“I was formerly in her father’s service.  My wife——­” He hesitated, and the expression on his face was a sour one.

“Go on.”

“Ah, but it is unpleasant, Herr.  You see, my wife and I were not on the best of terms.  She was handsome . . . a cousin of the late Prince. . . .  She left me more than twenty years ago.  I have never seen her since, and I trust that she is dead.  She was her late Highness’s hair-dresser.”

“And the Princess Hildegarde?”

“She is a woman for whom I would gladly lay down my life.”

“Yes, yes!” I said impatiently.  “Who made her the woman she is?  Who taught her to shoot and fence?”

“It was I.”

“You?”

“Yes.  From childhood she has been under my care.  Her mother did so desire.  She is all I have in the world to love.  And she loves me, Herr; for in all her trials I have been her only friend.  But why do you ask these questions?” a sudden suspicion lighting his eyes.

“I love her.”

He took me by the shoulders and squared me in front of him.

“How do you love her?” a glint of anger mingling with the suspicion.

“I love her as a man who wishes to make her his wife.”

His hands trailed down my sleeves till they met and joined mine.

“I will tell you all there is to be told.  Herr, there was once a happy family in the palace of the Hohenphalians.  The Prince was rather wild, but he loved his wife.  One day his cousin came to visit him.  He was a fascinating man in those days, and few women were there who would not give an ear to his flatteries.  He was often with the Princess, but she hated him.  One day an abominable thing happened.  This cousin loved the Princess.  She scorned him.  As the Prince was entering the boudoir this cousin, making out that he was unconscious of the husband’s approach, took the Princess in his arms and kissed her.  The Prince was too far away to see the horror in his wife’s face.  He believed her to be acquiescent.  That night he accused her.  Her denials were in vain.  He confronted her with his cousin, who swore before the immortal God himself that the Princess had lain willing in his arms.  From that time on the Prince changed.  He became reckless; he fell in with evil company; he grew to be a shameless ruffian, a man who brought his women into his wife’s presence, and struck her while they were there.  And in his passions he called her terrible names.  He made a vow that when children came he would make them things of scorn.  In her great trouble, the Princess came to my inn, where the Princess Hildegarde was born.  The Prince refused to believe that the child was his.  My mistress finally sickened and died—­broken-hearted.  The Prince died in a gambling den.  The King became the guardian of the lonely child.  He knows but little, or he would not ask Her Highness—­” He stopped.

“He would not ask her what?”