"How happily we sit here," murmured Barbara, "giving no thought to him who is lying dead! You were with Trevisa at the time of his murder; tell me how it happened." Paul gave an account of Trevisa's death, in itself a sad event, and one rendered still more painful to Barbara by the thought that it had occurred so shortly after his dismissal from his secretaryship. The sorrowful look with which he had received her decision would never fade from her mind. She felt his loss keenly, inasmuch as he had been her friend as well as her amanuensis, and for a long time she sat talking of Trevisa, of his loyalty and his good services. "I shall require a new secretary," she said. "You, Paul, must fill Trevisa's place. Nay, forgive me for being thus imperious. I speak as if I had the right to your obedience. My commands are for my ministers, not for you." [Illustration: "'See how well it becomes you,' she said, drawing him gently towards a mirror."] She slid playfully upon her knees before him, and put her hands together with a demure air. "May I have you for my secretary?" Paul, though sometimes given to day-dreams, had certainly never anticipated the time when a fair princess would be kneeling at his feet. He attempted to raise her. "I will not rise till you grant my request." No post could be more acceptable to Paul than this secretaryship, since he would thus live in daily companionship with Barbara; and, moreover, the handling of her correspondence would initiate him into the secrets of that fascinating subject, European diplomacy. "Are you won over yet?" she asked. "Who may gainsay a princess?" said Paul. "But are you certain that my appointment will not give offence?" "I reign over a divided realm. If I appoint a Pole I shall have the Muscovites against me; if I appoint a Muscovite I shall have the Poles against me. Therefore I will choose my secretary from neither party." "In order to unite both against you," smiled Paul. "But I fear, Barbara, that I am ill-qualified for the post." "So much the better, Paul, for it will be charming to be your instructress," she replied, delighted that he had accepted the appointment. "What will your sovereign say at losing a brave soldier?" "The princess is now my sovereign." "Nay, not your sovereign, Paul, but your equal." She rose and walked to a buhl table on which rested a golden diadem, and returning with it, she placed it playfully upon his head. "See how well it becomes you," she said, drawing him gently towards a mirror. "There! every inch a prince." Paul smiled oddly at his reflection in the glass. He to wear the crown of Czernova! The idea seemed too fantastic to be entertained. For the last four and twenty hours he seemed to have been playing a _rôle_ in some romantic opera rather than to have been living in the world of reality. He put the diadem aside. "It is not a crown I want, Barbara, but your own sweet self."