CHAPTER XV
Wogan jumped down from his box and ran to the carriage-door.
"Her Highness is ill?" he cried in suspense.
"Not the least bit in the world," returned Clementina, whose voice foronce in a way jarred upon Wogan's ears. Nothing short of a positivesickness could justify the delay.
"What is it, then?" he asked curtly, almost roughly, of Mrs. Misset.
"You carried a packet for her Highness. It is left behind at thetavern."
Wogan stamped impatiently on the ground.
"And for this, for a petticoat or two, you hinder us," he cried in aheat. "There's no petticoat in the world, though it were so stiff withgold that it stood on end of itself, that's worth a single second of thenext forty-eight hours."
"But it contains her Highness's jewels."
Wogan's impatience became an exasperation. Were all women at heart,then, no better than Indian squaws? A string of beads outweighed thesacrifices of friends and the chance of a crown! There was a blemish inhis idol, since at all costs she must glitter. Wogan, however, was themaster here.
"Her Highness must lose her jewels," he said roughly, and was turningaway when her Highness herself spoke.
"You are unjust, my friend," she said. "I would lose them verywillingly, were there a chance no one else would discover them. Butthere's no chance. The woman of the tavern will find the bundle, willopen it; very likely she has done so already. We shall have allInnspruck on our heels in half an hour;" and for the first time thatnight Wogan heard her voice break, and grieved to know that the tearswere running down her cheeks. He called to O'Toole,--
"Ride back to the tavern! Bring the packet without fail!"
O'Toole galloped off, and Gaydon drove the carriage to the side of theroad. There was nothing to do but to wait, and they waited in silence,counting up the chances. There could be no doubt that the landlady, ifonce she discovered the jewels hidden away in a common packet ofclothing, must suspect the travellers who had left them behind. Shewould be terrified by their value; she would be afraid to retain themlest harm should come to her; and all Innspruck would be upon thefugitives' heels. They waited for half an hour,--thirty minutes of gloomand despair. Clementina wept over this new danger which her comradesran; Mrs. Misset wept for that her negligence was to blame; Gaydon saton the box in the falling snow with his arms crossed upon his breast,and felt his head already loose upon his shoulders. The only one of theparty who had any comfort of that half-hour was Wogan. For he had beenwrong,--the chosen woman had no wish to glitter at all costs, though, tobe sure, she could not help glittering with the refulgence of her greatmerits. His idol had no blemish. Wogan paced up and down the road, whilehe listened for O'Toole's return, and that thought cheated the time forhim. At last he heard very faintly the sound of galloping hoofs belowhim on the road. He ran back to Gaydon.
"It might be a courier to arrest us. If I shout, drive fast as you canto Nazareth, and from Nazareth to Italy."
He hurried down the road and was hailed by O'Toole.
"I have it," said he. Wogan turned and ran by O'Toole's stirrup to thecarriage.
"The landlady has a good conscience and sleeps well," said O'Toole. "Ifound the house dark and the doors shut. They were only secured,however, by a wooden beam dropped into a couple of sockets on theinside."
"But how did you open them?" asked Clementina.
"Your Highness, I have, after all, a pair of arms," said O'Toole. "Ijust pressed on the doors till--"
"Till the sockets gave?"
"No, till the beam broke," said he, and Clementina laughed.
"That's my six foot four!" said she. O'Toole did not understand. But hesmiled with great condescension and dignity, and continued his story.
"I groped my way up the stairs into the room and found the bundleuntouched in the corner."
He handed it to the Princess; Wogan sprang again onto the box, andGaydon whipped up the horses. They reached the first posting stage attwo, the second at four, the third at six, and at each they wasted notime. All that night their horses strained up the mountain road amid thewhirling sleet. At times the wind roaring down a gorge would set thecarriage rocking; at times they stuck fast in drifts; and Wogan andGaydon must leap from the box and plunging waist-deep in the snow, mustdrag at the horses and push at the wheels. The pace was too slow; Woganseemed to hear on every gust of wind the sound of a galloping company.
