“What?” she stood up and stared down upon him as if she were repeating his statement to herself and endeavoring to place it in connection with her brain. In a moment the blood rose hotly to her hair, even her eyes looked bloodshot. “Oh!” she exclaimed. “Oh!” and then she walked to the window. It was an opportune moment for retreat, but there was more to be said; she was calm, and the sooner the whole task was finished the better. “Perhaps you will understand why I think it best you should not return to Budapest,” he said gently. “It is well for many reasons that this wedding take place at once, and it is my duty to expose you to no further temptation. It can be given out that your trousseau detains you here, or Sarolta’s illness--” Ranata wheeled about and faced him. For the first time in her life she was ugly. “And have you really deluded yourself,” she asked with an ominous calm, “that you will marry me to that man?--or to any one else?” The Emperor rose then and faced her. War was declared, and he knew where he stood. There was no better mettle in Europe than his. “You will marry Aloys Franz,” he said. Again Ranata laughed, and for the moment she looked hideous. “I shall not,” she said. “And you should know by this time what stuff I am made of.” “I have not had a doubt of your resistance. I have as little of my firmness of purpose. You have not been sufficiently disciplined. A princess marries whom and when her father and sovereign dictates. You were my youngest, in many ways exceptional, and very much alone. I have been more indulgent, more lax, than I should. But that is over. From this moment you will recognize that I am your emperor as well as your father.” “We are no longer in the Middle Ages, nor yet in the middle of the last century. Your subjects are free to marry whom they please, or to remain unmarried if they choose.” “Constitutions have shorn monarchs of too much power over their subjects, but in his own family the power of an emperor is as absolute as it ever was. To the law you would have no appeal did I choose to practise upon you the tortures of the Inquisition here in my palace, to starve you in a cell, to cause you to disappear forever from human sight. Please understand once for all that you are my property, given into my care by Almighty God; and for your own salvation and for the honor of my house I shall do what I think best with you.” “And if I still refuse?” “You will remain a prisoner in these rooms until you consent. Your servants will attend to every want, you will have the society of Maria Leopoldina, and you may take your exercise in the corridor. You will see no one else. There will be a guard day and night at each end of the corridor. If you make any attempt to bribe these guards, or to communicate with any one in the court-yard, you will be moved elsewhere and deprived of exercise. But I do not wish to be forced into undue severity, and you may remain here so long as you transgress no rules.”