persuading so fair a creature to resign herself to the doubtful destiny
of a throne. She had laid aside her magnificent bridal-robes of ivory
satin and cloth-of-gold,--and appeared before him in loose draperies of
floating white, with her rich hair unbound and rippling to her knees.

"May I speak?" she murmured, and her voice trembled.

"Most assuredly!"--he replied, half smiling--"You do me too much honour
by requesting the permission!"

As he spoke, he bowed profoundly, but she, raising her eyes, fixed them
full upon him with a strange look of mingled pride and pain.

"Do not," she said, "let us play at formalities! Let us be honest with
each other for to-night at least! All our life together must from
henceforth be more or less of a masquerade, but let us for to-night be
as true man and true woman, and frankly face the position into which we
have been thrust, not by ourselves, but by others."

Profoundly astonished, the prince was silent. He had not thought this
girl of nineteen possessed any force of character or any intellectual
power of reasoning. He had judged her as no doubt glad to become a
great princess and a possible future queen, and he had not given her
credit for any finer or higher feeling.

"You know,"--she continued--"you must surely know--" here, despite the
strong restraint she put upon herself, her voice broke, and her slight
figure swayed in its white draperies as if about to fall. She looked at
him with a sense of rising tears in her throat,--tears of which she was
ashamed,--for she was full of a passionate emotion too strong for