"We have lost twelve hours, more than twelve hours now," he repeated andrepeated to Gaydon. All the way to Ala they would still be in theEmperor's territory. It needed only a single courier to gallop pastthem, and at either Roveredo or Trent they would infallibly be taken.Wogan fingered his pistols, straining his eyes backwards down the road.
At daybreak the snow stopped; the carriage rolled on high among themountains under a grey sky; and here and there, at a wind of the road,Wogan caught a glimpse of the towers and chimney-tops of Innspruck, orhad within his view a stretch of the slope they had climbed. But therewas never a black speck visible upon the white of the snow; as yet nocourier was overtaking them, as yet Innspruck did not know its captivehad escaped. At eight o'clock in the morning they came to Nazareth, andfound their own berlin ready harnessed at the post-house door, thepostillion already in his saddle, and Misset waiting with an uncoveredhead.
"Her Highness will breakfast here, no doubt?" said Gaydon.
"Misset will have seen to it," cried Wogan, "that the berlin isfurnished. We can breakfast as we go."
They waited no more than ten minutes at Nazareth. The order oftravelling was now changed. Wogan and Gaydon now travelled in the berlinwith Mrs. Misset and Clementina. Gaydon, being the oldest of the party,figured as the Count of Cernes, Mrs. Misset as his wife, Clementina ashis niece, and Wogan as a friend of the family. O'Toole and Misset rodebeside the carriage in the guise of servants. Thus they started fromNazareth, and had journeyed perhaps a mile when without so much as amoan Clementina swooned and fell forward into Wogan's arms. Mrs. Missetuttered a cry; Wogan clasped the Princess to his breast. Her head fellback across his arm, pale as death; her eyes were closed; her bosom,strained against his, neither rose nor fell.
"She has fasted all Lent," he said in a broken voice. "She has eatennothing since we left Innspruck."
Mrs. Misset burst into tears; she caught Clementina's hand and claspedit; she had no eyes but for her. With Gaydon it was different. Wogan washolding the Princess in a clasp too loverlike, though, to be sure, itwas none of his business.
"We must stop the carriage," he said.
"No," cried Wogan, desperately; "that we must not do;" and he caught herstill closer to him. He had a fear that she was dying. Even so, sheshould not be recaptured. Though she were dead, he would still carry herdead body into Bologna and lay it white and still before his King.Europe from London to the Bosphorus should know the truth of her andring with the wonder of her, though she were dead. O'Toole, attracted bythe noise of Mrs. Misset's lamentations, bent down over his horse's neckand looked into the carriage.
"Her Highness is dead!" he cried.
"Drive on," replied Wogan, through his clenched teeth.
Upon the other side of the carriage, Misset shouted through the window,"There is a spring by the roadside."
"Drive on," said Wogan.
Gaydon touched him on the arm.
"You will stifle her, man."
Wogan woke to a comprehension of his attitude, and placed Clementinaback on her seat. Mrs. Misset by good fortune had a small bottle ofCarmelite water in her pocket; she held it to the Princess's nostrils,who in a little opened her eyes and saw her companions in tears abouther, imploring her to wake.
"It is nothing," she said. "Take courage, my poor marmosets;" and with asmile she added, "There's my six feet four with the tears in his eyes.Did ever a woman have such friends?"
The sun came out in the sky as she spoke. They had topped the pass andwere now driving down towards Italy. There was snow about them still onthe mountain-sides and deep
in drifts upon the roads. The air wasmusical with the sound of innumerable freshets: they could be seenleaping and sparkling in the sunlight; the valleys below were green withthe young green of spring, and the winds were tempered with the warmthof Italy. A like change came upon the fugitives. They laughed, wherebefore they had wept; from under the seat they pulled out chickens whichMisset had cooked with his own hands at Nazareth, bottles of the wine ofSt. Laurent, and bread; and Wogan allowed a halt long enough to getwater from a spring by the roadside.
