Part 59 (1/2)

But when the representatives of the cities of the Princedom, and the delegates from Thorn and the Mark, had been received with due honor, the Prince bade his Chancellor recount all he had learned from my father, and all that he had discovered in the archives of Pla.s.senburg.

Then, when Dessauer had finished, Karl the Prince arose.

”I am,” he said, ”a plain, brusque man. And speech was never my stronghold. But this I say. When Karl the Miller's Son goes the way of King's son and beggar's son, it is his will that Helene, legitimate Princess of Pla.s.senburg, shall reign over you. And also that her husband, Hugo, who, as you know, won her from dreadful death, shall stand by her right hand.”

Then the n.o.bles and great lords, fearing the Prince, and perhaps also envying a little the man who was the Prince's general of his armies, shouted amain:

”We swear to obey the Princess Helena!”

Whereat uprose the Little Playmate, very princess-like and full of sweet regal dignity.

”I thank you, n.o.ble Prince,” she said. ”I am glad that I can claim so honorable a name and lineage; but I had rather be no Princess, nor anything else than that which my husband hath made me--the wife of the captain-general of the armies of Karl, the only true and n.o.ble Prince of Pla.s.senburg!”

Then the Prince rose and clasped her in his arms, kissing her fondly on both cheeks.

”Fear not,” he said, ”dear and loyal lady. If you live to be the Princess, your goodman shall be the Prince. Never shall the gray mare flaunt it first, in Pla.s.senburg!”

And he gave us each a hand, and conducted us to a pair of seats which had been set level with his on the platform of the Council-chamber of the Princedom.

The Prince Karl lived many days after the winning of the Wolfmark and the ending of the ducal Wolves. But he gave less and less care to the regalities, leaving them even more completely to me, sitting mostly in the pleasaunce by the river-side, or in the far-regarding room which had been the Lady Ysolinde's.

Also he never looked again on the face of a woman--except as it might be to bid them good-day--save on that of my wife, Helene, who, as you who know her may guess, waxed but the sweeter and the fairer as the years went by.

And the blessing of children came to us, and in this thing the Prince Karl was even happier than we.