The storm had ceased and in the brilliancy of the afternoon sunshine little trace of the fury of the night could be seen.  Nature smiled radiantly through the tear-drops still glistening on tree and shrub and flower, like some capricious coquette defying the world to prove that she had ever been sad.

To Sir Paul, the place was hallowed with memories of his Queen, and his heart and soul were full of her as he left the train.  At the station Vasili awaited him with the news of the double tragedy that had horrified Lucerne.

In that moment, Sir Paul’s heart broke.  He grasped at the faithful servitor for a support the old man was scarce able to give.  He looked up into the pitying face, grown old and worn in the service of the young King and his heart thrilled, as it ever thrilled, at the sight of the long, cruel scar he remembered so well—­the scar which the Kalmuck had received in the service of his Queen, long years before.

Sir Paul loved Vasili for that—­loved him even more for the service he had done the world when he choked to death the royal murderer of his Queen, on the fatal night of that tragedy so cruelly alive in his memory.  He looked again at the scar on the swarthy face, and yet he knew it was as nothing to the scar made in the old man’s heart that day.

In some way—­they never knew how—­they managed to reach the scene of the tragedy, and Sir Paul, at his urgent request, was left alone with the body of his son.

Oh, God!  Could he bear this last blow—­and live?

After a time, when reason began to re-assert itself, he searched and found the letters that had told the Boy-king the story of his birth.  Was there no word at all for him—­his father?—­save the brief telegram he had received the night before?

Ah, yes! here was a note.  His Boy had thought of him, then, even at the last.  He read it eagerly.

“Father—­dear Father—­you who alone of all the world can understand—­forgive and pity your son who has found the cross too heavy—­the crown too thorny—­to bear!  I go to join my unhappy mother across the river that men call death—­and there together we shall await the coming of the husband and father we could neither of us claim in this miserable, gray old world.  Father Paul—­dearest and best and truest of fathers, your Boy has learned with you the cost of love, and has gladly paid the price—­’sorrow and death!’”

He bent again over the cold form, he pushed aside the clustering curls, and kissed again and again, with all the fervor and pain of a lifetime’s repression, the white marble face of his son.

And a few words of that little note rang in his ears unceasingly—­“dearest, and best, and truest of fathers!” Truest of fathers!  Ah, yes!  The Boy—­his Boy—­had understood!

And the scalding tears came that were his one salvation, for they washed away for a time some of the deadly ache from his bereaved heart.