“Will your Excellency be pleased to see the Baroness von Hilfenstein?”
“Certainly, Paschics. I will go to the carriage to meet her.”
But the Baroness was already standing in the hall, to the discomfiture of Paschics, who felt that he had erred in not escorting her up the steps. She accepted his hurried apology graciously, however, and passed on with Cyril into his private office. It was the day following that on which Cyril had delivered his ultimatum to Ernestine.
“I am the bearer of a message from her Majesty, Count,” said the Baroness, when she was satisfied that they could not be overheard. “My daughter had offered to bring it; but one cannot be too careful in questions of etiquette, and Prince Boris is extremely particular.”
This was no exaggeration, for Boris Mirkovics was commonly reported to be the most jealous husband in Thracia, although his pretty wife made the best of things by affecting to regard the feeling as a compliment; and Cyril was grateful to the Baroness for saving him from a possible complication in that quarter. His patience was sorely tried, however, when the old lady, after settling her laces, clearing her throat two or three times, and refreshing herself by a sniff at her bottle of smelling-salts, remarked, in a tone of chilling disapproval—
“You are aware, Count, of the aversion with which I have always regarded the—the state of things between her Majesty and yourself——”
“Pardon me, Baroness,” interrupted Cyril, “but would you have any objection to giving me your message at once? We can go into the moral aspects of the situation afterwards. Has the Queen come to any definite decision upon the matters which I had the honour of laying before her yesterday?”
“Forgive me,” said the Baroness. “I should have remembered that the question was one of deep importance to you. No, her Majesty has not arrived at any definite decision, save that she is still convinced that it is impossible for her to break her pledges to the King and to the Princess of Dardania; but she begs that you will be good enough to postpone any further discussion of the subject, or action in connection with it, until after the conclusion of next week’s festivities. She is anxious that they should pass off without any disagreeable contretemps, and trusts that in the interval you may be able to devise some settlement that may be satisfactory to all parties.”
“No one can be more desirous of obliging her Majesty than I am,” returned Cyril; “but you must know, Baroness, that it is not so much a question of my doing nothing, as of the Princess of Dardania’s consenting to remain inactive. I appeal to you, without fear of misconstruction, for I know that since her mother’s death the Queen has confided everything to you: do you think the Princess may be trusted not to steal a march on me?”
“Perhaps I am not too friendly to the Princess,” said the Baroness thoughtfully, “for her Royal Highness and I have long had a difference of opinion on the subject of etiquette, on many points of which her ideas seem to me inexcusably lax for one in her high position, but I think she would scarcely break the truce which the Queen proposes. I know that her Majesty has had a long interview with her, in which she steadily refused to retreat from the ground she took up immediately upon her arrival, but consented to the postponement of the question.”