“Will you telegraph at once for news of him?”
“Willingly;” and he went at once to give his instructions. The result was all I could have wished, and later in the day telegrams arrived from Spernow himself, saying that both he and Mademoiselle Broumoff were safe.
“The Princess Christina is ready to receive you,” he said when he came back. “Will you come with me?”
I followed him with heart beating high, and, as if he understood how matters were, he opened the door of a room and stood back for me to enter alone.
She had been eagerly watching for my coming, but, thinking that perhaps the Consul would be with me, she had put a strong restraint upon herself, and stood waiting in an attitude of reserve. But the colour mantling her cheeks, and the bright glow in her eyes, told me her feelings, and as soon as she saw me enter by myself she ran to meet me, and with a glad cry threw herself into my arms with the utter self-abandonment of love.
It was no moment for speech, and many minutes passed with nothing more than an exclamation or two of delight or a few softly breathed words of passion. All thoughts of the dangers passed, the anxieties still present, even of my poor dead friend, were lost, and merged in the ecstasy of holding in my arms the woman I loved beyond all else on earth, looking into her eyes glowing with love for me, hearing my name whispered in her moving voice, and feeling her lips pressed to mine. It was a moment of love rapture, and so untellable in any language but that which love itself speaks.
When at length we drew apart, the first wild rush of excitement past, and sat hand-locked to talk, I saw how anxiety and suspense had paled her, and how deeply she had suffered.
She listened intently to the story of my experiences since we had parted; and the ebbing and flowing colour, the passing light and shadow in her eyes, and the quick catches in her breath told of varied feelings which the recital roused. When I came to the sad story of poor gallant Zoiloff’s wound and death, she was moved to tears of deep and tender regret. But we were lovers and but just reunited, and the interchange of sympathies and mutual comfort in this our first sorrow in common served to awake a fresh chord in the rhythmic harmony of our love.
For her friend, Mademoiselle Broumoff, she was still full of tender concern, and it was a cause of rare happiness that, while we were still together—for the interview lasted some hours—the news came over the wires telling us that she and Spernow were safe, and coming post haste to join us at Nish.
There was but one shadow, besides Zoiloff’s death, that hovered in the background. The question whether she would feel it her duty to return to Sofia. I asked her with some dread.