“Why are you so agitated, Querida?  Did the sight of the silent brother alarm the sister?  Ay, darling, there are some things more terrible than the wild boar at which the brave huntress hurls her spear.  Our mother’s bequest——­”

Queen Mary, with hands outstretched beseechingly, bowed the knee before him; but he raised her with more strength than would have been expected from him just before, and, sighing faintly, continued: 

“There are hours, Mary, when the demon that overpowered the mother stretches his talons toward the son also.  But, in spite of his satanic origin, he is a cowardly wight, and a loving face, a tender word, drives him away.”

“Then may my coming be blessed!” she answered warmly.  “Yet it can scarcely be a demon or any being of mortal mould that is spoiling the life happiness of my beloved brother and sovereign lord.  After all, they are tolerably alike in the main point, and what semblance would the son of hell wear that dares to assail the most powerful and vigorous mind of all the ages, and yet is seized with panic terror at the glance of a feeble woman?  Whoever knows the anxieties which have recently burdened your Majesty, and the wide range of the decision to which the course of events is urging you, can not wonder if, as just now, your cheerful spirits desert you.  No demons or evil creatures of that sort, Heaven knows, are needed to accomplish it.”

“Certainly not,” replied the Emperor.  “Yet it does not matter what name is borne by the unconquerable power which poisons with horrible images the few hours of repose allotted to the solitary man who is bereft of love and joy.  But let us drop the subject!  When you appear and raise your voice, it seems as though all gloomy thoughts heard the view hallo which drives your stags and roes back into their coverts, Mary.  I suppose you have come to summon me to the table?”

The Queen assented, and now he could not prevent her kissing his hand.  Then she seized the dainty little bell on the table to ring for the valet Adrian; but the Emperor Charles stopped her with the exclamation: 

“Never mind him.  I will go with you as I am, if you do not object to sharing your meal with such a scarecrow of a man.  Only permit me to lock up these papers.”

“From Rome?” asked the regent eagerly.

“That is easily discerned,” replied the Emperor.  “New and amazingly favourable promises.  Nothing is required of me except the trifling obligation to allow the Protestants nothing in religious affairs which the Pope or the Council do not approve.  If I agree to accept the promises, every one will think that I have the advantage, and yet, if the contract is made, it is tearing from the sky the political polestar of many a lustrum, and burying one of my clearest, ripest, most sacred hopes.”