Ethelwood returns to fetch her. It is almost with regret that she leaves the vault where a king has kissed her brow and passed a ring on her finger. The next act is in the count's château. Edith seems happy. Ethelwood is happy. The arrival of the king is announced. What has he to do at the count's home? Edith would know why; obliged to hide herself from being seen by the king, she does it in such a way as not to lose a word he says to the count.
The king is profoundly sad. Like all wounded hearts, he seeks for conflict; the war with France affords a diversion for his grief; he will go on the Continent. But he wants a firm and trustworthy regent for his State during his absence; he has thought of Ethelwood, who shall be the regent, and, to reward him for his devotion, and, still more, to attach him to the interests of the kingdom, sure as he is of his loyalty, he will give him his sister in marriage.
Ethelwood tries to refuse this twofold honour; he objects that Princess Eleanor—I think she was called Eleanor; I am not very certain, but the name of the princess does not affect the matter: in theatrical slang the princess would be called la princesse Bouche Trou (i.e. a stop-gap princess)—the Princess Eleanor does not love him. Ethelwood is mistaken, the princess does love him. He refuses everything. This refusal at first surprises, then annoys, the king.... A quarrel springs up between subject and king. The subject puts his hand on his sword hilt. Henceforth, he will incur confiscation, degradation, death on the scaffold; he will become poor, renounce his rank, will brave death, but he will marry no other woman than Edith. The king goes away, forbidding him to follow: but Ethelwood is the king's host; he must conduct him to his château gates; he must hold his stirrup and give his knee for the king to mount his horse. Scarcely has the king gone out and the count disappeared behind him, than a thick tapestry is raised and Edith enters on the scene. She has seen nothing save that the king is young and beautiful; heard nothing but that he loves her. Ethelwood's devotion, his refusal to marry the king's sister, the danger he is incurring, all glide over her heart like a breath on a mirror. She goes to the window. Ethelwood is on his knees holding the king's stirrup. In the office which, where nobility of spirit is present, is regarded as an honour, Edith sees nothing but shame; and, looking at the king, covered with gold and precious stones, surrounded with the homage of a people, as in a purple mantle, grown great by the lowliness of all who are around him, she lets fall the whisper, "If only I could be queen!..." At this moment Ethelwood returns. He makes up his mind, Edith shall know him as he is. He asks for pen, paper and ink. He is going to write his will.
"Are you going to die then?" asks Edith.
"No; but I am going to make you a return for all you have done for me. I only poured you out half the liquid contained in the flask; the rest was for myself, in case it had turned out to be a poison instead of a narcotic."
"Well?"
"I have drunk the rest of that liquid from the flask."
Edith grows pale; she begins to understand. The parchment upon which Ethelwood has rapidly traced a few lines will tell to every one that the count has taken refuge from the king's anger in death. As Edith lay in her grave, Ethelwood will be laid in his; and, as he watched over her, she, in her turn, shall watch by him; as he had the key of death, she shall have the key of life. Edith fights against this idea; she measures her own weakness, urges her ambition, but too late: Ethelwood, when he left the king, had taken the narcotic. He totters, pales, falls into Edith's arms as he puts the key of the vault into her hand saying—
"Till to-morrow!"
Next day, instead of opening the gates of life to her lover, Edith takes the king her betrothal ring. The king at first thinks she is the ghost of the woman whom he loved; then, by degrees, he is satisfied; he joyously touches the warm and living hand which he had touched when it was dead and cold; he renews to the Edith full of life the offers he had made to the Edith asleep in the tomb. The young girl turns giddy and needs to recollect all her promised ambitions. The key of the vault where her lover lies burns like red-hot iron. She goes to the window and asks if the river which flows at the foot of the palace is very deep.