"My beloved lady," he said, turning to his wife, "this is certainly no place for you. Let me conduct you to your own chamber!"
"Not without the added presence of one of my people, sir," said Rollo, sternly; "this had not happened but for your intention of secretly deserting us, and leaving us to hold the castle alone against the cruel enemy of whose approach we risked our lives to warn you!"
Meanwhile the Queen-Regent had been casting her eyes wildly and uncomprehendingly around. Now she looked at the motionless form of the girl in the arms of El Sarria, now at the dead woman upon the floor, but all without the least token that she understood how the tragedy had come to pass.
But suddenly she threw her arms into the air and uttered a wild scream.
"Where is my Isabel—where is my daughter? She was in the arms of the nurse Susana who lies there before us. They have killed her also. This devil-born has killed her! Where shall I find her?—My darling—the protected of the Virgin, the future Queen of all the Spains?"
But it was a question no one could answer. None had seen the little Isabel, since the moment when she had passed forth through the portal of the palace into the night, clasped in the faithful arms of her nurse.
She had not cried. She had not returned. Apparently not a soul had thought of her, save only the woman whose life had been laid down for her sake, as a little common thing is set on a shelf and forgotten.
So, for this reason, the question of Maria Cristina remained unanswered. For, even as a star shoots athwart the midnight sky of winter, so the little Queen of Spain had passed and been lost in the darkness and terror without the beleaguered castle of La Granja.