The more sensitive in the crowd had already turned away. The hardier spirits, with eyes glued to the scene, saw an unfamiliar thing. The Dragon swayed, dipped, hesitated. Its tongue licked the dust at Conrad’s feet. He, who had hitherto done nothing to defend himself, drew out the handkerchief and threw it awkwardly but with lucky aim, right into the Dragon’s scarlet mouth. The beast roared, snorted, coughed, whimpered, and in a moment looked less terrible. Conrad, taking heart, lifted the axe and struck at the scaly neck towering above him. It was a clumsy blow, unworthy of a woodman, but it found its mark. A torrent of green blood gushed out, evaporating before it reached the ground. The Dragon’s claws lost their hold on the rock, and it sprawled outwards, exposing a long, black tubular body no one had seen till now. The neck dropped to within easy reach of Conrad’s axe, and encouraged by the frenzied cheering behind him, he hacked at it again and again. Its balance lost, the Dragon seemed bewildered and helpless; a child could have tackled it, it was as passive under the axe as a felled tree. Conrad seemed to be having matters all his own way, when suddenly the Dragon made a convulsive movement and wriggled backwards into the rock, which closed over it. Conrad was left in possession of the field.

The crowd stopped cheering; no one quite knew what to do, least of all Conrad, who was still standing by the steps, half-dazed. That the Dragon had retired wounded and discomfited was plain to all; but perhaps it was only biding its time, gathering its strength for a fresh attack. It had so long seemed invincible; they could not believe it was dead.

But when seconds passed and nothing happened, they began to surge round Conrad, weeping and laughing and trying to take his hand. From the castle, too, came signs of rejoicing, a faint cheering and fluttering of handkerchiefs, then a full-throated roar and flags waved from every window. A little throng began to form at the top of the steps, the King in the centre, his sceptre in his hand and his crown on his head. They were all laughing and talking together; it was clear they had never expected Conrad to win, they had made no plans for his reception, and were all rather enjoying the informal meeting. They called and beckoned to Conrad to come up; but he did not understand, so the crowd came behind and pushed him. As he moved up, the King came down, alone; they met in midstair, the King kissed Conrad and embraced him, and they walked up to the castle arm-in-arm.

‘And now I must present you to my daughter,’ the King was saying as they reached the top, and the members of the Court were pressing forward with shining eyes to congratulate the victor of the Dragon. ‘Where is she? She’s away somewhere, she’ll come in a minute. Silly child, she’s missed all the fun.’

‘Hermione! Your Royal Highness!’ called the ladies of the Court, in their light, eager voices, peering into the hall, staring up at the windows. And the crowd, nearly ninety feet below, took up the cry, ‘Hermione! We want Princess Hermione!’ It was an immense crowd now, for all the town was running to the spot, and the volume of sound was terrific. Everyone was delighted with the noise that he or she was making; even the group by the castle door winked and nudged and poked each other in the ribs, while they cried ‘Hermione!’ at the top of their voices. Only Conrad did not join in the cry.

But still she delayed. The crowd shouted itself hoarse; the ladies of the Court coughed and wrinkled up their faces and looked appealingly at each other; the King frowned slightly, for he felt she ought to be here now; but still the Princess did not come.

Then they all burst out excitedly, ‘Where can she be? Let’s go and look for her,’ while others said, ‘No, no, the shock would harm her, we must break it to her gradually.’ There was quite a little confusion and uproar of voices arguing this way and that, stirring the general gaiety to an even higher pitch. They flocked into the castle dividing hither and thither, their silvery laughter lost among the corridors and colonnades.

Conrad had been torn from the King’s side and hurried into the building before he knew what he was doing. Several people promised to show him the way, but when they had gone a little distance, they forgot about him, and flew off, with shouts of laughter, to join their own friends. Conrad seemed to be alone in the long dark corridor, but when he looked round, there was a man standing at the far end of it. Conrad walked towards him, calling out to him to wait; but the fellow hurried on, though how he could go like that, his face looking backwards all the time, Conrad did not understand.

Through doors, along passages, down steps they went, always with the same distance between them, always getting lower and lower; Conrad felt the cold on his cheeks and hands. At last a door, indistinguishable from the surrounding masonry, opened, showing a room. Conrad followed his guide in, then lost sight of him.

On a couch by the wall lay the Princess, her head turned away, and in the whiteness of her neck a gash dreadful to behold. On the wall above her hung the shadow to which her indescribable beauty had lent a kind of life: it could not long survive her, and just as Conrad took in the perfection of its loveliness, it faded.

He fell on his knees by the couch. How long he knelt, he could not tell, but when he looked up, the room was full of people.

‘You have killed her,’ someone said.

Conrad rose and faced them.

‘I did not kill her: I killed the Dragon!’

‘Look,’ said another voice. ‘She has the same wound in her neck.’

‘That wound I gave the Dragon.’

‘And what is this?’ asked a third, pointing to a ball of linen, tightly grasped in Princess Hermione’s outstretched hand. He took it and shook it out: the smell of chloroform filled the air. A cluster of eyes read the name in the corner of the handkerchief: it was Conrad’s.

‘And you poisoned her as well!’ they gasped.

‘That poison,’ said Conrad, ‘I gave to the Dragon.’

One or two nodded their heads; but the rest shouted:

‘But you must have killed her! How else did she die?’

Conrad passed his hand across his face.

‘Why should I kill her? I love her,’ he said in a broken voice. ‘It was the Dragon I killed.’

Then, as they all gazed at him fascinated, he added:

‘But the Dragon was the Princess!’

Immediately there was a terrible hubbub, and to shouts of ‘Liar, ‘Murderer,’ ‘Traitor,’ Conrad was hustled from the room and lodged in a neighbouring dungeon. He was released almost immediately and never brought up for trial, though a section of the Press demanded it.

A story was put about that the Princess had somehow met her death defending Conrad from the Dragon; and Conrad, when asked if this was so, would not altogether deny it. His hour of popularity as slayer of the Dragon soon passed, and in its place he incurred the lasting odium of having been somehow concerned in the Princess’s death. ‘He ought never to have used that chloroform,’ was a criticism repeated with growing indignation from mouth to mouth. ‘No sportsman would have.’ It was a mark of patriotism to make light of the Dragon’s misdeeds, for their long continuance redounded little to the country’s credit and capacity. They were speedily forgotten, while the fame of Princess Hermione, a national treasure, went mounting ever higher in the hearts of her countrymen. Before the year was out, Conrad heard a man in the street say to his friend:

‘What does it matter if the Princess did change herself into a dragon? She only did it for a lark.’

Conrad went back to his home, but he soon received an official intimation that in his own and the common interest, he ought to leave the country. The government would find him a passport and pay his fare. This was all the reward he got for killing the Dragon, but he went gladly enough—the more gladly that Charlotte consented to go with him. She stipulated, however, that they should make their home in a Republic. There they were married and lived happily ever after.