Madame, like a statue of expectancy, riveted her gaze on the throne. Hers at last! Her dreams were realized. She was no longer a duchess by patent; she was a queen by right of inheritance; she was now to be a power among the great. The kingdom of her forefathers was hers. She had reached the goal without bloodshed; she had been patient, and this was her reward. The blaze of her ambition dimmed all other stars. Her bosom heaved, triumph flashed in her beautiful eyes, and a smile parted her lips. Her first thought had been to establish headquarters in the parlors of the Continental Hotel, and from there to summon the archbishop, as a conqueror summons the chief of the vanquished. But no; she could not wait; above all things she desired the satisfaction of the eye. The throne of her forefathers!
“Mine!” she murmured.
Over her shoulders peered eager faces, in which greed and pleasure and impassibility were written. One face, however, had on it the dull red of shame. Not until now did the full force of his intended dishonesty come home to the Englishman; not until now did he realize the complete degradation to which his uniform had lowered him. His had been the hand to stay this misfortune, and he had not lifted it. This king had been his father's friend; and he had taken up arms against him. O, he had begun life badly; he was making the end still more dismal. Would this woman ever be his? Her promises were not worth the air that had carried them to his ear. He, the consort of a queen? A cold sweat dampened his forehead. How he loved her! And that kiss.... Queen or not, he would not be her dupe, his would not be a tame surrender.
From the Platz and the Park, where the two armies had bivouacked, came an intermittent cheering. The flames of bonfires were reflected on the windows, throwing out in dull, yellow relief the faces of Madame and her staff.
Between the private apartments of the king and the throne room was a wide sliding door. Suddenly this opened and closed. With his back against it, a pistol in one hand and a saber in the other, stood Captain von Mitter, his face cold and resolute. All eyes were instantly directed toward him.
“Captain,” said Madame, imperiously, “summon to me Monseigneur the archbishop!”
Her command fell on ears of stone. Von Mitter made no sign that he heard her.
“Take care, Monsieur,” she warned; “I am mistress here. If you will not obey me, my officers will.”
“Madame, I acknowledge no mistress save the daughter of the king. No one shall pass this door to announce your presence to Monseigneur.”
This reply was greeted with sundry noises, such as sabers coming from scabbards, clicking of pistol locks, and the moving of feet. Madame put out her hand suggestively, and the noise ceased. Von Mitter smiled disdainfully, but did not stir.
“I warn you, Madame,” he said, “that this is war. I accept all the responsibilities of my position. I know nothing of any surrender or victory. To me you are simply an enemy. I will kill any one who attempts to pass. I should be pleased if General Kronau would make the first step to question my sincerity.”
Kronau's fingers twitched around his revolver, but Madame touched his arm. She could read faces. The young Captain was in earnest. She would temporize.
“Captain, all here are prisoners of war,” she said. “Do not forget that soon there will be benefits for those who serve me.”
He laughed rudely. “I ask no benefits from your hands, Madame. I would rather stand on the corner and beg.” He sent an insolent, contemptuous glance at Kronau, who could not support it. “And now that you have gratified your curiosity, I beg you to withdraw to the street. To-night this palace is a tomb, and woe to those who commit sacrilege.”
“The king?” she said, struck by a thought which caused a red spot to appear on each cheek.
“Is dead. Go and leave us in peace.”
The wine which had tasted so sweet was full of lees, and the cup wormwood. Madame looked down, while her officers moved uneasily and glanced over their shoulders. Kronau brushed his forehead, to find it wet. Madame regretted the surrendering to the impulse. Her haste to triumph was lacking both in dignity and judgment. She had given the king so little place in her thoughts that the shock of his death confused her. And there was something in the calm, fearless contempt of the young soldier which embarrassed her.
“In that case, Captain,” she said, her voice uncertain and constrained, “bid Monseigneur to wait on me at the Continental.”
“Whenever that becomes convenient, Madame, Monseigneur will certainly confer with you and your rascally pack of officers.” He longed for some one to spring at him; he longed to strike a blow in earnest.
As he leaned against the door he felt it move. He stepped aside. The door rolled back, and her Royal Highness, the archbishop and the chancellor passed in. The princess's eyes were like dim stars, but her fine nostrils palpitated, and her mouth was rigid in disdain. The chancellor looked haggard and dispirited, and he eyed all with the listlessness of a man who has given up hope. The prelate's face was as finely drawn as an ancient cameo, and as immobile. He gazed at Madame with one of those looks which penetrate like acid; and, brave as she was, she found it insupportable. There was a tableau of short duration.
