"No, mother, you shall not touch it," cried Yolanda, s.n.a.t.c.hing the parchment from the countess and holding it behind her. "If I would let you, you could not make the alteration; see, your hand trembles! You would blot the parchment and spoil all this fine plan of mine. Give me the quill, mother! Give me the quill!"

She took the quill from Margaret's pa.s.sive hand and sat down at the table. Spreading the missive before her, she dipped the quill in the ink-well, and when she lifted it, a drop of ink fell upon the table within a hair's breadth of the parchment.

"Ah, Blessed Virgin!" cried Yolanda, s.n.a.t.c.hing the missive away from the ink blot. "If the ink had fallen on the parchment, we surely had been lost. I, too, am trembling, and I dare not try to make the alteration now. What a poor, helpless creature I am, when I cannot even cross a 't'

to save myself. Blessed Virgin, help me once more!"

But help did not come. Yolanda's excitement grew instead of subsiding, and she was so wrought upon by a nameless fear that she began to weep.

Margaret seated herself on the divan and covered her face with her hands. Yolanda walked the floor like a caged wild thing, uttering ejaculatory prayers to the Virgin. Again she took up the quill, but again put it down, exclaiming:--

"I have it, mother! There is a friend of whom I have often told you--Sir Karl. He will help us if I can bring him here in time. If father has left the castle, I'll take the letter to my parlor and fetch Sir Karl.

He is a brave, strong old man and his hand will not tremble."

Yolanda left the room and soon returned.

"Father has gone to the marshes," she whispered excitedly. "We have ample time if I can find Sir Karl."

She took the missive, the ink, and the quill to her parlor in Darius Tower, and hurried to Castleman's house. How she got there I will soon tell you.

She found Twonette sewing, and hastily explained her wishes.

"Run, Twonette, to The Mitre, and fetch me Sir Karl. I don't want Sir Max to know that I am sending. I think Sir Max has gone falconing with father; I pray G.o.d he has gone, and I pray that Sir Karl has not. Tell Sir Karl to come to me at once. If he is not at the inn send for him. If you love me, Twonette, make all haste. Run! Run!"

Twonette's haste was really wonderful. When she found me her cheeks were like red roses, and she could hardly speak for lack of breath. For the first and last time I saw Twonette shorn of her serenity.

The duke had not invited me to go hawking, and fortunately I had stayed at home cuddling the thought that Yolanda was the Princess Mary, and that my fair Prince Max had found rare favor in her eyes.

"Yolanda wants you at my father's house immediately," said Twonette, when I stepped outside the inn door. "The need is urgent beyond measure." Whereupon she courtesied and turned away. Twonette held that words were not made to be wasted, so I asked no questions. I almost ran to Castleman's house, and was taken at once to a large room in the second story. It was on the west side of the house immediately against the castle wall. The walls of the room were sealed with broad oak panels, beautifully carved, and the west end of the apartment--that next the castle wall--was hung with silk tapestries. When I entered the room I found Yolanda alone. She hurriedly closed the door after me and spoke excitedly:--

"I am so glad Twonette found you, Sir Karl. I am in dire need. Will you help me?"

"I will help you if it is in my power, Yolanda," I answered. "You can ask nothing which I will not at least try to do."

"Even at the risk of your life?" she asked, placing her hand upon my arm.

"Even to the loss of my life, Yolanda," I replied.

"Would you commit an act which the law calls a crime?" she asked, trembling in voice and limb.

"I would do that which is really a crime, if I might thereby serve you to great purpose," I answered. "G.o.d often does apparent evil that good may come of it. An act must be judged as a whole, by its conception, its execution, and its result. Tell me what you wish me to do, and I will do it without an 'if'--G.o.d giving me the power."

"Then come with me."

She took my hand and led me to the end of the room next the castle wall. There she held the draperies to one side while she pushed back one of the oak panels. Through this opening we pa.s.sed, and the draperies fell together behind us. After Yolanda had opened the panel a moment of light revealed to me a flight of stone steps built in the heart of the castle wall, which at that point was sixteen feet thick. When Yolanda closed the panel, we were in total darkness. She took my left hand in her left and with her right arm at my back guided me up the long, dark stairway. While mounting the steps, she said:--"Now, Sir Karl, you have all my great secrets--at least, they are very great to me. You know who I am, and you know of this stairway. No one knows of it but my mother, uncle, aunt, Twonette, and my faithful tire-woman, Anne. Even my father does not know of its existence. If he knew, he would soon close it. My grandfather, Duke Philip the Good, built it in the wall to connect his bedroom with the house of his true friend, burgher Castleman. Some day I'll tell you the story of the stairway, and how I discovered it. My bedroom is the one my grandfather occupied."

