“My sincerest prayer is that you may succeed, my fair cousin, and I will not darken with doubts and fears a time that ought to be given up to joy; I will not mingle with the shouts of gladness that rise on all sides to proclaim you queen, any vain regrets over that blind fortune which has placed beside the woman whom we all alike adore, whose single glance would make a man more blest than the angels, a foreigner unworthy of your love and unworthy of your throne.”

“You forget, Charles,” said the queen, putting out her hand as though to check his words, “Andre is my husband, and it was my grandfather’s will that he should reign with me.”

“Never!” cried the duke indignantly; “he King of Naples!  Nay, dream that the town is shaken to its very foundations, that the people rise as one man, that our church bells sound a new Sicilian vespers, before the people of Naples will endure the rule of a handful of wild Hungarian drunkards, a deformed canting monk, a prince detested by them even as you are beloved!”

“But why is Andre blamed?  What has he done?”

“What has he done?  Why is he blamed, madam?  The people blame him as stupid, coarse, a savage; the nobles blame him for ignoring their privileges and openly supporting men of obscure birth; and I, madam,”—­here he lowered his voice, “I blame him for making you unhappy.”

Joan shuddered as though a wound had been touched by an unkind hand; but hiding her emotion beneath an appearance of calm, she replied in a voice of perfect indifference—­

“You must be dreaming, Charles; who has given you leave to suppose I am unhappy?”

“Do not try to excuse him, my dear cousin,” replied Charles eagerly; “you will injure yourself without saving him.”

The queen looked fixedly at her cousin, as though she would read him through and through and find out the meaning of his words; but as she could not give credence to the horrible thought that crossed her mind, she assumed a complete confidence in her cousin’s friendship, with a view to discovering his plans, and said carelessly—­

“Well, Charles, suppose I am not happy, what remedy could you offer me that I might escape my lot?”

“You ask me that, my dear cousin?  Are not all remedies good when you suffer, and when you wish for revenge?”

“One must fly to those means that are possible.  Andre will not readily give up his pretensions:  he has a party of his own, and in case of open rupture his brother the King of Hungary may declare war upon us, and bring ruin and desolation upon our kingdom.”

The Duke of Duras faintly smiled, and his countenance assumed a sinister expression.

“You do not understand me,” he said.

“Then explain without circumlocution,” said the queen, trying to conceal the convulsive shudder that ran through her limbs.

“Listen, Joan,” said Charles, taking his cousin’s hand and laying it upon his heart:  “can you feel that dagger?”