“Madame,” said her Royal Highness, with a noble scorn, “what would you say if one desecrated your father's tomb while you were kneeling beside it? What would you say? In yonder room my father lies dead, and your presence here, in whatever role, is an insult. Are you, indeed, a woman? Have you no respect for death and sorrow? Was the bauble so precious to your sight that you could not wait till the last rites were paid to the dead? Is your heart of stone, your mind devoid of pity and of conscience? Are you lacking in magnanimity, which is the disposition of great souls? Ah, Madame, you will never be great, for you have stooped to treachery and deceit. You, a princess! You have purchased with glittering promises that which in time would have been given to you. And you will not fulfill these promises, for honesty has no part in your affair. Shame on you, Madame. By dishonorable means you have gained this room. By dishonorable means you destroyed all those props on which my father leaned. You knew that he had not long to live. Had you come to me as a woman; had you opened your heart to me and confided your desires—Ah, Madame, how gladly would I have listened. Whatever it signifies to you, this throne is nothing to me. Had you come then—but, no! you must come to demand your rights when I am defenseless. You must come with a sword when there is none to defend. Is it possible that in our veins there runs a kindred blood? And yet, Madame, I forgive you. Rule here, if you will; but remember, between you and your crown there will always be the shadow of disgrace. Monsieur,” turning toward Fitzgerald, whose shame was so great that it engulfed him, “your father and mine were friends—I forgive you. Now, Madame, I pray you, go, and leave me with my dead.”
The girlhood of Princess Alexia was gone forever.
To Madame this rebuke was like hot iron on the flesh. It left her without answer. Her proud spirit writhed. Before those innocent eyes her soul lay bare, offering to the gaze an ineffaceable scar. For the first time she saw her schemes in their true light. Had any served her unselfishly? Aye, there was one. And strangely enough, the first thought which formed in her mind when chaos was passed, was of him.
How would this rebuke affect her in his eyes? What was he to her that she cared for his respect, his opinion, good or bad? What was the meaning of the secret dread? How she hated him for his honesty to her; for now perforce she must look up to him. She had stepped down from the pinnacle of her pride to which she might never again ascend. He had kissed her. How she hated him! And yet... Ah, the wine was flat, tinctured with the bitterness of gall, and her own greed had forced the cup to her lips. She could not remain silent before this girl; she must reply; her shame was too deep to resolve itself into silence.
“Mademoiselle,” she said, “I beg of you to accept my sympathies; but the fortunes of war—”
“Ah, Madame,” interrupted the prelate, lifting his white, attenuated hand, “we will discuss the fortunes of war—later.”
Madame choked back the sudden gust of rage. She glanced covertly at the Englishman. But he, with wide-astonished eyes, was staring at the foot of the throne, from which gradually rose a terrible figure, covered with blood and caked with drying clay. The figure leaned heavily on the hilt of a saber, and swayed unsteadily. He drew all eyes.
“Ha!” he said, with a prolonged, sardonic intonation, “is that you, Madame the duchess? You are talking of war? What! and you, my lord the Englishman? Ha! and war? Look at me, Madame; I have been in a battle, the only one fought to-day. Look at me! Here is the mark of that friend who watched over your interests. But where is he? Eh? Where? Did you pick him up on the way?.... He is dead. For all that he was a rascal, he died like a man... .. as presently I shall die! Princes and kings and thrones; the one die and the other crumble, but truth lives on. And you, Madame, have learned the truth. Shame on your mean and little souls! There was only one honest man among you, and you dishonored him. The Marshal... I do not see him. An honest man dies but once, but a traitor dies a thousand deaths. Kronau... is that your name? It was an honest one once. And the paltry ends you gain!.... The grand duchess of Gerolstein!.... What a comic opera! Not even music to go by! Eh, you,—you Englishman, has Madame made you a Lieutenant?—a Captain?—a General? What a farce! Nobles, you? I laugh at you all for a pack of thieves, who are not content with the purse, but must add honor to the bag. A man is what he makes himself. Medals and clothes, medals and clothes; that is the sum of your nobility!” He laughed, but the laughter choked in his throat, and he staggered a few paces away from the throne.
“Seize him!” cried Madame.
When the men sprang forward to execute this command, Fitzgerald barred the way.
