proach, though worth seeing
from a distance.

But the men pressed close to her as she passed, and she heard them tell
each other that she was a brave woman who could dare to save her father
by such means, and there were quick applauding words as she passed, and
one said audibly that he could die for a girl who had such a true heart,
and another answered that he would marry her if she could forget Don
John. And they did not speak without respect, but in earnest, and out of
the fulness of their admiration.

At last she was at the door, and she paused to speak before going out.

"Have I saved his life?" she asked, looking up to the old Prince's kind
face. "Will they believe me?"

"They believe you," he answered. "But your father's life is in the
King's hands. You should go to his Majesty without wasting time. Shall I
go with you? He will see you, I think, if I ask it."

"Why should I tell the King?" asked Dolores. "He was there--he saw it
all--he knows the truth."

She hardly realized what she was saying.

* * * * *

CHAPTER XVI

Ruy Gomez was as loyal, in his way, as Mendoza himself, but his loyalty
was of a very different sort, for it was tempered by a diplomatic spirit
which made it more serviceable on ordinary occasions, and its object was
altogether a principle rather than a person. Mendoza could not conceive
of monarchy, in its abstract, without a concrete individuality
represented by King Philip; but Ruy Gomez could not imagine the world
without the Spanish monarchy, though he was well able to gauge his
sovereign's weaknesses and to deplore his crimes. He himself was
somewhat easily deceived, as good men often are, and it was he who had
given the King his new secretary, Antonio Perez; yet from the moment
when Mendoza had announced Don John's death, he had been convinced that
the deed had either been done by Philip himself or by his orders, and
that Mendoza had bravely sacrificed himself to shield his master. What
Dolores had said only confirmed his previous opinion, so far as her
father's innocence was at stake. As for her own confession, he believed
it, and in spite of himself he could not help admiring the girl's heroic
courage. Dolores might have been in reality ten times worse than she had
chosen to represent herself; she would still have been a model of all
virtue compared with his own wife, though he did not know half of the
Princess's doings, and was certainly