In the one tower of the citadel there were prisons of tolerably pleasant aspect, but she had heard whispers of terrible subterranean dungeons connected with the secret tribunal.

Suppose the Emperor Charles intended to lock her in one of these dungeons and withdraw her from the eyes of the world?  Who could guard her from this horrible fate? who could prevent him from keeping her buried alive during her life?

Shuddering, she looked out again.  If she was not mistaken, they were nearing the end of the road, and she would soon learn what was before her.  Perhaps the Emperor Charles himself was awaiting her up there.  But if he asked her whether she intended always to defy him, she would show him that Barbara Blomberg was not to be intimidated; that she knew how to defend herself and, if necessary, to suffer; that she would be ready to risk everything to baffle his design and carry out her own resolve.  Then he should see that nations and kings, nay, even the Holy Father in Rome-as Charles had once sacrilegiously done—­may be vanquished and humbled; that the hard, precious stone may be crushed and solid metal melted, but the steadfast will of a woman battling for what she holds dearest can not be broken.

The sedan chair had already passed through half a dozen citadel gates and left one solid wall behind it, but now a second rose, with a lofty door set in its strong masonry.

When Barbara had formerly ascended the Trausnitz, with what pleasure she had gazed at the deep moat at her left, the pheasants, the stately peacocks, and other feathered creatures, as well as a whole troop of lively monkeys; but this time she saw nothing except that the heavy iron-bound portals of the entrance opened before her, that the drawbridge, though the sun was close to the western horizon, was still lowered, and that Quijada stood at the end, motioning to the bearers to set the sedan chair on the ground.

Now the major-domo opened the door, and this time he was not alone; Barbara saw behind him a woman whose appearance, spite of her angry excitement, inspired confidence.

The questions which, without heeding his companion, she now with crimson cheeks poured upon Don Luis as if fairly frantic, he answered in brief, businesslike words.

The Emperor Charles wished to place her in safe quarters up here, while he himself had taken lodgings in the modest house of a Schwaiger—­a small farmer who tilled his own garden and land in the valley below.

For the present, some of the most distinguished officers were here in the citadel as guests of the Duke of Bavaria.  Barbara was to live in the ladies’ apartments of the fortress, under the care of the worthy woman at his side.

“His Majesty could not have provided for you more kindly,” he concluded.

“Then may the Virgin preserve every one from such kindness!” she impetuously exclaimed.  “I am dragged to this citadel against my will—–­”