But as soon as he heard what she desired, he straightened himself in the saddle, and cried:  “When I wished to present you to his Majesty—­do you remember?—­at Ratisbon, you hastily wheeled your horse and vanished.  Now, when you desire to bid farewell to our sovereign lord, I dutifully follow the example you then set me.”

As he spoke he put spurs to his horse and, kissing his hand to her, dashed away.  Barbara, wounded and disappointed, gazed after the pitiless scoffer.

She had knocked in vain where she might hope for consideration; only the young man of middle height who, carrying a portfolio under his arm, now approached her and raised his black secretary’s cap, had been omitted, though he, too, was one of the old Ratisbon friends, and his position with the Bishop of Arras gave him a certain influence.

It was the little Maltese choir boy, Hannibal Melas, who owed so much to her recommendation.

He asked sympathizingly what troubled her and, after Barbara had confided to him what she had hitherto vainly desired, he referred her unasked to his omnipotent master, who was to enter King Philip’s service, and proposed that she should come to his office early the next morning.  Thence he would try to take her to the minister, who had by no means forgotten her superb singing.  His Eminence had mentioned her kindly very recently in a conversation with the leech.

The following morning Barbara went to the great statesman’s business offices.  Hannibal was waiting for her.

It was on Saint Raphael’s day, which had attracted his fellow-clerks to a festival in the country.  Granvelle had given the others leave of absence, but wished to keep within call the industrious Maltese, on whose zeal he could always rely.

Without stopping his diligent work at the writing-desk, the secretary begged Barbara to wait a short time.  He would soon finish the draught of the new edict for which his Eminence and the Councillor Viglius were waiting in the adjoining chamber.  The pictures on the walls of the fourth room were worth looking at.

Barbara followed his advice, but she paused in the third room, for through the partly open door she heard Granvelle’s familiar voice.

Curious to see what changes time had wrought, she peered through the by no means narrow crack and overlooked the minister’s spacious office, where he was now entirely alone with the Councillor Viglius.

The Bishop of Arras had scarcely altered since their last meeting, only his appearance had become somewhat more stately, and his clever, handsome face was fuller.