They stood watching her until she
and her horse dwindled into a mere moving speck, finally to
become lost altogether in a crook of the road.
"I should like to know what that means," said Maurice.
"It is very strange," the prince said, musingly. "I have seen
that woman before. She is one of the dancers at the opera."
"Mayhap she has a lover on the other side."
"Mayhap. Let us be on. There's the sun, and we are a good
thirteen miles away!" and the prince slapped the neck of his
horse, which bounded forward.
This tiring pace they maintained until they mounted the hill
from which they could see the glittering spires of the city, and
the Werter See as it flashed back the sunlight.
"Bleiberg!" Maurice waved his hand.
"Thanks to you, that I look on it."
It was ten o'clock when they passed under the city gates.
"Monsieur, will you go with me to the palace?" asked the prince.
"If your Highness will excuse me," said Maurice; "no, I should
be in the way; and besides I am dead for want of sleep."
"I shall never sleep," grumbled the prince, "till I have humbled
that woman. And you? Have you no rankle in your heart? Have you
no desire to witness that woman's humiliation?"
"Your Highness, I belong to a foreign country.
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