The Secret Prince by Kathryn Jensen

brightened her face. “Dan, you wouldn’t…”
    â€œWant to come along?” He sensed, even as he said the words that he was inviting trouble.
    Elly laughed. “There’s absolutely no way both of us could slip out unnoticed.”
    â€œNot exactly unnoticed. Would you prefer to be a cook or a maid?”
    She gave him a skeptical smile, but he could tell she was as excited as he was at the prospect of escaping, if only for a short while, from their confinement. “I’ll go talk to the cook. She seems a cheery soul. Maybe she’ll lend me something from one of her assistants.”
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    Less than an hour later, Elly met Dan inside the door that led from the kitchen on the ground floor out into the gardens.
    â€œNow, you do keep your head down and don’t speak a word auf englisch while they’re in hearing,” Cook advised Elly as she helped her on with a white kitchen smock. “You just keep saying, ‘Entschuldigung! Ich wisse nichts.’”
    â€œThat means, Excuse me! I know nothing,” Elly explained to Dan.
    â€œWhat about me?” Dan asked. He had already borrowed some old clothing from Cook’s husband, the royal family’s head gardener.
    â€œLet the Fraulein do the talking,” Cook said bluntly. “Your Deutsch ist lousy.”
    Dan laughed, not taking offense. “I don’t care as long as I get to see something outside of these stone walls.”
    â€œHere,” Cook said, pressing a mesh shopping bag stuffed with paper-wrapped parcels on Dan, “you may get hungry. I’ve sent word to the guards on the reargate that you’ll be coming. They will let you out and watch for your return.”
    â€œThank you,” Elly said gratefully. “You’ve been great. You won’t get into trouble for helping us, will you?”
    Cook winked at her. “The king, he used to lick my cooking spoons as a little boy. He would never be angry with his Tante Anna.”
    As they approached the back gate, Dan felt the tension building in his shoulders and neck. It was so warm that they really didn’t need coats, yet their simple locally made garments made them look their parts as a groundsman and cook’s assistant.
    There seemed to be just as many reporters attached to the rear gate as there had been at the main entrance. As soon as the guard let them through the iron grille a flurry of excitement ran through their ranks. Several started barking into cell phones, alerting others that prey was afoot.
    But Elly played her role impeccably. Murmuring a few guttural words in German as Cook had instructed she jutted out her chin, dropped her glance and headed down the road in a stiff stride, all business. Dan stayed close by her side, glowering at the reporters who tossed out hopeful questions. He pulled his cap lower over his eyes and tried to look as bored and unintelligent as possible.
    By the time they’d gone a hundred yards down the road, their followers had dismissed them as unlikely sources of information and returned to their positions outside the gates.
    Elly laughed out loud as soon as they were out of hearing. “We did it! We actually fooled them!”
    â€œYou should take all the credit. If I’d opened mymouth they would have known immediately that I was an American.” He looked appreciatively at her. She was glowing, and he felt a shared enthusiasm for the day that spread out before them.
    The weather was balmy for winter. The sun shone brightly, chasing away the chill and melting the last traces of snow that lingered among the roots of roadside shrubs.
    â€œI feel positively giddy with freedom!” she cried. “Where will we go? What will we do? How about a stroll around the city?” Her eyes sparkled.
    Dan grimaced. “I’m afraid that would increase our chances of being caught. Someone in town will know we’re not really from the castle staff.”
    She stopped