“Ah, they will torture him, and yet he is innocent!” cried Elizabeth, bursting into tears.  And, clasping the regent’s neck, she anxiously exclaimed:  “Ah, Anna, dear Anna, save me from my enemies!  Let them not steal away my friends and ruin me!  They would also torture me and send me to Siberia; Anna, my friend, my sovereign, save me!  You alone can do it, for you know me, and know that I am innocent!  The idea that I should conspire against you, against you whom I love, and to whom, upon the sacred books of our religion, I have sworn eternal fidelity and devotion!  Anna, Anna, I swear to you by the soul of my father, I am innocent, as also is my friend.  Lestocq has never passed the threshold of the French ambassador’s hotel!  Oh, dear, dear Anna, have mercy on me, and do not permit them to torture me and wrench my poor members!”

With a loud cry of anguish, with streaming tears, pale and trembling, Elizabeth sank down at the regent’s feet.

It was this cry of anguish that rang through the hall, and spread everywhere astonishment and consternation.  And this shrieking, and weeping, and trembling, was no mask, but truth.  Elizabeth was frightened, she wept and trembled from fear, but she had sufficient presence of mind not to betray herself in words.  It was fear even that gave her that presence of mind and enabled her to play her part in a manner so masterly that the regent was completely deceived.  Taking the princess in her arms, she pressed her to her bosom, at the same time endeavoring to reassure and console her with tender and affectionate words, with reiterated promises of her protection and her love.

But it was a long time before the trembling and weeping princess could be tranquillized—­before she could be made to believe Anna’s asseverations that she had always loved and never mistrusted her.

“What most deeply saddens me,” said Elizabeth, with feeling, “is the idea that you, my Anna, could believe these calumnies, and suppose me capable of such black treason.  Ah, I should be as bad as Judas Iscariot could I betray my noble and generous mistress.”

Tears of emotion stood in Anna’s eyes.  She impressed a tender kiss upon Elizabeth’s lips, and with her own hand wiped the tears from the cheeks of the princess.

“Weep no more, Elizabeth,” she tenderly said—­“nay, I beg of you, weep no more.  It is indeed all right and good between us, and no cloud shall disturb our love or our mutual confidence.  Come, let us smile and be cheerful again, that this listening and curious court may know nothing of your tears.  They would make a prodigious affair of it, and we will not give them occasion to say we have been at variance.”

“No, they shall all see that I love, that I adore you,” said Elizabeth, covering Anna’s hand with kisses.

“They shall see that we love each other,” said Anna, taking the arm of the princess.  “Be of good cheer, my friend, and take my imperial word for it that I, whatever people may say of you, will believe no one but yourself; that I will truly inform you of all calumnies, and give you an opportunity to disarm your enemies and defend yourself.  Now come, and let us make another tour through the halls.”