The stairway explained to me all the strange occurrences relating to Yolanda's appearances and disappearances at Castleman's house, and it will do the same for you.

After we had climbed until I felt that surely we must be among the clouds, I said:--

"Yolanda, you must be leading me to heaven."

"I should like to do that, Sir Karl," she responded, laughing softly.

"I would gladly give my life to lead you and Max to heaven," said I.

"Ah, Sir Karl," she answered gently, pressing my hand and caressingly placing her cheek against my arm. "I dare not even think on that. If he could and would take me, believing me to be a burgher girl, he would truly lead me to heaven."

After a pause, while we rested to take a breath, I said: "What is it you want me to do, Yolanda? I am unarmed."

"I shall not ask you to do murder, Sir Karl," she said, laughing nervously. I fancied I could see a sparkle of mirth in her eyes as she continued: "It is not so bad as that. Neither is there a dragon for you to overthrow. But I shall soon enlighten you--here we are at the top of the steps."

At the moment she spoke I collided with a heavy oak part.i.tion, in which Yolanda quickly found a moving panel, and we entered a dimly lighted room. I noticed among the furniture a gorgeously tapestried bed. A rich rug, the like of which I had seen in Damascus, covered the floor. The stone walls were draped with silk tapestry, and a jewelled lamp was pendant from the vaulted ceiling. This was Yolanda's bedroom, and truly it was a resting-place worthy of the richest princess in Christendom. I felt that I was in the holy of holies. I found difficulty in believing that the childlike Yolanda could be so important a personage in the politics of Europe. She seemed almost to belong to me, so much at that time did she lean on my strength.

Out of her sleeping apartment she led me to another and a larger room, lighted by broad windows cut through the inner wall of the castle, which at that point was not more than three or four feet thick. This was Yolanda's parlor. The floor, like that of the bedroom, was covered with a Damascus rug. The windows were closed by gla.s.s of crystal purity, and the furniture was richer than any I had seen in the emperor's palace.

Yolanda led me to a table, pointed to a chair for me, and drew up one for herself. At that moment a lady entered, whom Yolanda ran to meet.

The princess took the lady's hand and led her to me:--

"Sir Karl, this is my mother. As you already know, she is my stepmother, but I forget that in the love I bear her, and in the sweet love she gives to me."

I bent my knee before the d.u.c.h.ess, who gave me her hand to kiss, saying:--

"The princess has often spoken to me of you, Sir Karl. I see she has crept into your heart. She wins all who know her."

"My devotion to Her Highness is self-evident and needs no avowal," I answered, "but I take pleasure in declaring it. I am ready to aid her at whatever cost."

"Has the princess told you what she wants you to do?" asked the d.u.c.h.ess.

I answered that she had not, but that I was glad to pledge myself unenlightened. I then placed a chair for the d.u.c.h.ess, but, of course, remained standing. Yolanda resumed her chair, and said:--

"Fetch a chair, Sir Karl. We are glad to have you sit, are we not, mother?"

"Indeed we are," said Margaret. "Please sit by the table, and the princess will explain why she brought you here."

"I believe I can now do it myself, mother," said Yolanda, taking a folded parchment from its pouch.

"See, my hand is perfectly steady. Sir Karl has given me strength."

She spread the parchment before her, and, taking a quill from the table, dipped it in the ink-well.

"I'll not need you after all, Sir Karl. I find I can commit my own crime," she said, much to my disappointment. I was, you see, eager to sin for her. I longed to kill some one or to do some other deed of valiant and perilous villany.

Yolanda bent over the missive, quill in hand, but hesitated. She changed her position on the chair, squaring herself before the parchment, and tried again, but she seemed unable to use the quill. She placed it on the table and laughed nervously.

"I surely am a great fool," she said. "When I take the quill in my hand, I tremble like a squire on his quintain trial. I'll wait a moment, and grow calm again," she added, with a fluttering little laugh peculiar to her when she was excited. But she did not grow calm, and after she had vainly taken up the quill again and again, her mother said:--

"Poor child! Tell Sir Karl what you wish him to do."

Yolanda did so, and then read the missive. I did not know the English language perfectly, but Yolanda, who spoke it as if it were her mother tongue, translated as she read. I had always considered the island language harsh till I heard Yolanda speak it. Even the hissing "th" was music on her lips. Had I been a young man I would doubtless have made a fool of myself for the sake of this beautiful child-woman. When she had finished reading the missive, she left her chair and came to my side.