Part 25 (1/2)

She ran to him, holding out both hands, like a child who asks indulgence. ”If I can explain,” she said, with quickening breath, her eyes s.h.i.+ning, star-like, ”if I tell you that it is quite, quite a mistake, that there was no thought of harm in my coming to this house, that I am true to all you thought me, to all I _hope_ you thought me, will you believe my word?”

Maximilian looked her in the eyes and straightway forgot that he and she were not alone. And the Chancellor saw that he forgot, and wished much to remind him of many things connected with his own presence. But even he dared not speak at that instant, and had to listen, biting his lip with a well-preserved tooth.

”Believe your word!” the Emperor echoed slowly. He would have said, ”Why should I believe it, when it is enough that I believe my eyes?”

But he was gazing into hers, and so he could not say it. No other woman's eyes had ever before had power to play tricks with his will, therefore he was the more ready to fall under the spell of hers. ”I must believe it!” he p.r.o.nounced. ”It is death to doubt you. Tell me you are all I thought you, show me how it can be so, and I will believe in spite of everything.”

”Your Majesty!” groaned the Chancellor. But His Majesty did not hear.

It was the Prince who drowned the warning.

”Oh, come!” he exclaimed; ”this is going farther than I bargained for.

I can't stand all this talk about doubting and proving. The whole thing----”

”Is for me to explain, not you,” broke in Sylvia. ”It is my right. I will not have it taken from me. Maximilian, last night you said that you cared for me, or--this would never have happened. A few moments ago you asked if the Prince's hunting-lodge were a fit place for me to remind you of that, and I answered yes. It was not time to tell you why, then, but it is time now. I said that this was the proper place, because it is my brother's house, and if we are ever to be anything to one another, it is fitting that my brother should put my hand in yours.”

”At last, then, I can introduce my sister, Princess Sylvia of Eltzburg-Neuwald,” e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the Crown Prince of Abruzzia, with a sigh of overwhelming relief.

For a moment n.o.body spoke. The room seemed to ring with Friedrich's words, with the name which, till now, had held so little music for Maximilian's ears. He heard it and was speechless, even as the Chancellor was speech less. He looked at Friedrich, as if he would have spoken; he looked at Sylvia, and forgot to speak. She held out her hands once more, and with an impulse which he did not strive to control, he went down upon one knee as he caught and kissed them.

Long ago she had vowed that he should bend the knee to her, if he were to win her; but now that the prophecy proved true, she bade him rise as he whispered the one word ”Forgive!”

”Oh, it is I who must be forgiven!” she said, with tears instead of triumph in her voice. ”You don't half understand yet.”

Friedrich and Count von Markstein stole from the room and were not missed. Their parts were played.