ead of Wirtemberg's court, it was imperative
Johanna Elizabetha should be removed. Murder no longer being politic--the
Emperor had frightened the Graevenitz off that track--it remained to
devise some other scheme whereby the Duchess could be rendered
unobnoxious.

Upon Eberhard Ludwig's arrival at the Jaegerhaus, he was immediately
informed of his mistress's decision. Again a small event precipitated the
formation of an important plan. Johanna Elizabetha had wept incessantly
during the Christmas Eve supper, and the Duchess-mother's sharp tongue
had rasped the Duke's irritable nerves till he had lost control of his
temper and had roughly bidden his wife and mother to leave him in peace.
There had followed a painful scene. Thus his Highness was well disposed
towards any scheme which would release him from his inharmonious family
circle. Yet he hesitated to acquiesce in the daring project of the entire
removal from Stuttgart of court and government. Wirtemberg had been
governed at Stuttgart, and the chief ducal residence had been there since
the twelfth century. As to Johanna Elizabetha's retirement to a
dower-house he reminded Wilhelmine that the proposal had been made, and
that the Duchess's answer was decisive: so long as she did not mourn her
husband's death she would remain in residence at Stuttgart's castle. The
Duke added that he had no power to force her to leave.

Serenissimus and the Landhofmeisterin were together in the famous yellow
damask room of the Jaegerhaus. The blue-tiled stove radiated a pleasant
warmth, and from the windows the lovers could see the snow-covered
Graben, the main thoroughfare of the town. The cheerful jingle of
sleigh-bells rang out as the peasants' sledges glided over the snow. The
Christmas Day service in the Leonards Kirche had ended, and the
traditional dole of silver pieces had been distributed in the Duke's
name, an old custom of mediaeval times.

It was one of those absolutely still winter mornings, so fraught with
peace, so purified by the great white silence of snow. Something of the
artificial elegance, the stilted formality of the eighteenth century with
its scrupulous apeing of French airs, mannerisms, and vices, seemed to
fall from the lovers in the Jaegerhaus, and for an hour they dreamed of
simple natural homely peace. Alas! their dream was of such a life
together. Like most dreams it was based on an impossibility.

A peasant couple in a sledge passed the window. The man