CHAPTER IX.
A NEW USE FOR A TEA TABLE.
If I were to detail the ordinary events of my daily life at this time, they might prove instructive to people who are not familiar with the insides of palaces; if I revealed some of the secrets I learned, they might prove of interest to the statesmen of Europe. I intend to do neither of these things. I should be between the Scylla of dullness and the Charybdis of indiscretion, and I feel that I had far better confine myself strictly to the underground drama which was being played beneath the surface of Ruritanian politics. I need only say that the secret of my imposture defied detection. I made mistakes. I had bad minutes: it needed all the tact and graciousness whereof I was master to smooth over some apparent lapses of memory and unmindfulness of old acquaintances of which I was guilty. But I escaped, and I attributed my escape,
