"No, no, it cannot be!" interposed the princess, with quivering lips. "Waldemar, you can have no tidings of what occurred over the border during the night; I must have received them sooner than you. You are deceiving us; do not resort to such ignoble subterfuges!"
For some moments Waldemar gazed silently at his mother, who would sooner accuse him of falsehood than believe his brother guilty of a breach of faith. It must have been this consciousness that made his voice so icy and his words so pitiless, as he said,--
"Prince Zulieski was intrusted with an important position, and had the strictest orders not to leave it. He was in command of a detachment which protected his uncle's rear. When the attack was made, the prince was missing from his post. The subordinate officers proved unequal to the emergency; they had no definite plan of defence, and a massacre ensued. Some twenty men saved their lives by flight across the border, where they fell into the hands of our patrols. Three of the refugees lie out in the yard severely wounded; I have learned these facts from them. The rest of Prince Leo's soldiers are dispersed or slain."
"And my brother?" asked the princess, with forced composure. "What has become of the Morynskian corps?"
"I do not know," answered Waldemar. "It is said that the victors went on to W----. I have no intelligence of what has occurred there."
He was silent. A momentous, breathless pause followed. Leo had buried his face in his hands, hollow moans issued from his breast, and his whole frame was convulsed with anguish. The princess stood erect, her eyes were fixed upon him, she struggled for breath.
"Leave us alone, Waldemar," she said at last, in a hollow voice, but with her usual firmness.
Waldemar hesitated. His mother had always appeared cold, and often enough hostile to him; here in this very spot she had stood opposed to him as an embittered rival, when the strife for supremacy in Villica had broken out; but he had never seen her hard and pitiless as she appeared at this moment, and he, the stern, relentless Nordeck, was seized with apprehension and sympathy, as he read his brother's sentence in her face.
"Mother," he said gently.
"Go!" she repeated; "I have to deal with your brother; no third person must come between us. Leave us alone!"