At length the ceremonious inspection was concluded, and the courtiers hurried away to view their own quarters, leaving her Excellency in the pavilion, and Serenissimus in his sumptuous Corps de Logis.
When the courtiers' steps ceased to echo in the corridor, Wilhelmine drew a little golden key from her bosom and, approaching a panel in the antechamber wall on the first floor, fitted it into a keyhole which was artfully hidden in the intricacies of the inlaid design. She turned the lock and a small door flew open. She stepped through and found herself in the corridor of statues. Directly facing the hidden panel door she found another similar lock masked beneath the outstretched hand of one of the many plaster Amorini. Here again a small door sprang open beneath her touch, and she entered the Duke's sitting-room. Her entry, however, was further hidden by an arras of Gobelin tapestry fitted on a wooden partition running down one side of his Highness's room. At the end nearest the entrance to his sleeping-chamber, a small portion of this partition flew back upon touching a spring, and revealed a narrow doorway. Little wonder that both Eberhard Ludwig and Wilhelmine smiled when the Italian conducted them down and up the staircases and through innumerable rooms ere they reached the apartments of the Landhofmeisterin!
Serenissimus was standing at the window of his writing-room overlooking the courtyard. In his hand was a closely written page, and his face wore a look of distress and perplexity. He turned sharply when he heard Wilhelmine's step, and, flushing deeply, he crushed the paper into the breast of his coat. She was quick to note the movement, and the Duke's evident embarrassment.
'A letter, Monseigneur, which you would hide from me?' she said. Like most women in illegitimate positions she was easily suspicious, and all letters, petitions, every scrap of paper destined for her lover, were carried for inspection to the omnipotent Landhofmeisterin ere they were permitted to reach their destination.
'Yes, Madame, a letter from a private friend,' returned the Duke, his embarrassment turning to anger.
'Ah! something not intended for me? I crave your Highness's forgiveness. I came to say a word of my great happiness in being indeed installed in our House of Harmony,' she sneered bitterly, and turning, would have hurried back to her apartments; but Serenissimus followed her, and laying his hand on her arm drew her towards him.
'There are things in each life which can never be told. Beloved, there is a seal on my lips which honour has impressed with her fair image. I cannot tell you what is in this letter. Believe me, it is no pleasant thing that I hide from you; it would not make you happy to read these lines. Also, they are unimportant, for I do not heed them.'
She prayed him to tell her. How could she rest if she knew he had a thought apart from her? It gave her anxiety, she said, that it was something disagreeable. She used all her arts of attraction, of seduction, but he remained obdurate. Then she flamed into anger and left him with a bitter word.
To celebrate his Highness's entry into Ludwigsburg, a masked ball had been commanded to take place on the evening following the arrival of the court. The Duke and his mistress met at supper after the episode of the letter, but the Landhofmeisterin avoided his Highness's eye and seemed absorbed in conversation with Zollern. During the evening she played faro at her own table, and early took her leave, pleading that she was fatigued. On the morning of the masked ball his Highness attended a stag-hunt, and thus it fell out that he and Wilhelmine did not meet to discuss the vexed question of the letter.
The beautiful ballroom at Ludwigsburg was brilliantly illuminated by a thousand waxen tapers which burned in the huge crystal chandeliers. The Landhofmeisterin's own musicians discoursed rhythmical strains from the gallery, and a gay motley crowd moved on the inlaid polished floor. There were dominoes of every colour, bizarre, fantastic shapes; and somehow this masked assemblage had a strangely sinister appearance, a mysterious lurking menace seemed to emanate from it.