She eagerly awaited her daughter’s coming, and having lingered at the window to watch with impatience the rather ceremonious leave-taking, she hastened to the door of the improvised sitting-room to welcome the mountaineers, as they returned to tell their adventures.
“My darling, who do you think was listening and looking from the window next ours?” she breathlessly inquired, when she had embraced her newly-restored treasure—for the secret of the adjoining room was too good to keep until questions had been put. “Can’t you guess? I’m surprised at that, since you were so sure last night of a certain person’s presence not far away. Why, who but your Emperor himself!”
The Princess laughed happily, and kissed her mother’s pink cheek. “Then he must have an astral body,” said she, “since one or the other has been with me all day; and it was to him—or his Doppelgänger—that you offered your purse to make up for accusing him of stealing!”
The Grand Duchess sat down; not so much because she wished to assume a sitting position, as because she experienced a sudden, uncontrollable weakness of the knees. For a moment she was unable to speak, or even to speculate; but one vague thought did trail dimly across her brain. “Heavens! what have I done to him? And maybe some day he will be my son-in-law.”
Meanwhile, Frau Yorvan—a strangely subdued Frau Yorvan—had droopingly followed the chamois hunter into the inn.
“My dear old friend, you must learn not to lose that well-meaning head of yours,” said he in the hall.
“Oh, but, your Majesty—”
“Now, now, must I remind you again that his Majesty is at Kronburg, or Petersbrück, or some other of his residences, when I am at Alleheiligen? This time I believe he’s at the Baths of Melina. If you can’t remember these things, I fear I shall be driven away from here, to look for chamois elsewhere than on the Schneehorn.”
“Indeed, I will not be so stupid again, your—I mean, I will do my very best not to forget. But never before have I been so tried. To see your high-born, imperial shoulders loaded down as if—as if you had been a common Gepäckträger for tourists, instead of—”
“A chamois hunter. Don’t distress yourself, good friend. I’ve had a day of excellent sport.”