ready the servants must have made comment upon so long an interview,
and though the opinion of menials was a matter of little importance, the
wily dame did not desire Wilhelmine's business to become the talk of the
town until the intrigue was fully developed.

'Monseigneur,' she whispered to Monsieur de Zollern, 'this must end.
Believe me, her Highness has many virtue-loving spies who will report to
her with the exaggeration of the respectable foul-minded, and we shall be
accused of having had a nocturnal carousal.'

Monsieur de Zollern rose and hobbled across to the pair at the window. He
had just reached them when the door opened, and Baron Forstner appeared
on the threshold.

'Ah! Serenissimus!' exclaimed Zollern, 'that is indeed an excellent
story! Your Highness must pardon an old invalid if he retires with the
memory of that witty tale in his mind as a bonne bouche.' He bowed and
took his leave, while Forstner, who had arrived on the scene hoping to
find the lovers alone together, was entirely put off the scent;
Zollern's quick ruse having made it appear as though the conversation had
been general.

The company now took leave, Zollern offering Forstner a seat in his
coach, which was accepted; thus the 'Representative of all the virtues'
(another of Madame de Ruth's names for 'L'osseux') was safely removed
from the scene, leaving Kammerjunker Graevenitz to attend his Highness.
Madame de Ruth retired to her rooms in the castle. Stafforth escorted
Wilhelmine to his coach, which waited to convey her to the house in the
Graben. As he bowed gallantly over her hand he felt her fingers press a
paper into his palm. She must have penned it ere she came to the concert,
he reflected, for she could have found no opportunity for writing since.
When he reached the deserted corridor outside the antehall, where two
tall gentlemen-at-arms guarded the door of his Highness's sleeping
apartment, he held the missive up to the light of one of the flickering
wall-lamps: 'For his Highness's own hand alone,' he read.

'Ah----!' he murmured. Passing through the antehall, he gained admission
to Eberhard Ludwig's apartment.

'Stafforth, my friend!' cried the Duke, when the Oberhofmarshall
appeared, 'this is much courtesy,--you attend me with zeal!' and he
laughed gaily.

Stafforth looked fixedly at him; he wished to convey to his Highness his
desire to speak with him alone; but Friedrich Graevenitz also,
unfortunately, had this impress