own heart was sore, and already the crust of
world-hardness had begun to melt under the tears which were welling up
ready to be shed.

She told the dwarf that he was free to return to that humble cottage in
the Swiss valley which he called home. There and then she wrote out a
passport for him and an order for a seat in the Duke's diligence as far
as the frontier; she gave him a purse of gold, and, more precious still,
an official command to all to treat the deformed traveller with
consideration; also, as postscriptum, an intimation that if the dwarf did
not reach his home safe and unrobbed, she would cause the whole Secret
Service to track the offender, who would suffer the utmost penalty of the
law. With this document the dwarf could have travelled from one end of
Wirtemberg to the other in safety; nay, more, he was sure of even servile
acceptance from high and low, for never was monarch so feared in his
domains as the Guestrow adventuress in the Dukedom of Wirtemberg.

'God reward you for this great good,' the dwarf said as he turned to
leave her presence, and she answered sadly:

'It is too late; God's hand is heavy upon me.' But she did not believe
it.

The hours passed, and still the Landhofmeisterin waited for Eberhard
Ludwig. She watched the grey dawn slip into the sky, then the glow of the
awaking sun came, and she knew that she waited in vain.

CHAPTER XX

SATIETY

'A Cloud of sorrow hanging as if Gloom
Had passed out of men's minds into the air.'

SHELLEY.

FRIEDRICH WILHELM and his Highness of Wirtemberg started early on the
morning after the state banquet. A number of wild boars had been tracked
in the Kernen forest and good sport was anticipated. The Landhofmeisterin
from her couch heard the stir of the sportsmen's departure. In happier
days she had waved farewell to her lover from her window, now she turned
her face to the wall and moaned in anguish. But the day's routine should
be carried out as usual, that she vowed; no one should pity her, no one
notice that she feared her sun had set. She dressed according to her wont
in a magnificent gown, sat patiently for an hour in her powdering closet
while the obsequious Frenchman dressed her hair elaborately and powdered
the curls afresh.

She reflected grimly on the blessings of powder to age-silvering locks;
none would see that her black hair was streaked with white.

Her step had never been prouder than when she walked through h