“Do not ever be unkind, Hugo,” she said.  “I am very lonely.  I wish, with all my heart, I were back again in the old Red Tower.”

“Unkind—­never while I live, little one,” I whispered in her ear.  “Cheer your heart, and to-morrow your sorrows will wear off, and you and I both shall find friendship in the strange land.”

“I hate the Princess!  And I shall never like her as long as I live!” she said, with that certain concentrated dislike which only good women feel towards those a degree less innocent, specially when the latter are well to look upon.

There was no time to reply immediately as I conducted her up the steps.  For I had to keep my eyes open to observe how the Prince conducted himself, and in the easy ceremonial of Plassenburg it chanced that I happened upon nothing extravagant.

“But, Helene, you said a while ago that you hated me!” I said, after a little pause, smiling down at her.

“Did I?” she answered.  “Surely nay!”

“Ah, but ’tis true as your eyes,” I persisted.  “Do you not remember when I had cut the calf’s head off with the axe?  You did not love the thought of the Red Tower so much then!”

“Oh, that!” she said, as if the discrepancy had been fully explained by the inflexion of her voice upon the word.

But she pressed my hand, so I cared not a jot for logic.

“You do not love her, you are sure?” she said, looking up at me when we came to the darker turn of the stairs, for the corkscrews were narrower in the ancient castle than in the new palace below.

“Not a bit!” said I, heartily, without any more pretence that I did not understand what she meant.

She pressed my hand again, momentarily slipping her own down off my arm to do it.

“It is not that I love you, Hugo, or that I want you to love me,” she said, like one who explains that which is plain already, “except, of course, as your Little Playmate.  But I could not bear that you should care about that—­that woman.”

It was evident that there were to be stirring times in the Castle of Plassenburg, and that I, Hugo Gottfried, was to have my share of them.

As soon as we had arrived at the banqueting-hall, the Prince beckoned me and presented me formally to the Lady Ysolinde.

“Your Highness, this is Captain Hugo Gottfried, my new officer-in-waiting.”

The Princess bowed gravely and held out her hand.  Her aqua-marine eyes were bent upon me, suffused with a certain quick and evident pleasure which became them well.

“Your Highness has chosen excellently.  I can bear witness that the Captain Gottfried is a brave—­a very brave man,” she said.

And at that moment I was most grateful to her for the testimony.  For behind us stood the young Von Reuss, pulling at his mustache and looking very superciliously over at me.

Then the Lady Ysolinde withdrew to her own apartments, and that day I got no more words with her nor yet with Helene.