"There is no salt," said Gaydon.
"Indeed there is," replied Misset, indignant at the aspersion on hiscatering. "I have it in my tobacco-box." He took his tobacco-box fromhis pocket and passed it into the carriage. Clementina made sandwichesand passed them out to the horsemen. The chickens turned out to be oldcocks, impervious to the soundest tooth. No one minded except Misset,who had brought them. The jolts of the carriage became matter for ajest. They picnicked with the merriment of children, and finallyO'Toole, to show his contempt for the Emperor, fired off both his loadedpistols in the air.
At that Wogan's anxiety returned. He blazed up into anger. He thrust hishead from the window.
"Is this your respect for her Highness?" he cried. "Is this yourconsideration?"
"Nay," interposed Clementina, "you shall not chide my six feet four."
"But he is mad, your Highness. I don't say but what a trifle of madnessis salt to a man; but O'Toole's clean daft to be firing his pistols offto let the whole world know who we are. Here are we not six stages fromInnspruck, and already we have lost twelve hours."
"When?"
"Last night, before we left Innspruck, between the time when you escapedfrom the villa and when I joined you in the avenue. I climbed out of thewindow to descend as I had entered, but the sentinel had returned. Iwaited on the window-ledge crouched against the wall until he shouldshow me his back. After five minutes or so he did. He stamped on thesnow and marched up the lane. I let myself down and hung by my hands,but he turned on his beat before I could drop. He marched back; I clungto the ledge, thinking that in the darkness he would pass on beneath meand never notice. He did not notice; but my fingers were frozen andnumbed with the cold. I felt them slipping; I could cling no longer, andI fell. Luckily I fell just as he passed beneath me; I dropped feetforemost upon his shoulders, and he went down without a cry. I left himlying stunned there on the snow; but he will be found, or he willrecover. Either way our escape will be discovered, and no later thanthis morning. Nay, it must already have been discovered. AlreadyInnspruck's bells are ringing the alarm; already the pursuit isbegun--" and he leaned his head from the window and cried, "Faster!faster!" O'Toole, for his part, shouted, "Trinkgeldt!" It was the onlyword of German which he knew. "But," said he, "there was a Saracen ladyI learned about at school who travelled over Europe and found her loverin an alehouse in London, with no word but his name to help her over theroad. Sure, it would be a strange thing if I couldn't travel all overGermany with the help of 'Trinkgeldt.'"
The word certainly had its efficacy with the postillion. "Trinkgeldt!"cried O'Toole, and the berlin rocked and lurched and leaped down thepass. The snow was now less deep, the drifts fewer. The road wound alonga mountain-side: at one window rose the rock; from the other thetravellers looked down hundreds of feet to the bed of the valley and theboiling torrent of the Adige. It was a mere narrow ribbon of a road madeby the Romans, without a thought for the convenience of travellers in alater day; and as the carriage turned a corner, O'Toole, mounted on hishorse, saw ahead a heavy cart crawling up towards them. The carter sawthe berlin thundering down towards him behind its four maddened horses,and he drew his cart to the inside of the road against the rock. Thepostillion tugged at his reins; he had not sufficient interval of spaceto check his team; he threw a despairing glance at O'Toole. It seemedimpossible the berlin could pass. There was no use to cry out; O'Toolefell behind the carriage with his mind made up. He looked down theprecipice; he saw in his imagination the huge carriage with its tangled,struggling horses falling sheer into the foam of the river. He could notride back to Bologna with that story to tell; he and his horse must takethe same quick, steep road.
