He found his way to the Rubens room, and seated himself, wondering how long it was necessary to wait before demanding access to the private apartments. The short winter day was well-nigh done, and the great, unlit chamber looked vast and ghostly in the failing light. The shadowed corners, the rich stillness, touched and oppressed his imagination. Great men and proud women had passed in sumptuous pageantry through the walls of that noble chamber; and Trafford felt their presence, and strove to exorcise them with the fumes of a cigarette. But the impalpable dust of centuries seemed to impregnate the air, and by-gone monarchs looked askance at him from their dim gold frames, in a scornful wonder at the American interloper who sat so carelessly in the seat of kings. He rose, impatient of their glances, and walked to the window. Snow was falling. The sun that had graced and greeted the new-crowned Queen had sunk beneath the rugged outline of the encircling mountains; the sky, which had been of no uncertain blue, was a nondescript monotone weeping a white haze of crystalline tears. His thoughts harked back to the ashen face and sad eyes of the new-crowned Queen. Why had she not grasped the fact that Karl's immurement in the _Eisenmädchen_ was a humane act of rescue, not a piece of callous cruelty? She herself had experienced the same hiding-place under the same innocuous conditions, and yet it did not seem to have occurred to her that the spikes might still be reposing at the bottom of his overcoat pocket. That the others should have failed to suspect the truth was only natural. That they would be angry on discovering it, was probable--but for that he cared not one jot. What troubled his awakening conscience was, that good men and true must go down before peace reigned again in the troubled monarchy of Grimland. After a few more minutes of such meditation, he made his way through the Rubens-saal in the direction of the private apartments. In the corridor leading to the Queen's chamber stood the officer on guard, and talking to him was no less a personage than Von Hügelweiler. "My orders are precise," the former was saying. "Her Majesty is resting and will see no one." "But have the goodness at least to send in my name," Von Hügelweiler returned pettishly. "It would be no use, Captain," retorted the other. "The Queen is resting and must not be disturbed." Von Hügelweiler's disappointment showed itself plainly in his crestfallen air. "I want access to her Majesty," he said doggedly. "It is true that by admitting me you risk offending the Queen, but by not admitting me you offend me for a certainty." "I am very sorry, Captain," said the officer in a conciliatory manner. He was quite a young man, and he was rather alarmed at having to defy so important a person as Von Hügelweiler had become. Still, he held stoutly to his position in the centre of the corridor.