She was in her apartments, to which he hurried me, scattering maids of honour like fowls. He shut the door upon her and me and himself alone. “My love!” he said. She was in like pass with himself. She was going up and down, muttering entreaties to the saints, her stays stuck full of prayers and pious ejaculations writ on scraps of paper. Every now and again she would pluck out one of these in a spasm, dip it in a plate of broth that stood on a table, and swallow it. “My soul!” murmured the king. She noticed us all in a moment, and stopped dead. “Who are you?” she demanded witheringly. “Angel of my heart, don’t you know your lord?” She advanced quickly, and whipped him this way and that. He was still in Ascoli’s clothes. “Is this all they have left of you, you poor rag of royalty?” He tried a little bluster. “How now, madam! I adopted it for a disguise.” “What!” she said, “by revealing yourself? I should have thought that one exposure had been enough.” “Hush!” he said, perspiring; “there is a witness.” “One!” she cried; “the whole nation!” and she left him for me. “What do _you_ do here?” she demanded. The king put in a word. “I bring you your physician, madam--our physician. If it had not been for her, your Ferdinando would have lost his mind.” “Better that than his kingdom,” she answered bitterly, and stood scowling on me. “I understand, madam, I understand. I called you Circe, and not, it seems, without excellent reason.” “I was persuaded, madam,” I said, raising my head. “My honour is as precious to me as your Majesty’s. If you have no further use for me, I beg your permission to withdraw.” At which, if you will believe me, this stormy queen ran to a chair, and flinging herself down on it, began to weep violently. “I am deserted of all,” she cried; “in the hour of my tribulation they all forsake and disown me.” The king skipped to her and fell on his knees before. “My soul,” he wept, “all is not yet lost. General Mack”-- “General post,” she snapped. “What do you know of your own city, or of the anarchy that reigns in it? It only needed this spark to the mine. All _is_ lost, I tell you. They are clamouring for a republic. We shall be sacrificed like the King of France and my sister to the fury of the Jacobins--I feel the knife at my neck--O! O!” She rose in a frenzy of horror, shuffling her billets like cards to find a trump. “Gennaro, Valentino, Jeromio?” she whispered tearfully, and ended by making a sippet of the hermit. He was old and a misogynist. It was evident for some moments that he disagreed with her.