"'Sûr Imar, thou hast been very good to me. If I placed no confidence in such a kind defender, never could I hope to be defended any more. But now I am safe among all these great ladies; I am not one of those who shriek at every shadow.'
"'To that I can bear witness,' I answered very softly, to remind her of the night when she lay upon my horse; 'but what can I do, if the Princess will not trust me?'
"At this gentle reproach all her generous nature sprang forth, like the sun in a tempest. She threw aside her veil, and came close to me, and was not afraid to fix her eyes on mine. 'Sûr Imar, is that faith enough?' she asked, as she gave me her soft hand long enough to last for many an hour of dreaming. 'It is all I can ask for the present,' I replied, and she turned away her face, but not her form.
"She turned away her face."
"Fearing to bring her into contumely among her proud companions, whose voices we could hear not far away, I retired from the gate with the proper martial tread; but not before I had obtained her promise to meet me on the morrow at the foot of the winding passage into the black wood; but she was not to venture up the path, until she saw me there; for truly there had been a wolf prowling near it, according to the children of the peasants. Therefore I had taken care to keep our golden ladies from risking ten thousand good crowns perhaps apiece to the cause of freedom (which they were ready to embrace, as soon as they knew both sides of it), by venturing into those gaunt and lonely shadows, where no man could hear them while being devoured.
"In this assurance I had every hope of treating confidentially the position of the Princess Oria; and if that desirable wolf would only form number three at the interview, who could say what might come of it? But even his youngest cub, if he had any, might have regarded me with contempt, if he had seen the condition I was in, while waiting for the footstep of my love; for they look at such matters in a less submissive way.
"Unworthy as I was of the joy I then attained, even the pleasure of remembering it would be justly taken from me, if I lowered it by any ordinary words. For any one else it seems enough to know that after some talk of affairs in general, and trifles we pretended to be full of, my beauty, my darling, my gift from Heaven, my own and my only love confessed—that I was as much to her as she could be to me."
* * * * * * * * * *