Some distance in his rear, drawn up across the woodland path, the narrowness of which did not admit of more than two abreast, was a posse of mounted lancers belonging to the Blue Legion. Fronting these troopers was the vehicle evidently used by the princess in her journey to this spot,—a light, elegant droshky, expressly adapted for swift travelling.
And the Cossack sentinel, likewise noting all this, felt ill at ease. The sound of his bugle would instantly have summoned a party from the Russian guard-house, but as this might have led to the exposure of his own participation in the affair, he refrained from the act, and looked on in silence.
"Marshal, conduct your prisoner to the Citadel."
"You would arrest me?"
There was an emphasis on the last word which was intended to remind the princess that it behoved her to consider who he was. It was clear to her that relying on his kinship to the Czar, he set little store by the law of Czernova. His pitying smile cut the constitutionalist princess to the quick.
"You talk bravely, fair cousin, forgetful in whose territory you now stand. I put myself under the protection of this sentry, the representative of the Czar."
The duke was not mending matters in appealing to the Czar for protection against the law of Czernova.
"O silly duke!" murmured Zabern. "How nicely you are playing into my hands! You have lost the princess by that speech."
The Cossack sentinel, now heartily regretting that he had become compromised by an affair in which the great ones of Czernova were involved, nevertheless at the duke's abjuration rode off to the princess.
"What is this?" he cried, with an air of authority. "Prisoner? No arrest can take place here. Little mother, you are standing on Russian ground; therefore—your passport, signed by the Russian consul at Slavowitz."