLE wy 42 Biel} mi wa A fee! th ERS ryigl iy $ PAA SEMEL an, . ’ . ’ i a 4 i iecye @ by | “ But this scandal must leak out some The truth has got to be known, ? said the princess. “We must have time to think. ” We whis- “Oh, this He shall rue the day he deceived me. My honorable reputation has gone forever,” The old man broke down and wept like a child. “Calm. yourself, baron,” said the princess compassionately. ‘The scoun- drels managed this imposture cleverly pered the wretched premier. enough to deceive anybody. Let us hear — how they worked it. Tell us everything, you miserable one, if you hope for any mercy.” ‘“ Yes—yes,” cried the wretched man, “ ¥ will tell you everything. Have mercy on me. I am not really so much to blame. It was that fellow Duval -who _ persuaded me to do- it—Duval, who is now dead. I swear it.” | _“ Begin at the beginning,” commanded the princess sternly. “T will,” said the man who was still King of Nordinia. ‘ It was Duval who first conceived the plot. It was Duval who did most toward carrying it out. It was Duval who instructed me in every move I made. It was Duval who urged me on whenever I faltered and was afraid. I was only a tool in Duval’s hands. I was, indeed. “ Duval knew my father, Carl Gas- pard, who was once valet*to the baron here. When the baron visited America, many years ago, my father accompanied him. When Prince Carl Richard, brother of the late king, called on the baron in Washington, accompanied by his little boy, and told the baron that he was the prince, and showed him the seal mark he had branded on his son’s shoul- der, my father was listening through the keyhole. “When the prince gave the baron a | piece of parchment on which was a dupli- cate of the seal, my father made up his mind he would see that piece of parch- ment. ‘“ Afterward he did manage to lay his hands on it, took it away, unknown to the baron, and made a careful copy of the seal. My father was quite clever at drafting. Then he returned the parch- in doing this. He simply took a copy of that seal, thinking it might come useful to him some time. ‘Afterward he grew ver with the Frenchman Duval, him about the visit of the. prince about the seal mark on the young boy shoulder. “Duval wasn’t interested at the time, but some years later, when he learned that the King of Nordinia was suffer- ing from an incurable malady and that it was supposed there was no heir to the throne, an idea entered his mind. ‘It was a daring idea; only a man of Duval’s nerve and daring could have conceived it. Duval planned to have a duplicate seal made from the design my father had copied and to brand that seal on my right shoulder. ‘IT was the same age as the real Carl Richard Felix, Jr., and I had been brought up in America, my father hav- | ing emigrated out there after he was caught stealing by the baron and dis- charged from his service. “I was duly branded and then we bided our time. Duval’s original plan was to kill the real Carl Richard Felix, so that he could not interfere with my impersonation of him. Fortunately, however, we did not have to resort to murder. “After he left college the real Carl Richard mysteriously disappeared. We made a careful search and discovered that an unknown man answering his description was drowned by the upset- ting of a canoe in Canada. The body was never recovered, but there is little doubt that it was he. “When the baron recently visited America for the second time to seek the real Carl Richard, and advertised for him in the newspapers, our es were all carefully laid. ‘‘ Duval instructed me minutely as to how I should conduct myself. My father described to me several little inci- dents which had happened during the visit of the prince to the baron in Wash- ington, years before. He described to me also a curious ring he had noticed on the baron’s finger at the time. comicbooks.co ment to the safe in which the baron* : kept it. | ‘My father hoe no particular object m-