It was Father Lamormain who, gliding to his side, assumed the gracious part of cicerone.
"And are you still pleased with your good news, colonel?" he asked with his benevolent smile of universal fatherhood.
"More and more, Father! This morning there was the promise. This evening it is in flower!"
"The blossom," said the priest, looking at the court suit, "becomes the tree if the tree yield good fruit." A saying which left Nigel puzzled, intimating as it did that his reward was not so much for service done as for services to do. He had no time to ponder it, for Father Lamormain had led him to the Archduchess Stephanie and was presenting him.
"Your Highness! may I present to you the youngest Colonel of Musketeers in the Imperial armies, Mr Nigel Charteris, who has had the honour and the peril of bearing Count Tilly's despatches from Magdeburg!"
"I am pleased to greet you!" said the Archduchess, giving him her hand to kiss. "I trust your journey was as pleasant as the issue was successful."
As Nigel had bent to kiss the long slender fingers that were so like the Emperor's, he seemed to see again those of Ottilie von Thüringen binding up the wound of Elspeth Reinheit. He answered her—
"The journey was not so perilous, your Highness, as the reward is great in your Highness's gracious welcome!" And greatly daring he gazed for a moment with unfeigned admiration at the eyes of the Archduchess.
"Count Tilly's captains are swift to learn, Father?" she said, smiling.
"They are more teachable than princesses!" said Father Lamormain, with such banter in his tone as the privileged spiritual director of the family might employ. "And princesses," he added, "are swift to teach."