“God forbid!” said I, heartily.  For next to my own father, of all men I loved the Prince.

“The Princess hath a pretty hand,” remarked Dessauer casually, as if he had said, “It will rain to-morrow!”

“I’ faith, yes!” said I; “what have you been at to find out that?”

“Weak—­weak!” he said, shaking his head.  “I fear you will wreck on that rock.  It is your blind peril!”

“My blind peril!” cried I.  “What may that be, High Councillor?”

“Ah, lad,” he said, smiling with that wise, all-patient smile which the aged affect when they mean to be impressive, yet know how useless is their wisdom, “it was never intended by the Almighty that any man should have eyes all round his head.  That is why He fixed two in front, and made them look straight forward.  That is also why He made us a little lower (generally a good deal lower) than the angels!”

I heard him as if I heard him not.

“You do me the honor to follow me?” he said, looking at me.  He was, I think, conscious that my eyes wandered to the door, for indeed I was expecting the Little Playmate to come down every minute.

“Ah! yes, you follow indeed,” he said, bitterly, “but it is the trip of feet, the flirt of farthingales down the turret steps.  No matter!  As I was saying, every man has his blind peril.  He can see the thousand.  He provides laboriously against them.  He blocks every avenue of risk, he locks every dangerous door, and lo! there is the thousand-and-first right before him, yawning wide open, which he does not see—­his Blind Peril!”

“And what, High-Councillor Dessauer, is my blind peril?”

“I will tell you, Hugo,” he said; “not that you will believe or alter a hair.  A man may do many things in this world, but one thing he cannot do.  He cannot kiss the fingers of a Princess—­dainty fingers, too, separating finger from finger—­and kiss also the Princess’s maid of honor on the mouth.  The combination is certainly entertaining, but like the Friar’s powder it is somewhat explosive.”

“And how,” asked I, “may you know all that ?”

The old man nodded his head sagely.

“Neither by ink-pool nor yet by scrying!  All the same, I know.  Moreover, your peril is not a blind peril only, but a blind man’s peril.  Ye must choose, and that quickly, little son—­fingers or lips.”

I heard the rustle of a skirt down the stair.  It was the light, springing tread of the one I loved first and best, last and only.

“By the twelve gods, lips!” cried I, and made for the door.

And I heard the chuckling laughter of High-Chancellor Dessauer behind me as I followed Helene down the stairs.  It sounded like the decanting of mellow wine, long hidden in darksome cellars, and now, in the flower of its age, bringing to the light the smiling of ancient vineyards and the shining of forgotten suns.

I found Helene arrived before me in the rose-garden.  She did not turn round as I came, though she heard me well enough.  Instead she walked on, plucking at a marguerite.