ANY mention of Princess Chalcondylas and her son Basile in Rome always provoked a smile: a cruel smile, perhaps; certainly a smile which casts a cruel light upon both their portraits.
Princess Chalcondylas bore an ancient Graeco-Byzantine name, but she was no princesse lointaine and she was once plain Marie Delestre. She came from nowhere more remote than Paris and her maiden name was that of a respectable family of teachers, a family which, though middle-class, yet seemed to contain a heritage of intellect, for it had enriched mankind for years, if not for centuries, with tutors and governesses, even as another family will breed clergymen, a third give the preference to men of business, a fourth supply the military element, and a fifth play-actors, civil servants, hairdressers, sailors, or what not. Marie Delestre proved herself a chip of the old block: as a girl of barely nineteen, she took the courageous resolve to seek a situation as a governess, in order to contribute to the support of her elderly parents. Governesses are always better paid abroad than at home; so Marie Delestre, with a couple of certificates in her pocket, looked out for a situation in Germany, Russia, or America. As luck would have it, the agency to which she applied found her a position as governess in a half-Greek, half-Roumanian family, who lived at Bucharest and wanted a French teacher for their children, two boys of fifteen and fourteen and a girl of twelve. The family enjoyed the princely title of Chalcondylas and owned extensive estates in Roumania in addition to their palace at Bucharest.
II
Marie Delestre set out for Bucharest. She was a plucky girl with good qualities all her own. She was not pretty, but capable and confident, young and healthy, a fresh blossom of the Delestre fam-
