"In half an hour a woman, even if she be a queen, might become piqued and jealous, and the destinies of Europe will be shaped accordingly."
His keen grey eyes were searching the bosquets, trying to read what went on behind the dark yew hedges of the park.
"To think that the fate of Catholic Europe should depend upon the chance meeting of a young girl and a Court gallant," sighed Don Miguel impatiently.
"The fate of empires has hung on more slender threads than these ere now, my son," rejoined His Eminence quietly; "diplomacy is the art of seeming to ignore the great occasions whilst seizing the small opportunity."
He said nothing more, for at that same moment there came to his ears, gently echoing across the terrace, the sound of a half-gay, half-melancholy ditty. A pure, girlish voice was singing somewhere within the Palace, like a young caged bird behind the bars, at sight of the brilliant sunshine above.
Don Miguel gave a short sarcastic laugh.
"The Lady Ursula's voice," he said.
Then he pointed to the more distant portion of the garden, where Wessex and Mary were once more seen strolling slowly back towards the terrace.
A look of expectancy, of shrewd and sudden intuition crept into the Cardinal's handsome face. The eyes lighted up as if with a quick, bright, inward vision, whilst the thin lips seemed to close with a snap, as if bent on guarding the innermost workings of the mind.
He took his breviary from his pocket and began walking along the flagstones of the terrace in the direction whence the song had come. His head was bent; apparently he was deeply absorbed in the Latin text.