Ranata looked about her lingeringly. It was all a mockery, to be sure. Had her father possessed a proper sense of humor he would have burned the tapestries and the portrait, done all that he could to obliterate the memory of a fiasco which would have been one of the passing absurdities of history had it not been for the untimely finish of an estimable man and the more cruel fate of his wife; nevertheless it was impressive in its high and perfect harmonies and in its serious intent, and it expressed sufficiently all that she was about to renounce. Moreover, she was leaving the loveliest and most various country in Europe--for what? She might have this beautiful castle for her own did she remain Archduchess of Austria, and in Europe there must always be a thousand compensations that could never be found in a new country among a crude and alien people, were love less than she had dreamed. A composite of woman seemed to come forth from the shades and warn her that love was not all, nor yet enough, for man demands all, yet so little, giving less in return. The music of the Chardash rose, as the ghost of the dead women drifted on; and then the words of Sarolta. But in a moment she lit a candle and read Fessenden’s letter. XXXVII They arrived on the following afternoon, the Emperor and his American guests, his relatives, his primate, two or three members of his household, and his ministers. It was raining when they left the train at the little mountain-station, and there was no driveway, no alternative but to walk down the steep and winding paths and stairs, sheltered by the umbrellas the lackeys held over them. As the long file under the umbrellas emerged from the arbor into the garden, the Emperor picking his way daintily on his diminutive toes, and the Archbishop holding up his gown with both hands, while the gorgeous flunkies streamed with rain, the sight was not as imperial as it should have been, and two girls in an upper window giggled irreverently. Being uncertain of their status, they left Maria Leopoldina to receive in solitary state, and did not appear until dinner; but when this solemn hour arrived, Ranata, in an evening-gown of pale-green velvet and all her pearls, entered the audience-chamber where the party was assembled, greeted her father and the guests as she had done many times before, and led the Archbishop down to dinner. With Fessenden it was not possible to exchange more than a flash.