“Oh my God, my God! grant that I die!” cried the Princess Amelia.

“But the death of his beloved,” said the king (without regarding the wild exclamations of the princess)—­“this death was so greatly to his advantage, that he soon consoled himself with the love of the attractive Bestuchef—­this proud and intriguing woman who now, through the weakness of her husband, rules over Russia, and threatens by her plots and intrigues to complicate the history and peace of Europe.  She is neither young nor beautiful; she is forty years of age, and you cannot believe that Trenck at four-and-twenty burns with love for her.  But she adores him; she loves him with that mad, bacchantic ardor which the Roman empress Julia felt for the gladiators, whose magnificent proportions she admired at the circus.  She loved him and confessed it; and his heart, unsubdued by the ancient charms, yielded to the magic power of her jewels and her gold.  He became the adorer of Bestuchef; he worked diligently in the cabinet of the chancellor, and appeared to be the best of Russian patriots, and seemed ready to kiss the knout with the same devotion with which he kissed the slipper of the chancellor’s wife.  At this time I resolved to try his patriotism, and commissioned my ambassador to see if his patriotic ardor could not be cooled by gold.  Well, my sister, for two thousand ducats, Trenck copied the design of the fortress of Cronstadt, which the chancellor had just received from his engineer.”

“That is impossible!” said Amelia, whose tears had now ceased to flow, and who listened to her brother with distended but quiet eyes.

“Impossible!” said Frederick.  “Oh my sister, gold has a magic power to which nothing is impossible!  I wished to unmask the traitor Trenck, and expose him in his true colors to the chancellor.  I ordered Goltz to hand him the copy of the fortress, drawn by Trenck and signed with his name, and to tell him how he obtained it.  The chancellor was beside himself with rage, and swore to take a right Russian revenge upon the traitor—­he declared he should die under the knout.”

Amelia uttered a wild cry, and clasped her hands over her convulsed face.

The king laughed, bitterly.  “Compose yourself—­we triumphed too early; we had forgotten the woman!  In his rage the chancellor disclosed every thing to her, and uttered the most furious curses and resolves against Trenck.  She found means to warn him, and, when the police came in the night to arrest him, he was not at home—­he had taken refuge in the house of his friend the English ambassador, Lord Hyndforth.” [Footnote:  Trenck’s Memoirs.]

“Ah! he was saved, then?” whispered Amelia.