“A sober, honest gentleman,” said the mother.

“A sober butler to an honest gentleman,” said Clementina.

“He has an air,” said Chateaudoux.

“He has indeed,” replied Clementina, “as though he handed himself upon a plate to you, and said, ‘Here is a miracle.  Thank God for it!’ Well, I must take to my bed.  I am very ill.  I have a fever on me, and that’s truth.”

She moved towards the door, but before she had reached it there came a knocking on the street door below.

Clementina stopped; Chateaudoux looked out of the window.

“It is the Prince’s carriage,” said he.

“I will not see him,” exclaimed Clementina.

“My child, you must,” said her mother, “if only for the last time.”

“Each time he comes it is for the last time, yet the next day sees him still in Innspruck.  My patience and my courtesy are both outworn.  Besides, to-day, now that I have heard this great news we have waited for—­how long?  Oh, mother, oh, mother, I cannot!  I shall betray myself.”

The Princess’s mother made an effort.

“Clementina, you must receive him.  I will have it so.  I am your mother.  I will be your mother,” she said in a tremulous tone, as though the mere utterance of the command frightened her by its audacity.

Clementina was softened on the instant.  She ran across to her mother’s chair, and kneeling by it said with a laugh, “So you shall.  I would not barter mothers with any girl in Christendom.  But you understand.  I am pledged in honour to my King.  I will receive the Prince, but indeed I would he had not come,” and rising again she kissed her mother on the forehead.

She received the Prince of Baden alone.  He was a stout man of much ceremony and took some while to elaborate a compliment upon Clementina’s altered looks.  Before, he had always seen her armed and helmeted with dignity; now she had much ado to keep her lips from twitching into a smile, and the smile in her eyes she could not hide at all.  The Prince took the change to himself.  His persistent wooing had not been after all in vain.  He was not, however, the man to make the least of his sufferings in the pursuit which seemed to end so suitably to-day.

“Madam,” he said with his grandest air, “I think to have given you some proof of my devotion.  Even on this inclement day I come to pay my duty though the streets are deep in snow.”

“Oh, sir,” exclaimed Clementina, “then your feet are wet.  Never run such risks for me.  I would have no man weep on my account though it were only from a cold in the head.”

The Prince glanced at Clementina suspiciously.  Was this devotion?  He preferred to think so.

“Madam, have no fears,” said he, tenderly, wishing to set the anxious creature at her ease.  “I drove here in my carriage.”

“But from the carriage to the door you walked?”

“No, madam, I was carried.”