"I see the cogency of your arguments," returned she, "but I grieve to allow them unanswerable. Fortune may yet favour us. You have twice assisted me in distress. If it happens a third time," added she, smiling impressively, "take care of your destiny!--At present I grant your release.--Silence must be our mutual bond, till we can meet in open day!" "Silence, inviolable silence!" returned Louis, as he put her hand to his lips, and rose to withdraw. "Altenstein," cried she, "give me that casket." The lady obeyed; and the Electress, pressing a spring, opened it. She took out a small miniature of herself, set in plain gold. "I intended this for the bosom of my best counsellor;" said she, "but he will not object the transfer to him who has preserved my life. Take it de Montemar. It will not, by word or action, betray your esteem for Maria of Bavaria." "I need not the picture, since the image is stamped on my heart!" said Louis, pressing it to his breast, and then laying it back into the open casket; "I must not be the possessor of so dangerous a treasure." A vivid colour kindled on the cheek of the Electress; and with a little elevation of her head, she closed the lid of the box upon the portrait, and said, "For a brave man, Marquis, you are a very coward!--But it shall be as you say.--Farewell, till more propitious hours." Louis bowed. "Altenstein," continued she, "shall conduct you out by a private door; and then----Farewell!" She stretched her hand to him. He again put it to his lips; and as she instantly withdrew, he mechanically obeyed the summons of Madame, to follow her. As the faithful _Lady of the Key_, (who certainly did not appear to have her name for nothing,) dismissed Louis from a little obscure door, into a back street, he observed three men approaching; at sight of him, they evidently drew back into the shadow; and as he passed them, the gleam of the lamps attached to this part of the Bavarian residence, fell on his face. Of this he was unconscious, and thinking no more of the eves-droppers, (on whom his absorbed attention had not cast a second look,) he walked swiftly along. The observers were no other than Duke Wharton, and the two Spaniards, de Patinos and Orendayn. As soon as he had passed, de Patinos exclaimed; "surely, that is de Montemar!" "And from the Bavarian palace by stealth!" remarked Orendayn, "what can it mean?" Wharton was not less surprised than his companions, at a rencontre with Louis at so incredible a place; and the more so, to see him issue from a portal, which, to this instant, was sacred to his own regress at hours of untimely counsel. But surprise did not appear in him, by look, start, or exclamation. "No;" replied he, with perfect indifference, "it is one Phaffenberg, who, I believe, has been thought like the Spanish secretary."