"I hate the Princess! And I shall never like her as long as I live!" she said, with that certain concentrated dislike which only good women feel towards those a degree less innocent, specially when the latter are well to look upon.
There was no time to reply immediately as I conducted her up the steps. For I had to keep my eyes open to observe how the Prince conducted himself, and in the easy ceremonial of Plassenburg it chanced that I happened upon nothing extravagant.
"But, Helene, you said a while ago that you hated me!" I said, after a little pause, smiling down at her.
"Did I?" she answered. "Surely nay!"
"Ah, but 'tis true as your eyes," I persisted. "Do you not remember when I had cut the calf's head off with the axe? You did not love the thought of the Red Tower so much then!"
"Oh, that!" she said, as if the discrepancy had been fully explained by the inflexion of her voice upon the word.
But she pressed my hand, so I cared not a jot for logic.
"You do not love her, you are sure?" she said, looking up at me when we came to the darker turn of the stairs, for the corkscrews were narrower in the ancient castle than in the new palace below.
"Not a bit!" said I, heartily, without any more pretence that I did not understand what she meant.
She pressed my hand again, momentarily slipping her own down off my arm to do it.