“You forget the thousands who love and trust you.  Do they deserve to be wronged?”

“No, no,—­ach, God, how I have suffered because of them!  I have betrayed them, have stolen their rights and made them a nation of beggars.  But I would not, for all this nation, have an innocent man condemned—­nor could my people ask that of me.  You cannot dissuade me.  It must be as I wish.  Oh, why does not Quinnox come for you!” She arose and paced the floor distractedly.

He was revolving a selfish, cowardly capitulation to love and injustice, when a sharp tap was heard at the door.  Leaping to his feet he whispered: 

“Quinnox!  He has come for me.  Now to get out of your room without being seen!”

The Princess Yetive ran to him, and, placing her hands on his shoulders, cried with the fierceness of despair: 

“You will go back to the monastery?  You will leave Graustark?  For my sake—­for my sake!”

He hesitated and then surrendered, his honor falling weak and faint by the pathway of passion.

“Yes!” he cried, hoarsely.

Tap! tap! tap! at the door.  Lorry took one look at the rapturous face and released her,

“Come!” she called.

The door flew open, an attendant saluted, and in stepped —­Gabriel!

XXIV

OFF TO THE DUNGEON

The tableau lasted but a moment.  Gabriel advanced a few steps, his eyes gleaming with jealousy and triumph.  Before him stood the petrified lovers, caught red-handed.  Through her dazed brain struggled the conviction that he could never escape; through his ran the miserable realization that he had ruined her forever.  Gabriel, of all men!

“I arrive inopportunely,” he said, harshly, the veins standing out on his neck and temples.  “Do I intrude?  I was not aware that you expected two, your highness!” There was no mistaking his meaning.  He viciously sought to convey the impression that he was there by appointment, a clandestine visitor in her apartments at midnight.

“What do you mean by coming to my apartment at this hour?” she stammered, trying to rescue dignity from the chaos of emotions.  Lorry was standing slightly to the right and several feet behind her.  He understood the Prince, and quickly sought to interpose with the hope that he might shield her from the sting.

“She did not expect me, sir,” he said, and a menacing gleam came to his eyes.  His pistol was in his hand.  Gabriel saw it, but the staring Princess did not.  She could not take her eyes from the face of the intruder.  “Now, may I ask why you are here?”

Gabriel’s wit saved him from death.  He saw that he could not pursue the course he had begun, for there was murder in the American’s eye.  Like a fox he swerved and, with a servile promise of submission in his glance, said: 

“I thought you were here, my fine fellow, and I came to satisfy myself.  Now, sir, may I ask why you are here?” His fingers twitched and his eyes were glassy with the malevolence he was subduing.