"You do not know who loves our Louise so ardently, so passionately? You do not know the man for whose sake she would leave father and mother? You do not know the only man whom the Princess Charlotte Louise loves?"
"I do not know, but I command you to tell me!" said the Electress dryly.
"Well," said the Princess, smilingly surveying the group, "it is our dear, only brother—it is Frederick William."
"You are a little blockhead!" exclaimed the Electress, shrugging her shoulders and smiling.
"You are a dear little rogue," said Frederick William, tenderly embracing his willful sister. She playfully broke away from him, dancing through the hall, and challenging her brother to pursue and overtake her. Princess Louise said not a word, but the blush upon her cheeks died away, and the expression of horror and alarm vanished from her features.
Still Princess Hedwig Sophie kept up her frolic, and as often as the Prince thought he had caught her she flew off again like a butterfly. Finally, at the extreme end of the hall, he held her fast, and now, laughingly and tenderly, she flung her arms about his neck, and whispered softly: "Expect me this evening in your room at nine o'clock. I have something important to tell you. Silence!"
Again she let him go, and continued to hop about, laughing merrily and cheerfully as a child.
And in the evening, when the clock in the great corridor had just struck the ninth hour, the Princess Hedwig Sophie slipped unperceived into the room of her brother, who already held the door open for her and awaited her coming.
"Look, here you are, my princess of the fairies," said he, smiling. "What is there now on hand, and what playful scheme are you revolving in your mind to-day?"
But the countenance of the Princess exhibited no signs of playfulness. It was pale, and her whole being seemed under the influence of violent excitement.