"I shall be with Monseigneur if he lives," she answered.
Yes, it was very strange; yet already, even now—when he had known her again for half an hour, had seen her and talked to her—gradually and insidiously it began to seem less strange, less fantastic, more natural. Dunstanbury had to give himself a mental shake to get back to Essex and to Sophy Grouch. Volseni set old and gray amid the hills, the King whose breath struggled with his blood for life, the beautiful woman who would be with the King if and so long as he lived—these were the present realities he saw in vivid immediate vision; they made the shadows of the past seem not indeed dim—they kept all their distinctness of outline in memory—but in their turn fantastic, and in no relation to the actual. Was that the air of Kravonia working on him? Or was it a woman's voice, the pallid pride of a woman's face?
"In Slavna they call me a witch," she said, "and tell terrible tales about this little mark—my Red Star. But here in Volseni they like me—yes, and I can win over Slavna, too, if I get the opportunity. No, I sha'n't be a weakness to Monseigneur if he lives."
"You'll be—?"
"His wife?" she interrupted. "Yes." She smiled again—nay, almost laughed. "That seems worst of all—worse than anything else?"
Dunstanbury allowed himself to smile too. "Well, yes, of course that's true," he said. "Out of Kravonia, anyhow. What's true in Kravonia I really don't know yet."
"I suppose it's true in Kravonia too. But what I tell you is Monseigneur's will about me."
He looked hard at her. "You love him?" he asked.
"As my life, and more," said Sophy, simply.
At last Dunstanbury ceased to look at her; he laid his elbows on the battlements and stood there, his eyes roaming over the lake in the valley to the mountains beyond. Sophy left his side, and began to walk slowly up and down the rugged, uneven, overgrown surface of the walls.