“No,” he said doggedly; “you shall not touch him.”
“Stand aside, Monsieur,” said Madame, determined to vent her rage on some one.
“Madame,” said von Mitter, “I will shoot down the first man who lays a hand on Monsieur Carewe.”
The princess, her heart beating wildly at the sudden knowledge that lay written on the inner vision, a faintness stealing away her sight, leaned back against the prelate.
“He is dying,” she whispered; “he is dying for me!”
Maurice was now in the grasp of the final delirium. “Come on!” he cried; “come on! I will show you how a brave man can die. Come on, Messieurs Medals and Clothes! Aye, who will go out with me?” He raised the saber, and it caught the flickering light as it trailed a circle above his head. He stumbled toward them, sweeping the air with the blade. Suddenly there came a change. He stopped. The wild expression faded from his face; a surprised look came instead. The saber slipped from his fingers and clanged on the floor. He turned and looked at the princess, and that glance conveyed to her the burden of his love. “Mademoiselle....” His knees doubled, he sank, rolled face downward, and a dark stain appeared and widened on the marble floor.
“Go, Madame,” said the prelate. “This palace is indeed a tomb.” He felt the princess grow limp on his arm. “Go.”
“Maurice!” cried Fitzgerald, springing to the side of the fallen man. “My God! Maurice!”
Madame, surrounded by her staff and courtiers, sat in the main salon of the Continental Hotel, waiting for the archbishop. The false, self-seeking ministers of Leopold's reign crowded around her to pay their respects, to compliment and to flatter her. Already they saw a brilliant court; already they were speculating on their appointments. Offices were plenty; new embassies were to be created, old embassies to be filled anew.
Madame listened to all coldly. There was a canker in her heart, and no one who saw that calm, beautiful face of hers dreamed how deeply the canker was eating. There were two men who held aloof from compliments and flattery. On the face of one rested a moody scowl; on the other, agony and remorse. These two men were Colonel Mollendorf and Lord Fitzgerald. The same thought occupied each mind; the scene in the throne room.
Presently an orderly announced: “Monseigneur the archbishop.”
Madame arose, and all looked expectantly, toward the door.
The old prelate entered, his head high and his step firm. He appeared to see no one but Madame. But this time she met his glance without a tremor.
“Monseigneur,” she began, “I have come into my own at last. But for you and your ambitious schemes, all this would not have come to pass. You robbed my father of his throne and set your puppet there instead. By trickery my father was robbed of his lawful inheritance. By trickery I was compelled to regain it. However, I do not wish to make an enemy of you, Monseigneur. I have here two letters. They come from Rome. In one is your recall, in the other a cardinal's hat. Which do you prefer?”
“Surely not the cardinal's hat,” said the prelate. “Listen to me, Madame, for I have something to say to you which will cause you some reflection. If I had any ambitions, they are gone; if I had any dreams, they have vanished. Madame, some twenty years ago your duchy was created. It was not done to please Albrecht's younger brother, the duke, your father. Albrecht was childless. When your father was given the duchy it was done to exclude forever the house of Auersperg from reigning on this throne. You say that you were tricked; well, and so was I. Unhappily I touched the deeper current too late.
“This poor king, who lies silent in the palace, was not my puppet. I wished to make him great, and bask in his greatness. But in that I failed; because Leopold was a poet and a philosopher, and the greatness of earthly things did not concern him. Leopold and I were dupes of Austria, as you are at this moment, Madame. So long as Leopold reigned peacefully he was not to be disturbed. Had you shown patience and resignation, doubtless to-day you would be a queen. You will never be more than a duchess.
“Madame, you have done exactly as Austria intended you should. There is no longer any kingdom.” There was a subdued triumph in his eyes. “To you,” with a gesture toward the courtiers and office-seekers, “to you I shall say, your own blind self-interest has destroyed you. Madame, you are bearing arms not against this kingdom, but against Austria, since from to-day this land becomes the property of the imperial crown. If you struggle, it will be futilely. For, by this move of yours, Austria will declare that this kingdom is a menace to the tranquility of the confederation. Madame, there is no corner-stone to your edifice. This is what I wished to say to you. I have done. Permit me to withdraw.”
For a moment his auditors were spellbound; then all the emotions of the mind and heart portrayed themselves on the circle of faces. Madame's face alone was inscrutable.
“His Excellency, the Austrian ambassador!” announced the orderly.
The archbishop bowed and left the apartment.
