"I would face a thousand kings rather," I replied.
We could see at the gate the carriage which was to take us to the station. Now came the moment when I was tried by the crucible and found to be dross. I committed the most foolish blunder of my life. My love suddenly overleapt its bounds. In a moment my arms were around her lithe body; my lips met hers squarely. After it was done she stood very still, as if incapable of understanding my offence. But I understood. I was overwhelmed with remorse, love, and regret. I had made impossible what might have been.
"Your Highness," I cried, "I could not help it! Before God I could not! It is because I love you better than anything in the world—you cannot be of it!—and all this is impossible, this going away together."
Her bosom heaved, and her eyes flashed like a heated summer sky.
"I will give you one minute to leave this place," she said, her tones as even and as cold as sudden repression of wrath could make them. "I trusted you, and you have dared to take advantage of what seemed my helplessness. It is well indeed for you that you committed this outrage before it is too late. I should have killed you then. I might have known. Could ever a woman trust a man?" She laughed contemptuously. "You would have made me a thing of scorn; and I trusted you!"
"As God is my judge," I cried, "my respect for you is as high as heaven itself. I love you; is there nothing in that? I am but human. I am not a stone image. And you have tempted me beyond all control. Pardon what I have done; it was not the want of respect—."
"Spare me your protestations. I believe your minute is nearly gone," she interrupted.
And then—there was a crunch on the gravel behind us. The Princess and I turned in dismay. We had forgotten all about the anonymous note. Two officers were approaching us, and rapidly. The elder of the two came straight to me. I knew him to be as inexorable as his former master, the victor of Sedan. The Princess looked on mechanically.
"Come," said the Count, in broken English; "I believe your carriage is at the gate."
I glanced at the Princess. She might have been of stone, for all the life she exhibited.