Laura bent forward and kissed him. "What ails my love?" said she.
"This letter has destroyed a blessed dream, beloved. I had hoped that we had propitiated Fate, and that misfortune had ceased to follow us."
"Why, what have your political papers to do with our fortunes?"
"This is not a political dispatch," replied Eugene. "It is the answer to a letter I addressed to Pope Innocent. Will you read it, dearest?"
She took the paper from his hands, and then began to laugh.
"I do not read Latin," said she. "Translate it for me."
Eugene then rose, put his arm around her and read:
"The sacrament of marriage is holy and inviolable, and it cannot be set aside. Woe be unto those who deny its sanctity and its irrevocable pledges! The marchioness Strozzi was married by a priest, and her witnesses were a father and a brother. We are under the necessity of refusing the petition of the Prince of Savoy; for, no representation of intentions misdirected, can stand against the deliberate consent of the parties to wedlock, witnessed by honorable relatives. We, therefore, call upon the Prince of Savoy to humble himself as beseems a man that has sinned against God and the Church, lest he incur her malediction, at the hands of the vicar of Christ on earth."
The paper fell from his hands and fluttered to her feet.
"You appealed to the pope to annul my marriage with Strozzi?" asked she.