“Your Highness,” began the Austrian, “his Imperial Majesty commands your immediate evacuation of Bleiberg, and that you delay not your departure to the frontier. This kingdom is a crown land. It shall remain so by the consent of the confederation. If you refuse to obey this injunction, an army will enforce the order. Believe me, Madame, this office is distasteful to me, but it was not avoidable. What disposition am I to submit to his Majesty?”
“Monsieur,” she said, “I am without choice in the matter. To pit my forces against the emperor's would be neither politic nor sensible. I submit.” There was not a sign of any emotion, no hint of the terrible wrath which lay below the surface of those politely modulated tones. But it seemed to her as she stood there, the object of all eyes, that some part of her soul had died. Her pride surmounted the humiliation, the pride of a woman and a princess. She would show no weakness to the world.
“Then, Madame,” said the ambassador, suppressing the admiration in his eyes at this evidence of royal nonchalance, “I shall inform his Majesty at once.”
When he had gone, Madame turned coldly to her stricken followers. “Messieurs, the fortunes of war are not on our side. I thank you for your services. Now leave me; I wish to be alone.”
One by one they filed out into the corridors. The orderly was the last to leave, and he closed the door behind him. Madame surveyed the room. All the curtains were drawn. She was alone. She stood idly fingering the papers which lay scattered on the table. Suddenly she lifted her hands above her head and clenched them in a burst of silent rage. A dupe! doubly a dupe! To-morrow the whole world would laugh at her, and she was without means of wreaking vengeance. Presently the woman rose above the princess. She sat down, laid her face on her arms and wept.
Fitzgerald stepped from behind one of the curtains. He had taken refuge there during the archbishop's speech. He had not the strength to witness the final humiliation of the woman he loved. He was gazing out of the window at the troops in the Platz when the door closed.
Madame heard the rustle of the curtain and looked up. She sprang to her feet, her eyes blazing.
“You?” she cried. “You? You have dared to hide that you might witness my weakness and my tears? You....”
“Madame!”
“Go! I hate you!”
“Ah, Madame, we always hate those whom we have wronged. Do not forget that I love you, with a love that passes convention.”
“Monsieur, I am yet a princess. Did you not hear me bid you go?”
“Why?” in a voice singularly free from agitation. “Because I am the only man who has served you unselfishly? Is that the reason, Madame? You have laughed at me. I love you. You have broken me. I love you. I can never look an honest man in the face again. I love you. Though the shade of my father should rise to accuse me, still would I say that I love you. Madame, will you find another love like mine, the first love of a man who will know no second? Forgive me if I rejoice in your despair, for your despair is my hope. As a queen you would be too far away; but in your misfortune you come so near! Madame, I shall follow you wherever you go to tell you that I love you. You will never be able to shut your ears to my voice; far or near, you will always hear me saying that I love you. Ambition soars but a little way; love has no fetters. Madame, your lips were given to me. Can you forget that?”
“Monsieur, what do you wish?” subdued by the fervor of his tones.
“You! nothing in the world but you.”
“Princesses such as I am do not wed for love. What! you take advantage of my misfortune, the shattering of my dreams, to force your love upon me?”
“Madame,” the pride of his race lighting his eyes, “confess to me that you did not win my love to play with it. If my heart was necessary to your happiness, which lay in these shattered dreams, tell me, and I will go. My love is so great that it does not lack generosity.”
For reply she sorted the papers and extended a blood-stained packet toward him. “Here, Monsieur, are your consols.” But the moment his hand touched them, she made as though to take them back. On the top of the packet was the letter she had written to him, and on which he had written his scornful reply to her. She paled as she saw him unfold it.
“So, Madame, my love was a pastime?” He came close to her, and his look was like an invisible hand bearing down on her. “Madame, I will go.”
“No, no!” she cried, yielding to the impulse which suddenly laid hold of her. “Not you! You shall not misjudge me. No, not you! Those consols were given to me by the woman of your guide, Kopf, who found them no one knows how. They were given to me this morning. That letter..... I did not intend that you should see it. No, Monsieur; you shall not misjudge the woman, however you judge the princess. Forgive me, it was not the woman who sought your love; it was the princess who had need of it.
