“I am the bearer of a message from her Majesty to you, Count,” she said coldly, giving him a note. “You were right in supposing that she would wish to come here in person, but by representing the difficulty she would experience in leaving the Palace unobserved, I induced her to allow me to be her messenger.”
She turned away again to the window, and Cyril tore open the envelope, and drew out the blotted and tear-stained missive which it contained.
“Cyril, my Beloved” (Ernestine had written),—“You cannot intend to leave me like this. They tell me that you are quitting Thracia in disgrace—but I know that is only my cousin’s malevolence—take me with you. Let me share your trouble—I will not say disgrace, for that cannot attach to your name. Send me one word by Anna, and I will come. Do not think that I shall repent taking the step. You know me well enough to be sure that neither poverty nor scorn would trouble me if I was with you. But I know you are saying, as you did the other day, ‘The choice was in your own hands, and you preferred your son to me.’ Dearest, how could I build our happiness on the ruins of my child’s? You would not wish me to do so; you were trying me, were you not? I have never opposed you in anything but this, but how could I deprive Michael of the joy I desired for myself? And if you think I deserve punishment for following my conscience in this respect, I have received it. Three days and nights of misery, Cyril! Even you would pity me if you saw me now—they tell me I am mad, merely because I love you—or will you not forgive me yet? But if I must go on suffering in this way, at least do not leave me without a word. Let me see you once more, just to say good-bye. I will not trouble you with entreaties, I will only look at you for the last time. Let me have a kind look to remember, and not the dreadful cold eyes that met mine the other day. Remember that day in the burning house, that mountain-path in the snow. You loved me then. Have you the heart to forsake me without one kind word? But no, you are welcome to overwhelm me with reproaches, if only you will let me see you. You know how I love you.—Your broken-hearted
Ernestine.”
“I fear, mademoiselle,” said Cyril to the messenger, crumpling the note in his hand, “that her Majesty forgets the circumstances of the case. It would scarcely improve my position in Thracia at the present moment if I invited the Queen to run away with me. Not,” he dropped for a moment the hard tone in which he had spoken, and Anna Mirkovics looked up with sudden hope, “that I do not consider the scandal involved would inflict a very salutary punishment on King Michael and his future relatives, but one really must consider one’s own personal feelings a little in such a matter.”
“Then what answer”—the maid of honour’s voice was almost choked with indignation—“am I to take to her Majesty?”
“I think it would be best to tell her that there is no answer. To say that I decline the honour might sound discourteous.”
“But you will see her to say good-bye? You must.”
“Pardon me; such a step would indicate a willingness to do more, and I have no intention of doing anything.”
“Yes, if you saw her, you must yield. Oh, Count, have pity upon her! We can do nothing to comfort her, although our hearts are broken by the sight of her sufferings. She sits in the same place from morning till night, and neither weeps nor speaks. The Princess and the King have rallied her, upbraided her, threatened to give out that she has become insane, but nothing could rouse her until Baroness von Hilfenstein happened to hear that you had been released and were about to leave Thracia, and then she determined to make a last effort to communicate with you. You cannot refuse this one small favour. I will smuggle you into the Palace as a friend of my own—what does it signify what they say of me, if I can help to comfort her?—and when you see her, you must give way.”