“Ah, I am afraid you found me very troublesome last night—but that is just what I thought you at the time. I have a vague impression,” she added, turning to Fräulein von Staubach, “that Count Mortimer was helping me up the mountain, and that he insisted on talking when I wanted to be quiet. I know that he enunciated the most outrageous doctrines, for I felt he was trying to see how far he could go without making me contradict him, and I took a perverse pleasure in remaining silent.”
“I congratulate you on your skill in concealing your feelings, madame,” said Cyril, with a bow. “I did you the injustice of imagining that you were nearly asleep.”
“Oh no, I was not asleep then,” she replied hurriedly, blushing as she spoke; “but I fear that your thinking so proves that it must have been difficult to get me up the hill. Did you find me very heavy?”
“I could wish that you had been heavier, madame. The greater the weight the greater the honour, in such a case.”
“That is a double-barrelled insult, Count. Do you imply that my weight was great, or that the honour was small?”
“Madame, there is some one coming,” interrupted Fräulein von Staubach, who had been listening with evident displeasure to this exchange of badinage; and almost as she spoke the door opened, and the old servant entered.
“You are up, then?” she said, surveying the party cheerfully. “I am glad of that, for all morning I have been afraid that the master would come and rouse you up and turn you out. It’s much better to get your breakfast quietly before starting. I have brought you another loaf, by the way, and a pair of soft slippers for your wife, poor soul!” she added to Cyril, who felt for once devoutly thankful that the Queen did not understand Thracian. “I saw that her feet were all cut and blistered last night.”
“You see, Sophie, it is a good thing that I got up, if we are to be turned out,” said the Queen to Fräulein von Staubach, when the gift had been duly tried on, and the old woman thanked with great heartiness, much to her disgust.
“There, there!” she said. “I suppose one may give away a pair of old slippers without being supposed to have done anything great. I don’t know whether it makes any difference to you, young man; but when I looked down at Karajevo just now, I saw a crowd streaming out of the gate and coming towards the mountain. I haven’t an idea who you may be; but you know best whether you are in any danger.”
“Many thanks,” said Cyril. “Can you add to your kindness by telling us the nearest way to Prince Mirkovics’s castle from here?”