“Yes, I remember her very well,” Rudolf answered. “She and the friends with her were Americans. I was told that she is the head of some noble order in her country; but what it is, I couldn’t understand.”
Katrina, in the meantime, had finished setting the table, which, though simple with its service of quaint blue china, was made attractive by a vase filled with crimson roses. She had gathered them that afternoon from a bush growing near the castle gates. So now, after Frieda had placed the dainty meal upon the table, they all stood for a moment, their heads bowed, while Rudolf asked a blessing on the food.
V.
s the three sat at table, Rudolf talked to his wife and Katrina about some of the happenings of the day. It was his custom to say little in regard to the castle, or the visitors who came there. For, as has been said before, both he and Frieda thought it better that their child should know the more practical things of life, so the romance of the castle was hidden from her.
This evening seemed to be an exception, though, and Rudolf talked more freely than he had ever done before, while Katrina asked him many questions. She wanted to hear more about the beautiful lady who had stopped and spoken to her of Saint Elizabeth.
“The very first place the lady wished to see,” her father said, in answer to her eager questions, “was the Elizabethan Gallery, and she spent a long time gazing at the pictures. But,” he continued in a low tone, while it was evident that his feelings were greatly stirred, “it was when she stood before the painting in which the holy Elizabeth gives bread to the hungry poor that I noticed the same thing you spoke of, little daughter,—a strange, beautiful light seemed to be shining from the lady’s face.”
Rudolf paused as the scene in the Elizabethan Gallery rose again before him; then as he was about to resume his story, all three were startled by some one knocking at the door. In answer to the summons to enter, Fritz, all white and trembling, came into the room.
“What is it, my boy?” Frieda and Rudolf both exclaimed; for they saw instantly that he was the bearer of bad tidings.