The postillion drove so close to the cart that he touched it as hepassed. "We are lost!" he shouted in an agony; and O'Toole saw the hindwheel of the berlin slip off the road and revolve for the fraction of asecond in the air. He was already putting his horse at the precipice asthough it was a ditch to be jumped, when the berlin made, to hisastonished eyes, an effort to recover its balance like a live thing. Itseemed to spring sideways from the brink of the precipice. It not onlyseemed, it did spring; and O'Toole, drawing rein, in the great revulsionof his feelings, saw, as he rocked unsteadily in his saddle, thecarriage tearing safe and unhurt down the very centre of the road.
O'Toole set his spurs to his horse and galloped after it. The postillionlooked back and laughed.
"Trinkgeldt!" he cried.
O'Toole swore loudly, and getting level beat him with his whip. Wogan'shead popped out of the window.
"Silence!" said he in a rage. "Mademoiselle is asleep;" and then seeingO'Toole's white and disordered face he asked, "What is it?" No one inthe coach had had a suspicion of their danger. But O'Toole still sawbefore his eyes that wheel slip over the precipice and revolve in air,he still felt his horse beneath him quiver and refuse this leap intoair. In broken tones he gasped out his story to Wogan, and as he spokethe Princess stirred.
"Hush!" said Wogan; "she need not know. Ride behind, O'Toole! Your blueeyes are green with terror. Your face will tell the story, if once shesees it."
O'Toole fell back again behind the carriage, and at four that afternoonthey stopped before the post-house at Brixen. They had crossed theBrenner in a storm of snow and howling winds; they had travelled tenleagues from Innspruck. Wogan called a halt of half an hour. ThePrincess had eaten barely a mouthful since her supper of the nightbefore. Wogan forced her to alight, forced her to eat a couple of eggs,and to drink a glass of wine. Before the half-hour had passed, she wasanxious to start again.
From Brixen the road was easier; and either from the smoothness of thetravelling or through some partial relief from his anxieties, Wogan, whohad kept awake so long, suddenly fell fast asleep, and when he woke upagain the night was come. He woke up without a start or even a movement,as was his habit, and sat silently and bitterly reproaching himself forthat he had yielded to fatigue. It was pitch-dark within the carriage;he stared through the window and saw dimly the moving mountain-side, andhere and there a clump of trees rush past. The steady breathing ofGaydon, on his left, and of Mrs. Misset in the corner opposite toGaydon, showed that those two guardians slept as well. His reproachesbecame more bitter and then suddenly ceased, for over against him in thedarkness a young, fresh voice was singing very sweetly and very low. Itwas the Princess Clementina, and she sang to herself, thinking all threeof her companions were asleep. Wogan had not caught the sound at firstabove the clatter of the wheels, and even now that he listened it cameintermittently to his ears. He heard enough, however, to know and torejoice that there was no melancholy in the music. The song had theclear bright thrill of the blackbird's note in June. Wogan listened,entranced. He would have given worlds to have written the song withwhich Clementina solaced herself in the darkness, to have composed themelody on which her voice rose and sank.
The carriage drew up at an inn; the horses were changed; the flight wasresumed. Wogan had not moved during this delay, neither had Misset norO'Toole come to the door. But an ostler had flashed a lantern into theberlin, and for a second the light had fallen upon Wogan's face andopen eyes. Clementina, however, did not cease; she sang on until thelights had been left behind and the darkness was about them. Then shestopped and said,--
"How long is it since you woke?"
Wogan was taken by surprise.
"I should never have slept at all," stammered he. "I promised myselfthat. Not a wink of sleep betwixt Innspruck and Italy; and here was Ifast as a l
og this side of Trent. I think our postillion sleeps too;"and letting down the window he quietly called Misset.
"We have fresh relays," said he, "and we travel at a snail's-pace."
"The relays are only fresh to us," returned Misset. "We can go nofaster. There is someone ahead with three stages' start of us,--someoneof importance, it would seem, and who travels with a retinue, for hetakes all the horses at each stage."
