"Ah yes," she cried. "You are ruined in this miserable intrigue! Why could you not remain loyal? This is all the doing of Count Louis—I always hated him; little did you think of me when you suffered yourself to be led away by his boy's tricks!" William looked at her steadily.
"What I do is according to my conscience," he said quietly, "but that I think you do not comprehend. Yet let me tell you this: a man situated as I am, who sees nothing but troubles before him, could find no greater comfort than a patient wife who took her difficulties lightly. But that comfort, I fear, I shall never have from you."
"And what comfort shall I get from anyone?" asked Anne wildly.
She flung into the inner chamber, harshly closing the door after her so that the panels rattled.
Rénèe felt the tears sting her eyes at the misery, the wretchedness of it all; what was wrong, she wondered, that things should be like this?
"See to these affairs, my child," said the Prince, pointing to the confusion in the chamber, "we must indeed be gone to-morrow."
"All is nearly ready, Highness," answered Rénèe; "the men may come when they will for the coffers. And I think the Princess will come quietly—she is frightened."
"She is in a melancholy," said William, "she has not all her wits. A fine discord she will strike in Dillenburg," he added grimly. "I had hoped, these humours would pass with her youth, but it is not so."
Anne was still only twenty-four, but no one thought of her as young.
"It is a sickness," answered Rénèe, "she is never well, seigneur, but always ailing and often in pain."