ed in, disguised as a page, she entered the litter and
was carried to the Golden Cross, where Adrian received her and conducted
her to his royal master.

The elderly man thought he had never seen her look so charming as in the
yellow velvet doublet with ash-gray facings, the gray silk hose, and the
yellow and gray cap resting on her glittering golden hair.

And the Emperor Charles was of the same opinion.

Besides, her lively prank transported him back to his own youth, when
he himself had glided more than once in page's attire to some beautiful
young lady of the court, and gaily as in better days, tenderly as an
ardent youth, he thanked her for her charming enterprise.

After a few blissful hours, which crowded all that she had lately
suffered into oblivion, she left him.

When she again entered the little Prebrunn castle she would gladly have
embraced the whole world.

From the litter she had noticed a light in the windows of the marquise's
sitting-room, but she could now look the poor old noblewoman freely in
the face, for this time, sure of experiencing no sharp rebuff, she had
found courage to speak of the son to her royal lover.

True, as soon as Charles heard what she desired, he kindly requested
her not to sully her beautiful lips with the name of a scoundrel who
had long since forfeited every claim to his favour, and her mission was
thereby frustrated; but she had now kept her promise.

With the entreaty to spare him in future the pain of refusing any wish
of the woman he loved, the disagreeable affair had been dismissed.

When Barbara took the lute, he had begged the fairest of all troubadours
to sing once more, before any other song, his beloved "Quia amore
langueo," and the most vigorous applause was bestowed on every one which
she afterward executed.

Now she had done all that was possible for the marquise, but no power on
earth should induce her to undertake anything of the sort a second time;
She was saying this to herself as she entered the little castle.

Let the old noblewoman come now!

She was not long in doing so. But how she looked!

The little gray curls done up in papers stood out queerly from her
narrow head. Her haggard cheeks were destitute of rouge and lividly
pale.

Her black eyes glittered strangely from their deep sockets as if she
were insane, and ragged pieces of her morning dress, which she had torn
in a fit of helpless fury, hung down upon her breast.

The sight made