“You have outsped your time by two days, Mr. Wogan.  That is unwise, since it may lead us to expect again the impossible of you.  But here, alas, your speed for once brings us no profit.  You have heard, no doubt.  Her Highness the Princess Clementina is held at Innspruck in prison.”

Wogan rose to his feet.

“Prisons, sir,” he said quietly, “have been broken before to-day.  I myself was once put to that necessity.”  The words took the Chevalier completely by surprise.  He leaned back in his chair and stared at Wogan.

“An army could not rescue her,” he said.

“No, but one man might.”

“You?” he exclaimed.  He pressed down the shade of the lamp to throw the light fully upon Wogan’s face.  “It is impossible!”

“Then I beg your Majesty to expect the impossible again.”

The Chevalier drew his hand across his eyes and stared afresh at Wogan.  The audacity of the exploit and the imperturbable manner of its proposal caught his breath away.  He rose from his chair and took a turn or two across the room.

Wogan watched his every gesture.  It would be difficult he knew to wring the permission he needed from his dejected master, and his unruffled demeanour was a calculated means of persuasion.  An air of confidence was the first requisite.  In reality, however, Wogan was not troubled at this moment by any thought of failure.  It was not that he had any plan in his head; but he was fired with a conviction that somehow this chosen woman was not to be wasted, that some day, released by some means in spite of all the pressure English Ministers could bring upon the Emperor, she would come riding into Bologna.

The Chevalier paused in his walk and looked towards the Cardinal.

“What does your Eminence say?”

“That to the old the impulsiveness of youth is eternally charming,” said the Cardinal, with a foppish delicacy of speaking in an odd contrast to his person.

Mr. Wogan understood that he had a second antagonist.

“I am not a youth, your Eminence,” he exclaimed with all the indignation of twenty-seven years.  “I am a man.”

“But an Irishman, and that spells youth.  You write poetry too, I believe, Mr. Wogan.  It is a heady practice.”

Wogan made no answer, though the words stung.  An argument with the Cardinal would be sure to ruin his chance of obtaining the Chevalier’s consent.  He merely bowed to the Cardinal and waited for the Chevalier to speak.

“Look you, Mr. Wogan; while the Emperor’s at war with Spain, while England’s fleet could strip him of Sicily, he’s England’s henchman.  He dare not let the Princess go.  We know it.  General Heister, the Governor of Innspruck, is under pain of death to hold her safe.”

“But, sir, would the world stop if General Heister died?”

“A German scaffold if you fail.”

“In the matter of scaffolds I have no leaning towards any one nationality.”