Wogan thrust his head out of the window. There was no doubt of it; thehorses lagged. In this hurried flight the most trifling hindrance was amonumental danger, and this was no trifling hindrance. For the hue andcry was most certainly raised behind them; the pursuit from Innspruckhad begun twelve hours since, on the most favourable reckoning. At anymoment they might hear the jingle of a horse's harness on the roadbehind. And now here was a man with a great retinue blocking their wayin front.
"We can do no more, but make a fight of it in the end," said he. "Theymay be few who follow us. But who is he ahead?"
Misset did not know.
"I can tell you," said Clementina, with a slight hesitation. "It is thePrince of Baden, and he travels to Italy."
Wogan remembered a certain letter which his King had written to him fromRome; and the hesitation in the girl's voice told him the rest of thestory. Wogan would have given much to have had his fingers about thescruff of that pompous gentleman's neck with the precipice handy at hisfeet. It was intolerable that the fellow should pester the Princess inprison and hinder her flight when she had escaped from it.
"Well, we can do no more," said he, and he drew up the window. NeitherGaydon nor Mrs. Misset were awakened; Clementina and Wogan were alone inthe darkness.
She leaned forward to him and said in a low voice,--
"Tell me of the King. I shall make mistakes in this new world. Will hehave patience with me while I learn?"
She had spoken upon the same strain in the darkness of the staircaseonly the night before. Wogan gently laughed her fears aside.
"I will tell you the truest thing about the King. He needs you at hisside. For all his friends, he is at heart a lonely man, throned uponsorrows. I dare to tell you that, knowing you. He needs not a merewife, but a mate, a helpmate, to strive with him, her hand in his. Everyman needs the helpmate, as I read the world. For it cannot but be that aman falls below himself when he comes home always to an empty room."
The Princess was silent. Wogan hoped that he had reassured her. But herthoughts were now turned from herself. She leaned yet further forwardwith her elbows upon her knees, and in a yet lower voice she asked aquestion which fairly startled him.
"Does she not love you?"
Wogan, indeed, had spoken unconsciously, with a deep note of sadness inhis voice, which had sounded all the more strange and sad to her fromits contrast with the quick, cheerful, vigorous tones she had come tothink the mark of him. He had spoken as though he looked forward with apoignant regret through a weary span of days, and saw himself always inyouth and middle years and age coming home always to an empty room.Therefore she put her question, and Wogan was taken off his guard.
"There is no one," he said in a flurry.
Clementina shook her head.
"I wish that I may hear the King speak so, and in that voice; I shall bevery sure he loves me," she said in a musing voice, and so changingalmost to a note of raillery. "Tell me her name!" she pleaded. "What isamiss with her that she is not thankful for a true man's love likeyours? Is she haughty? I'll bring her on her knees to you. Does shethink her birth sets her too high in the world? I'll show her so muchcontempt, you so much courtesy, that she shall fall from her arroganceand dote upon your steps. Perhaps she is too sure of your devotion? Why,then, I'll make her jealous!"
Wogan interrupted her, and the agitation of his voice put an end to herraillery. Somehow she had wounded him who had done so much for her.
