“I think,” she said, “there are no slaves in all the world like princesses. It is not for me, as with the free and happy, to say to my father, ‘I have tried with all my heart because you desired it, and yet I cannot, and I know it would be wrong to give myself rather with aversion than with regard.’ It is enough with more fortunate girls to say ‘I do not love him.’ But what does that avail with us?”
“Aversion!”—he breathed the word in deep scorn—“when you have not even met him?”
“O, father! you have said it. I have not even met him.”
“What, then?” He burst out again, in spite of all his efforts at self-control. “Have you no sense of decency—of what your rank demands of you? There should be loftier motives than mere personal feeling behind these great alliances. But I will hear no more. My patience is exhausted.”
“I will not marry him.”
He stared at her in amazement.
“Sullen and obdurate!” he said. “You will not? We will see. O, I knew very well you had started with an insane prejudice—the mere peevish humour of an unreasonable child. But, beware! Kingdoms are not to be bandied on such terms of spoilt caprice. What or who has instigated you to this rebellion, I say? If any has abused his trust to do so, let him look well to the consequences of his daring.”
She was scared in her turn now—so scared, that her heart for an instant seemed to stop.
“I am a woman, father,” she said faintly; “why should you look for anything beyond a woman’s natural repugnance to being pledged against her choice or will?”
He did not answer for a minute; and then in a softened, more persuasive tone he said: