or the risk I ran in coming. You have not
seen me for many days, yet you remember me and have come five times to
the bridge. I was wrong when I said you would forget the burgher girl
within a fortnight. Sir Max, you are a marvel of constancy.' At that
moment the figures of two men appeared on the castle battlements,
silhouetted against the moon; they seemed of enormous stature, magnified
in the moonlight. One of them was the Duke of Burgundy. I recognized him
by his great beard, of which I have heard you speak. Yolanda caught one
glimpse of the men and ran back to the house without so much as giving
me a word of farewell."

"What did you say during the brief interview?" I asked.

"Not one word," he replied.

"By my soul, you are an ardent lover," I exclaimed.

"I think she understood me," Max replied, confidently; and doubtless he
was right.

Once more the riddle was solved. A few more solutions and there would be
a mad Styrian in Burgundy. My reflections were after this fashion:
Princesses, after all, do wander by the moat side and loiter by the
bridge. Princesses do go on long journeys with no lady-in-waiting to do
their bidding and no servants ready at their call. Yolanda was Mary of
Burgundy, thought I, and Max had been throwing away God-given
opportunities. Had she not seen Max from the battlements, and had she
not fled at sight of the duke? These two small facts were but scant
evidence of Yolanda's royalty, but they seemed sufficient.

"What would you have me say, Karl?" asked Max. "You would not have me
speak more than I have already said and win her love beyond her power to
withdraw it. That I sometimes believe I might do, but if my regard for
her is true, I should not wish to bring unhappiness to her for the sake
of satisfying my selfish vanity. If I am not mistaken, a woman would
suffer more than a man from such a misfortune."

Here, truly, was a generous love. It asked only the privilege of giving,
and would take nothing in return because it could not give all. If
Yolanda were Mary of Burgundy, Max might one day have a reward worthy of
his virtue. Yolanda's sweetness and beauty and Mary's rich domain would
surely be commensurate with the noblest virtue. I was not willing that
Max should cease wooing Yolanda--if I might give that word to his
conduct--until I should know certainly that she was not the princess.
This, I admit, was cruel indifference to Yolanda's peace of mind or
pain of heart, if Max sho