"Madam, I beg you to believe me, there is no one;" and casting about fora sure argument to dispel her conjectures, he said on an impulse,"Listen; I will make your Highness a confidence." He stopped, to makesure that Gaydon and Mrs. Misset were still asleep. Then he laugheduneasily like a man that is half-ashamed and resumed,--"I am lord andking of a city of dreams. Here's the opening of a fairy tale, you willsay. But when I am asleep my city's very real; and even now that I amawake I could draw you a map of it, though I could not name its streets.That's my town's one blemish. Its streets are nameless. It has taken along while in the building, ever since my boyhood; and indeed the work'snot finished yet, nor do I think it ever will be finished till I die,since my brain's its architect. When I was asleep but now, I discovereda new villa, and an avenue of trees, and a tavern with red blinds whichI had never remarked before. At the first there was nothing but a queerwhite house of which the original has fallen to ruins at Rathcoffey inIreland. This house stood alone in a wide flat emerald plain thatstretched like an untravelled sea to a circle of curving sky. There wasroom to build, you see, and when I left Rathcoffey and became awanderer, the building went on apace. There are dark lanes there fromAvignon between great frowning houses, narrow climbing streets fromMeran, arcades from Verona, and a park of many thickets and tallpoplar-trees with a long silver stretch of water. One day you will seethat park from the windows of St. James. It has a wall too, my city,--around wall enclosing it within a perfect circle; and from whateverquarter of the plain you come towards it, you only see this wall,there's not so much as a chimney visible above it. Once you have crowdedwith the caravans and traders through the gates,--for my town isbusy,--you are at once in the ringing streets. I think my architect inthat took Aigues Mortes for his model. Outside you have the flat, silentplain, across which the merchants creep in long trailing lines, withinthe noise of markets, the tramp of horses' hoofs, the talk of men andwomen, and, if you listen hard, the whispers, too, of lovers. Oh, mycity's populous! There are quiet alleys with windows opening onto them,where on summer nights you may see a young girl's face with themoonlight on it like a glory, and in the shadow of the wall beneath, thecloaked figure of a youth. Well, I have a notion--" and then he brokeoff abruptly. "There's a black horse I own, my favourite horse."
"You rode it the first time you came to Ohlau," said the Princess.
"Do you indeed remember that?" cried Wogan, with so much pleasure thatGaydon stirred in his corner, and Clementina said, "Hush!"
Wogan waited in a suspense lest Gaydon should wake up, which, to besure, would be the most inconsiderate thing in the world. Gaydon,however, settled himself more comfortably, and in a little his regularbreathing might be heard again.
"Well," resumed Wogan, "I have a notion that the lady I shall marry willcome riding some sunrise on my black horse across the plain and into mycity of dreams. And she has not."
"Ah," said Clementina, "here's a subterfuge, my friend. The lady youshall marry, you say. But tell me this! Has the lady you love ridden onyour black horse into your city of dreams?"
"No," said Wogan; "for there is no lady whom I love." There Wogan shouldhave ended, but he added rather sadly, "Nor is there like to be."
"Then I am sure," said Clementina.
"Sure that I speak truth?"
"No, sure that you mislead me. It is not kind; for here perhaps I mightgive you some small token of my gratitude, would you but let me. Oh, itis no matter. I shall find out who the lady is. You need not doubt it. Ishall set my wits and eyes to work. There shall be marriages when I amQueen. I will find out!"
Wogan's face was not visible in the darkness; but he spoke quickly andin a startled voice,--
"That you must never do. Promise that you never will! Promise me thatyou will never try;" and again Gaydon stirred in his corner.
Clementina made no answer to the passionate words. She did not promise,but she drew a breath, and then from head to foot she shivered. Wogandared not repeat his plea for a promise, but he felt that though she hadnot given it, none the less she would keep it. They sat for awhilesilent. Then Clementina came back to her first question.
r /> "Tell me of the King," she said very softly. And as the carriage rolleddown the mountain valley through the night and its wheels struck flashesof fire from the stones, Wogan drew a picture for her of the man she wasto marry. It was a relief to him to escape from the dangerous talk ofthe last hour, and he spoke fervently. The poet in him had always beensensitive to the glamour of that wandering Prince; he had hiscountrymen's instinctive devotion for a failing cause. This was nosuitable moment for dwelling upon the defects and weaknesses. Wogan toldher the story of the campaign in Scotland, of the year's residence inAvignon. He spoke most burningly. A girl would no doubt like to hear ofher love's achievements; and if James Stuart had not so many to his nameas a man could wish, that was merely because chance had served him ill.So a fair tale was told, not to be found in any history book, of anight attack in Scotland and how the Chevalier de St. George, surprisedand already to all purposes a prisoner, forced a way alone through ninegrenadiers with loaded muskets and escaped over the roof-tops. It was agood breathless story as he told it, and he had just come to an end ofit when the carriage drove through the village of Wellishmile andstopped at the posting-house. Wogan opened the door and shook Gaydon bythe shoulder.
