Before now the queen had left us, persuaded to lie down and try to rest till the matter should be settled. Stilled by Rudolf’s gentle rebuke, she had urged him no more in words, but there was an entreaty in her eyes stronger than any spoken prayer, and a piteousness in the lingering of her hand in his harder to resist than ten thousand sad petitions. At last he had led her from the room and commended her to Helga’s care. Then, returning to us, he stood silent a little while. We also were silent, Sapt sitting and looking up at him with his brows knit and his teeth restlessly chewing the moustache on his lip. “Well, lad?” he said at last, briefly putting the great question. Rudolf walked to the window and seemed to lose himself for a moment in the contemplation of the quiet night. There were no more than a few stragglers in the street now; the moon shone white and clear on the empty square. “I should like to walk up and down outside and think it over,” he said, turning to us; and, as Bernenstein sprang up to accompany him, he added, “No. Alone.” “Yes, do,” said old Sapt, with a glance at the clock, whose hands were now hard on two o’clock. “Take your time, lad, take your time.” Rudolf looked at him and broke into a smile. “I’m not your dupe, old Sapt,” said he, shaking his head. “Trust me, if I decide to get away, I’ll get away, be it what o’clock it will.” “Yes, confound you!” grinned Colonel Sapt. So he left us, and then came that long time of scheming and planning, and most persistent eye-shutting, in which occupations an hour wore its life away. Rudolf had not passed out of the porch, and we supposed that he had betaken himself to the gardens, there to fight his battle. Old Sapt, having done his work, suddenly turned talkative. “That moon there,” he said, pointing his square, thick forefinger at the window, “is a mighty untrustworthy lady. I’ve known her wake a villain’s conscience before now.” “I’ve known her send a lover’s to sleep,” laughed young Bernenstein, rising from his table, stretching himself, and lighting a cigar. “Ay, she’s apt to take a man out of what he is,” pursued old Sapt. “Set a quiet man near her, and he dreams of battle; an ambitious fellow, after ten minutes of her, will ask nothing better than to muse all his life away. I don’t trust her, Fritz; I wish the night were dark.” “What will she do to Rudolf Rassendyll?” I asked, falling in with the old fellow’s whimsical mood. “He will see the queen’s face in hers,” cried Bernenstein. “He may see God’s,” said Sapt; and he shook himself as though an unwelcome thought had found its way to his mind and lips. A pause fell on us, born of the colonel’s last remark. We looked one another in the face. At last Sapt brought his hand down on the table with a bang. “I’ll not go back,” he said sullenly, almost fiercely. “Nor I,” said Bernenstein, drawing himself up. “Nor you, Tarlenheim?” “No, I also go on,” I answered. Then again there was a moment’s silence.