[pg 13]
"There the English minister came forward from the town to flout us with an address of welcome in which he used not our incognitos but our true names."
"From Ratisbon then no doubt you hurried? Since you were discovered, you shed your retinue and hurried?"
"Sir, we hurried—to Augsburg," faltered Hay. He stopped, and then in a burst of desperation he said, "At Augsburg we stayed eight days."
"Eight days?"
There was a stir throughout the room; a murmur began and ceased. Wogan wiped his forehead and crushed his handkerchief into a hard ball in his palm. It seemed to him that here in this room he could see the Princess Clementina's face flushed with the humiliation of that loitering.
"And why eight days in Augsburg?"
"The Princess's mother would have her jewels reset. Augsburg is famous for its jewellers," stammered Hay.
The murmur rose again; it became almost a cry of stupefaction. The Chevalier sprang from his chair. "Her jewels reset!" he said. He repeated the words in bewilderment. "Her jewels reset!" Then he dropped again into his seat.