“I thought it would be but a passing fancy. I did not dream of this end. To-morrow I shall be laughed at, and I cannot defend myself as a man can. I must submit; I must smile and cover my chagrin. O, Monsieur, do not speak to me of love; there is nothing in my heart but rage and bitterness. To stoop as I have stooped, and in vain! I am defeated; I must remain passive; like a whipped child I am driven away. Talk not of love to me. I am without illusion.” She fell to weeping, and to him she was lovelier in her tears than ever in her smiles. For would she have shown this weakness to any but himself, and was it not a sign that he was not wholly indifferent to her?
“Madame, what is it?” he cried, on his knees before her. “What is it? Do you wish a crown? Find me a kingdom, and I will buy it for you. Be mine, and woe to those who dare to laugh! Ah, could I but convince you that love is above crowns and kingdoms, the only glimpse we have on earth of Paradise. There is no boundary to the dreams; no horizons; a vast, beautiful wilderness, and you and I together. There are no storms, no clouds. Ambition, the god of schemes, finds no entrance. Ah, how I love you! Your face is ever before me, waking or sleeping. All thoughts are merged into one, and that is of you. Self has dropped out of my existence. Forget that you are a princess; remember only that you are a woman, and that I love you.”
Love has the key to eloquence. Madame forgot her vanished dreams; the bitterness in her heart subsided. That mysterious, indefinable thrill, which every woman experiences when a boundless love is laid at her feet, passed through her, leaving her sensible to a delicious languor. This man was strong in himself, yet weak before her, and from his weakness she gained a visible strength. Convention was nothing to him; that she was of royal blood was still less. What other man would have dared her wrath as he had done?
Nobility, she thought, was based on the observance of certain laws. Around the central star were lesser stars, from which the central star drew its radiance. Whenever one of these stars deviates from its orbit, the glory of the central star is diminished. To accept the love of the Englishman would be a blow to the pride of Austria. She smiled.
“Monsieur,” she said, in a hesitating voice, “Monsieur, I am indeed a woman. You ask me if I can forget that I offered you my lips? No. Nor do I wish to. Why did I permit you to kiss me? I do not know. I could not analyze the impulse if I tried. Monsieur, I am a woman who demands much from those who serve her. I am capricious; my moods vary; I am unfamiliar with sentiment; I hate oftener than I love. Listen. There is a canker in my heart, made there by vanity. When it heals—well—mayhap you will find the woman you desire. Mind you, I make no promises. Follow me, if you will, but have patience; love me if you must, but in silence;” and with a gesture which was not without a certain fondness, she laid her hand upon his head.
Into the princess's own chamber they carried Maurice, and laid him on the white bed. Thus would she have it. No young man had ever before entered that sacred chapel of her maiden dreams. Beside the bed was a small prie-dieu; and she knelt upon the cushion and rested her brow against the crucifix. The archbishop covered his eyes, and the state physician bent his head. Chastity and innocence at the feet of God; yet, not even these can hold back the fleeting breath of life. She asked God to forgive her the bitterness in her heart; she prayed for strength to repel the weakness in her limbs. Presently she rose, an angelic sweetness on her face. She looked down at Maurice; there was no sign of life, save in the fitful drawing in of the nether lip. She dampened a cloth and wiped the sweat of agony from the marble brow.
“O, if only he might live!” she cried. “And he will not?”
“No, your Highness,” said the physician. “He has perhaps an hour. Extraordinary vitality alone is the cause of his living so long. He has lost nearly all the blood in his body. It was a frightful wound. He is dying, but he may return to consciousness before the end.”
The archbishop, with somber eyes, contemplated the pale, handsome face, which lay motionless against the pillow. His thoughts flew back to his own youth, to the long years which had filled the gap between. Friends had come and gone, loved ones vanished; and still he stood, like an oak in the heart of a devastated forest, alone. Why had he been spared, and to what end? Ah, how old he was, how very old! To live beyond the allotted time, was not that a punishment for some transgression? His eyes shone through a mist of tears.
The princess, too, contemplated the face of the dying man. How many times had that face accompanied her in her dreams! How familiar she was with every line of it, the lips, that turned inward when they smiled; the certain lock of hair that fell upon the forehead! And yet, she had seen the face in reality less than half a dozen times. Why had it entered so persistently into her dreams? Why had the flush risen to her cheeks at the thought? At another time she would have refused to listen to the voice which answered; but now, as the object of her thoughts lay dying on her pillow, her mind would not play truant to her heart. Sometimes the approach of love is so imperceptible that it does not provoke analysis. We wake suddenly to find it in our hearts, so strong and splendid that we submit without question.... All, all her dreams had vanished, the latest and the fairest. Across the azure of her youth had come and gone a vague, beautiful flash of love. The door of earthly paradise had opened and closed. That delicate string which vibrates with the joy of living seemed parted; her heart was broken, and her young breast a tomb. With straining eyes she continued to gaze. The invisible arms of her love clasped Maurice to her heart and held him there. Only that day he had stood before her, a delight to the eye; and she had given him her hand to kiss. How bravely he had gone forth from the city! She had followed him with her ardent gaze until he was no longer to be seen. And now he lay dying.... for her.
