She was dazed still, and the tears veiled her sight.  He stood before her, as if guarding her, ready in case she should move and try to leave him.  His long arms hung by his sides, but not quite motionless, so that he could have caught her instantly had she attempted to spring past him; and he was wise and guessed rightly what she would do.  Her eyes brightened suddenly, and she half rose before he held her again.

“No, no!” she said desperately.  “I must go to him—­let me go—­let me go back!”

But his hands were on her shoulders in an instant, and she was in a vise, forced back to her seat.

“How dare you touch me!” she cried, in the furious anger of a woman beside herself with grief.  “How dare you lay hands on me!” she repeated in a rising key, but struggling in vain against his greater strength.

“You would have died, if I had left you there,” answered the jester.  “And besides, the people will come soon, and they would have found you there, lying on his body, and your good name would have gone forever.”

“My name!  What does a name matter?  Or anything?  Oh, let me go!  No one must touch him—­no hands that do not love him must come near him—­let me get up—­let me go in again!”

She tried to force the dwarf from her—­she would have struck him, crushed him, thrown him from the terrace, if she could.  She was strong, too, in her grief; but his vast arms were like iron bars, growing from his misshapen body.  His face was very grave and kind, and his eyes more tender than they had ever been in his life.

“No,” he said gently.  “You must not go.  By and by you shall see him again, but not now.  Do not try, for I am much stronger than you, and I will not let you go back into the room.”

Then her strength relaxed, and she turned to the stone parapet, burying her face in her crossed arms, and her tears came again.  For this the jester was glad, knowing that tears quench the first white heat of such sorrows as can burn out the soul and drive the brain raving mad, when life can bear the torture.  He stood still before her, watching her and guarding her, but he felt that the worst was past, and that before very long he could lead her away to a place of greater safety.  He had indeed taken her as far as he could from Don John’s door, and out of sight of it, where the long terrace turned to the westward, and where it was not likely that any one should pass at that hour.  It had been the impulse of the moment, and he himself had not recovered from the shock of finding Don John’s body lifeless on the floor.  He had known nothing of what had happened, but lurking in a corner to see the King pass on his way back from his brother’s quarters, he had made sure that Don John was alone, and had gone to his apartment to find out, if he could, how matters had fared, and whether he himself were in further danger or not.  He meant to escape from the palace, or to take his own life, rather than be