"Pardon me, madam," replied the Count, "but in this I cannot yield your Majesty that obedience I would willingly show under any other circumstances. I cannot, I must not fly. My own honour, madam, requires that I should stay; for if flight be not construed into an evidence of guilt, it may at least be supposed a sign of cowardice." "Indeed, indeed! De Blenau," said the Queen, earnestly, "you must do as I require; nay," she added, with a mixture of sweetness and dignity, "as I command. If they can prove against you that you have forwarded letters from me to my brother the King of Spain, they will bring you to the block, and will most likely ruin me." "I trust to the promise your Majesty gave me when first I undertook to have those letters conveyed to your royal brother King Philip," answered De Blenau: "you then pledged to me your word that they were alone of a domestic nature, and that they should always continue so, without ever touching upon one subject of external or internal policy, so that my allegiance to my king, and my duty to my country, should alike remain pure and inviolate. I doubt not that your Majesty has pointedly kept this promise; and De Blenau will never fly, while he can lay his hand upon his heart and feel himself innocent." "Yes, but remember, my good youth," replied the Queen, "that this Cardinal,--my husband's tyrant rather than his subject,--has commanded me, his Queen, to forbear all correspondence with my brother, and has narrowly watched me to prevent that very communication between Philip and myself, which your kindness has found means to procure. Remember too his remorseless nature; and then judge whether he will spare the man who has rendered his precautions vain." "Madam," replied De Blenau, "I do not fear; nothing shall make me fly. Though there be no bounds to what the Cardinal dare attempt, yet his power does not extend to make me a coward!" "But for my sake," still persevered Anne of Austria, labouring to persuade him to a measure on which she too well knew his safety depended. "Remember, that if there be proved against me even so small a crime as having sent those letters, my ruin is inevitable, and there are modes of torture which will wrench a secret from the most determined constancy." "I fear me," replied De Blenau, "that some act of mine must have much degraded me in your Majesty's opinion." "No, no, my friend!" said the Queen; "not so indeed,--I do not doubt you in the least: but I would fain persuade you, De Blenau, to that which I know is best and safest." "Your Majesty has now given me the strongest reasons for my stay," replied De Blenau, with a smile; "I have now the means of proving my fidelity to you, and nothing shall tempt me to leave you at this moment. But in the mean time there is one favour I have to request." "Name it," replied, the Queen: "indeed, De Blenau, you might command it."