"Is it not?" he asked with a smile. "For while you were with the Queen, talking of I know not what——"
"Nor I indeed," said Osra hastily.
"I was with the King, and he, saying that forewarned was forearmed, told me very strange and pretty stories; of some a report had reached me before——"
"And yet you came to Strelsau?"
"While of others I had not heard."
"Or you would not have come to Strelsau?"
The Grand Duke, not heeding these questions, proceeded to his conclusion.
"Love, therefore," said he, "is very various. For M. de Mérosailles——"
"These are old stories," cried Osra, pretending to stop her ears.
"Loved in one way, and Stephen the smith in another, and—the Miller of Hofbau in a third."