“Certain! I shall ask her Majesty,” was the reply, as Fräulein von Staubach slipped back to her post. It was with the freedom of a privileged confidant that she attacked the Queen that evening.
“Dearest madame, may we not be allowed to congratulate you? Is not something going to happen that will make us all very happy? You know that your happiness is ours.”
“Is that so, Sophie? Then you must be very happy at this moment.”
“Indeed I am, madame. May I make the rest happy too?”
“No; I will tell Banics and Stefanovics myself,” said the Queen, and she did so the next morning. Whatever their secret thoughts were upon the matter, they appreciated their mistress’s consideration in communicating the news personally, and crushed down their feelings nobly when they congratulated Cyril. There was to be no secrecy this time about the betrothal. If Cyril had desired any delay in the announcement, he could not have asked it, with the memory of that twelve years’ engagement, which Ernestine had accepted with such unwillingness, and which had ended so sadly, fresh in his mind. They exchanged rings, therefore, in German fashion, and after taking this decisive step, notified their respective relations of the understanding to which they had come.
In the meantime, the news filtered down into the village through the gossip of the servants, and quickly reached Colonel Czartoriski at Damascus by the agency of one of the men employed at the inn, with whom he had bargained to keep him informed of all that went on. Unfortunately, however, the announcement that the Queen had begun to appear in public and to receive visitors only arrived at the same time; so that he found it was too late to carry out his orders and anticipate a reconciliation. In this dilemma he telegraphed to the Princess of Dardania for instructions, receiving the prompt reply, “Deliver my letter to her immediately,” and this he proceeded at once to do. It was with the utmost reluctance that Ernestine consented to receive him. The shrinking dread of her cousin, with which the sufferings endured at her hands had filled her, made her feel instinctively that the request boded ill to her new happiness, and she was only partially reassured by the reminder from her ladies that Colonel Czartoriski had been entreating an opportunity of delivering his mistress’s letter for months past, so that it could not possibly be concerned with the engagement. She received the visitor with the utmost formality, accepted at his hands the packet with which he was charged, made and answered the customary polite inquiries, and dismissed him, graciously but with marked coldness. She was not by nature a vindictive woman, but the injuries which the Princess of Dardania had done her were such as she could never forgive.
A few minutes later, Cyril, lounging idly on the grass beside one of the fountains in the garden, was disturbed by Fräulein von Staubach, who told him that the Queen wished to speak to him, adding the gratuitous information that her Majesty was very much troubled about something. He found Ernestine, as usual, in the marble verandah which served her as a presence-chamber. She had an open letter before her, and her face was very pale as she looked up at him.
“Cyril,” she said fearfully, “this comes from my cousin Ottilie.”
“Now for it!” was Cyril’s inward comment, as he braced himself to meet the blow, the imminence of which had been little present to his mind of late. “I hope it hasn’t brought you any bad news?” he added, with a coolness which he was far from feeling, but which tended to reassure the Queen.
“I have only looked at the first page,” she said; “but I can see that it is an attack upon you. She says that you have injured her deeply—that you belong to her, and not to me. Cyril, I must know, I must be sure! Do you love her? have you ever loved her?”