“Monsieur,” she said, turning to the physician, “I have something to say to Monseigneur.”
The physician bowed and passed into the boudoir, the door of which he closed.
“Father,” she said to the prelate, “I have no secrets from you.” She pointed to Maurice. “I love him. I know not why. He comes from a foreign land; his language nor his people are mine, and yet the thought of him has filled my soul. I have talked to him but four different times; and yet I love him. Why? I can not tell. The mind has no power to rule the impulse of love. Were he to live, perhaps my love would be a sin. Is it not strange, father, that I love him? I have lost parental love; I am losing a love a woman holds priceless above all others. He is dying because of me. He loves me. I read it in his eyes just before he fell. Perhaps it is better for him and for me that he should die, for if he lived I could not live without him. Father, do I sin?”
“No, my child,” and the prelate closed his eyes.
“I have been so lonely,” she said, “so alone. I craved the love of the young. He was so different from any man I had met before. His bright, handsome face seemed constantly with me.”
At this moment Maurice's breast rose and fell in a long sigh. Presently the lids of his eyes rolled upward. Consciousness had returned. His wandering gaze first encountered the sad, austere visage of the prelate.
“Monseigneur?” he said, faintly.
“Do you wish absolution, my son?”
“I am dying...?”
“Yes.”
“I am dying.... God has my account and he will judge it. I am not a Catholic, Monseigneur.” He turned his head. “Your Highness?” He roved about the room with his eyes and discerned the feminine touch in all the appointments.
“Where am I?”
“You are in my room, Monsieur,” she said. Her voice broke, but she met his eyes with a brave smile. “Is there anything we can do for you?”
“Nothing. I am alone. To die.... Well, one time or another. And yet, it is a beautiful world, when we but learn it, full of color and life and love. I am young; I do not wish to die. And now... even in the midst... to go... where? Monseigneur, I am dying; to me princes and kings signify nothing. That is not to say that they ever did. In the presence of death we are all equal. Living, I might not speak; dying... since I have but a little while to stay... I may speak?”
“Yes, my son, speak. Her Highness will listen.”
“It is to her Highness that I wish to speak.”
Her lips quivered and she made no secret of her tears. “What is it you wish to say to me, Monsieur Carewe?” She smoothed his forehead, and the touch of her hand made him forget his pain.
“Ah, I know not how to begin,” he said. “Forgive me if I offend your ears.... I have been foolish even to dream of it, but I could not help it.... When first I saw you in the garden.. the old dog was beside you.... Even then it came to me that my future was linked to the thought of you. I did not know you were so far beyond.... I was very cold, but I dared not let you know it, for fear you would lead me at once to the gate. That night wherever I looked I saw you. I strove to think of some way to serve you, but I could not. I was so obscure. I never thought that you would remember me again; but you did... That afternoon in the carriage... I wanted to tell you then. That rose you dropped... it is still on my heart. I loved you, and to this end. And I am glad to die, for in this short fortnight I have lived.... My mother used to call me Maurice ... to hear a woman repeat it again before I go.”
“Maurice.” She took his hand timidly in hers, and looked at the archbishop.
“Speak to him from your heart, my child,” said the prelate. “It will comfort you both.”
Suddenly she drooped and the tears fell upon the hand in hers. “Maurice,” she whispered, “you have not loved in vain.” She could utter no more; but she raised her head and looked into his eyes, and he saw the glory of the world in hers.
“Into still waters and silence,” he said softly. “No more pain, nor joy, nor love; silence.... You love me!... Alexia; how often have I repeated that name to myself.... I have not strength to lift your hand to my lips.”
She kissed him on the lips. She felt as if she, too, were dying.
“God guard your Highness,” he said. “It is dark.... I do not see you....”
He tried to raise himself, but he could not. He sank back, settled deeply into the pillow, and smiled. After that he lay very still.