“For you heaven has ordained happiness; do not, then, refuse to look upon those to whom bitterness and sorrow are appointed.
“Give to the suppliant who now appeals to you the joy of beholding the light of your countenance, that you may be assured that not only your mercy, but your justice, will be satisfied if you grant her petition.
“That God may grant you a long and happy life with the royal lady to whom your troth is plighted, is the wish of all your subjects.
“But especially, whether you grant her entreaty or refuse it, will it be the prayer of her who is now kneeling before you.”
“It is splendid!” said Nadia. “I should never have thought of such a way of putting it. It could not be better—except that I shall say ‘this shameful murder,’ instead of ‘this fearful sorrow.’ They say the King loves justice, and that will show him that a crime will be committed if he refuses to interfere.”
“You are bold,” said her friend. “But after all, no doubt the King will stand more from a girl than he would from an old woman, and he is an Englishman, and boldness may please him.”
CHAPTER XVIII.
SO NEAR, AND YET——
The long hours of evening and night wore away, so monotonously that Nadia began to feel as if a slow and uneven progress on a badly laid track, conducted to the accompaniment of the clanking of couplings and the dull thud of the engine, and diversified by halts of varying duration at unfinished and ill-lighted stations, was a normal condition of her life, and might be expected to last for ever. The men at the other end of the carriage made themselves comfortable upon the benches, and the two women slumbered intermittently among the bundles. Whenever she awoke Nadia busied herself in laying her plans for the morrow, as she sat gazing into the flying darkness, with an occasional glimpse of a distant star or a cloud of rushing steam. Her friend’s insistence upon the necessity of a written petition had given her a new idea, but she did not intend to make use of it unless she was forced to do so by circumstances. It was still her intention to throw herself suddenly at Caerleon’s feet and entreat him to listen to her for a moment. If, not perceiving who she was, he should depute Cyril to inquire into her case, all would be well; but if he should recognise her, and she were compelled to deliver her warning to himself, she still cherished the wild hope that she would be able to retreat and lose herself in the crowd before he could recover from his astonishment. The petition was only to be used in case she found it difficult to obtain access to him. There was little likelihood of his recognising her handwriting, which he had only seen once or twice, but she hoped that the idea of a miscarriage of justice would rouse him at once to make inquiries, when Cyril would naturally be the messenger chosen.
In thus providing against various contingencies she passed the waking hours of the night, and in the morning, when the train stopped at the station where her friend’s cousin lived, she felt that she was prepared for any event. The station-master’s residence was not imposing in appearance, consisting as it did of four whitewashed walls and a thatched roof, but the owner’s wife received her visitors with much hospitality, insisted on their sharing her breakfast, and supplied them with the means of making a hasty and somewhat primitive toilet. During the meal Nadia’s first friend unfolded the girl’s story, in so far as she had heard it, to her cousin, and engaged her help in the matter of drawing up the petition. The hostess wasted no time in assuring them of her sympathy, but produced at once a pen and ink and some sheets of official paper from a hole under the thatch, which served apparently as her husband’s bureau, and Nadia sat down to write at the small low table, from which the breakfast things had been hastily removed. It was no easy matter to translate into passable French the sonorous Thracian which her travelling companion poured forth, to the loudly expressed admiration of the station-master’s wife, and the latter complicated the matter almost at the beginning by exclaiming—
“Oh no, Maria! You must not mention the marriage, it would be most unsuitable. Haven’t you heard the news?”