She was now all trembling and distract, her lips red, her eyes bright, her hands clasped and trembling as they were strained palm to palm.
"Lady Ysolinde, I would that this were not so," I began.
A new quick spasm passed over her face. I think it came across her that my heart was wavering. "God knows that I, Hugo Gottfried, am not worth all this!"
"Nay," she said, with a kind of joy in her voice and in her eyes, "that matters not. Ysolinde of Plassenburg is as a child that must have its toy or die. Worthiness has no more to do with love than creeds and dogmas. Love me—Hugo—love me even a little. Put me not away. I will be so true, so willing. I will run your errands, wait on you, stand behind you in battle, in council lead you to fame and great glory. For you, Hugo, I will watch the faces of others, detect your enemies, unite your well-wishers, mark the failing favor of your friends. What heart so strong, what eye so keen as mine—for the greater the love the sharper the eye to mark, prevent, countermine. And this maid, so cold and icy, so full of good works and the abounding fame of saintliness, let her live for the healing of the people, for the love of God and man both, and it liketh her. She shall be abbess of our greatest convent. She shall indeed be the Saint Helena of the North. Even now I will save her from death and give her refuge. I promise it. I have the power in my hands. Only do you, Hugo Gottfried, give me your love, your life, yourself!"
She was standing before me now, and had her arms about my neck. I felt them quiver upon my shoulders. Her eyes looked directly up into mine, and whether they were the eyes of an angel or of a tempting fiend I could not tell. Very lovely, at any rate, they were, and might have tempted even Saint Anthony to sin.
"Ysolinde," I said, at last, "it is small wonder that I am strongly moved; you have offered me great things to-night. I feel my heart very humble and unworthy. I deserve not your love. I am but a man, a soldier, dull and slow. Were it not for one man and one woman it should be as you say. But Karl of Plassenburg is my good master, my loyal friend. Helene is my true love. I beseech you put this thought from you, dear lady, and be once more my true Princess, I your liege subject—faithful, full of reverence and devotion till life shall end!"
As I spoke she drew herself away from me. My hand had unconsciously rested on her hair, for at first she had leaned her head towards me. When I had finished she took my hand by the wrist and gripped it as if she would choke a snake ere she dropped it at arm's-length. I knew that our interview was at an end.
"Go!" she commanded, pointing to the door. "One day you shall know how precious is the love you have so lightly cast aside. In a dark, dread hour, you, Hugo Gottfried, shall sue as a suppliant. And I shall deny you. There shall come a day when you shall abase yourself—even as you have seen Ysolinde the Princess abase herself to Hugo, the son of the Red Axe of the Wolf mark. Go, I tell you! Go—ere I slay you with my knife!"
And she flashed a keen double-edged blade from some recess of her silken serpentine dress.
"My lady, hear me," I pleaded. "Out of the depths of my heart I protest to you—"