to possess an atoning power--no longer to deceive the worthy man
who loved her so loyally, and for whom she felt an affection. At the very
next opportunity Wolf should learn that she could never become his, and
when she had just confessed it so gently and lovingly, she had only
fulfilled the vow made in the chapel before the Virgin's image. There,
too, she had determined, if the Emperor ever gave her any power over his
decisions, to reward Wolf's loyal love by interceding for him wherever it
could be done.

Now he had left her; but she could wait for her father no longer. She
must go to Fran Lerch.

The idea of confiding to her the secret which filled her with happy dread
was far from her thoughts; but love had both increased her vanity
tenfold, and confined it within narrower limits. She could not be
beautiful enough for the lover who awaited her, yet she wished to be
beautiful for him alone. But her stock of gowns and finery was so very
scanty, and no one understood how to set off her charms so well as the
obliging, experienced old woman, who had an expedient for every
emergency.

Retiring to her little bow-windowed room, she examined her store of
clothes.

There, too, lay her royal lover's gift, the glittering star.

She involuntarily seized it to take the jewel to the Grieb and show it to
the old woman; but the next instant, with a strange feeling of
dissatisfaction, she flung it back again among the other contents of the
chest.

Thus, in her impetuous fashion, she thrust it out of her sight. Maestro
Gombert had pronounced the star extremely valuable, and she desired
nothing from the Emperor Charles, nothing from her beloved lord save his
love.

She had already reached the outer door, when her two Woller cousins from
the Ark greeted her. They were merry girls, by no means plain, and very
fond of her. The younger, Anne Mirl, was even considered pretty, and had
many suitors. They had learned from their house steward, who had been
told by a fellow-countryman in the royal service, that his Majesty had
rewarded Barbara for her exquisite singing with a magnificent ornament,
and they wanted to see it.

So Barbara was obliged to open the chest again, and when the star flashed
upon them the rich girls clapped their hands in admiration, and Anne Mirl
did not understand how any one could toss such an exquisite memento into
a chest as if it were a worn-out glove. If the Emperor Charles had
honoured her with such a g