"Impossible if your Majesty so wills it. No one can disobey your
Majesty."

"_I_ shall not prevent it; but surely your own reason, and the immense
difficulties of such an undertaking, will."

"Sire! I will set out to-morrow."

"But if you perish on the road?"

"If I perish, sire, he will have lost nothing, for I am neither his
mother, his daughter, nor sister, but only his mistress--that is, a
woman to whom society gives no rights, and who must consider herself
fortunate if the world looks upon her with no harsher feeling than
indifference. But if I _am_ able to join him, I shall be _every thing_
to him--mother, sister, family, and friends. We shall be two to suffer
instead of one, and that fearful exile will lose half its terrors. You
see, sire, I _must_ rejoin him, and that as soon as possible."

"You are right," said the Emperor, looking fixedly at her, "and I no
longer oppose your departure."

He rang; an aide-de-camp appeared.

"Is Corporal Ivan in attendance?"

"He waits your Majesty's orders."

"Let him come in."