“Doubtless, however, there is a safe.”
She waved her hand impatiently. “It will be time enough for that when we get there.”
“And if we can’t find the Book in the library?” he persisted.
“Then we will seek it elsewhere—it’s just that contingency which sends me. If I were sure it is in the library, I might let the Archduke go.”
“Yet will you not take some precaution for your own safety, in event of Lotzen overcoming us?” Moore asked.
“I can’t bring myself to believe that he would venture to harm the Regent, but, if he should, these,” pushing two papers across to him, “ought to be sufficient.”
“Your Highness is a strategist,” said the Colonel, when he had read them. “I have nothing to suggest; and I’m ready now to go with a more willing spirit and a lighter heart.”
She held out her hand, and flashed him the smile, usually reserved for Armand, alone.
“And we will save the king, Ralph—you and I; and give him the Book, and speed him to his crowning. I leave the details to you, to see the others, and instruct and caution them; remember, for the Archduke to get the slightest suspicion would ruin everything. It will be for me to see that he retires early to-night. Now, do you, yourself, seek out Bernheim and send him to me quickly.”
“My good friend,” said she, acknowledging Bernheim’s stiff military salute with one equally formal, “I need your aid in a matter of peculiar importance and delicacy—and which must not, under any circumstance, be known to any one in the Castle, and above all not to His Highness the Archduke—not a whisper of it, Colonel Bernheim.”