eeable about everything that day. She was
afraid to stay in the Palace, and afraid to leave it. And just when she
had begun to feel calm, and the sun and fresh air were getting in their
work, that wretched funeral band had brought back everything she was
trying to forget.

The Countess was very gay. She said brilliant, rather heartless things
that set the group to laughing, and in the intervals she eyed Hedwig
with narrowed eyes and hate in her heart. Hedwig herself was very quiet.
The bouquet had contained lilies-of-the-valley, for one thing.

Miss Braithwaite knitted, and watched that the Crown Prince kept his
white gloves clean.

Just before they left the Palace the Archduchesss had had a moment of
weakening, but the Countess had laughed away her fears.

"I really think I shall not go, after all," Annunciata had said
nervously. "There are reasons."

The Countess had smiled mockingly. "Reasons!" she said. "I know that
many things are being said. But I also know that General Mettlich is an
alarmist;" purred the Countess. "And that the King is old and ill, and
sees through gray glasses."

So the Archduchess had submitted to having a plumed and inappropriate
hat set high on her head, regardless of the fashion, and had pinned on
two watches and gone.

It was Hedwig who showed the most depression on the trip, after all.
Early that morning she had attended mass in the royal chapel. All the
household had been there, and the King had been wheeled in, and had sat
in his box, high in the wall, the door of which opened from his private
suite.

Looking up, Hedwig had seen his gray old face set and rigid. The Court
had worn black, and the chapel was draped in crepe. She had fallen on
her knees and had tried dutifully to pray for the dead Hubert. But her
whole soul was crying out for help for herself.

So now she sat very quiet, and wondered about things.

Prince Ferdinand William Otto sat by the rail and watched the green
banks flying by. In one place a group of children were sailing a tiny
boat from the bank. It was only a plank, with a crazy cotton sail. They
shoved it off and watched while the current seized it and carried it
along. Then they cheered, and called good-bye to it.

The Crown Prince leaned over the rail, and when the current caught it,
he cheered too, and waved his cap. He was reproved, of course, and some
officious person insisted on tucking the rug around his royal legs. But
when no one was looking,