"Let us try if we can get stronger horses here," said he, and he gotout. Gaydon woke up with surprising alacrity.
"I must have fallen asleep," said he. "I beseech your Highness'sforgiveness; I have slept this long while." It was no business of his ifWogan chose to attribute his own escape from Newgate as an exploit ofthe King's. The story was a familiar one at Bologna, whither they werehurrying; it was sufficiently known that Charles Wogan was its hero. Allthis was Wogan's business, not Gaydon's. Nor had Gaydon anything to dowith any city of dreams or with any lady that might ride into it, orwith any black horse that chanced to carry her. Poets no doubt talkedthat way. It was their business. Gaydon was not sorry that he had sleptso heartily through those last stages. He got down from the carriage andmet Wogan coming from the inn with a face of dismay.
"We are stopped here. There is no help for it. We have gained on thePrince of Baden, who is no more than two stages ahead. The relays whichcarried him from here to the next stage have only this instant comeback. They are too tired to move. So we must stay until they arerefreshed. And we are still three posts this side of Trent!" he cried."I would not mind were Trent behind us. But there's no help for it. Ihave hired a room where the Countess and her niece can sleep until suchtime as we can start."
Clementina and Mrs. Misset descended and supped in company with Gaydonand Wogan, while Misset and O'Toole waited upon them as servants. It wasa silent sort of supper, very different from the meal they had made thatmorning. For though the fare was better, it lacked the exhilaration.This delay weighed heavily upon them all. For the country was now for asure thing raised behind them, and if they had gained on the Prince ofBaden, their pursuers had no less certainly gained on them.
"Would we were t'other side of Trent!" exclaimed Wogan; and looking uphe saw that Clementina was watching him with a strange intentness. Hereyes were on him again while they sat at supper; and when he led her tothe door of her room and she gave him her hand, she stood for a littlewhile looking deep into his eyes. And though she had much need of sleep,when she had got into the room and the door was closed behind her, sheremained staring at the logs of the fire.
For she knew his secret, and to her eyes he was now another man. Before,Wogan was the untiring servant, the unflinching friend; now he was theman who loved her. The risks he had run, his journeyings, his unswervingconfidence in the result, his laborious days and nights of preparation,and the swift execution,--love as well as service claimed a share inthese. He was changed for ever to her eyes; she knew his secret. Therewas the cloud no bigger than a man's hand. For she must needs think overall that he had said and done by the new light the secret shed. When didhe first begin to care? Why? She recalled his first visit long ago toOhlau, when he rode across the park on his black horse charged with hismomentous errand. She had been standing, she remembered, before theblazing log-fire in the great stone hall, much as she was standing now.Great changes had come since then. She was James Stuart's chosenwife--and this man loved her. He had no hope of any reward; he desiredeven that she should not know. She should no doubt have been properlysorry and compassionate, but she was a girl simple and frank. To beloved by a man who could so endure and strive and ask no guerdon,--thatlifted her. She thought the more worthily of herself because he lovedher. She was raised thereby. She could not be sorry; her blood pulsed,her heart sang, the starry eyes shone with a brighter light. He lovedher. She knew his secret. A little clock chimed the hour upon themantel-shelf, and lifting her eyes she saw that just twenty-four hourshad passed since she had driven out of Innspruck up the Brenner.
As she got into bed a horse galloped up to the inn and stopped. Sheremembered that she had not ridden on his black horse out of the sunriseacross the plain. He loved her, and since he loved her, surely--She fellasleep puzzled and wondering why. She was waked up some two hoursafterwards by a rapping on the door, and she grew hot and she recognisedWogan's voice cautiously whispering to her to rise with all speed. Forin her dreams from which she had wakened, she had ridden across the flatgreen plain into the round city of dreams.