, she laughed in their very faces, declaring that she would
only submit to force. "I refuse to go," she said defiantly, "unless I am
expelled by the hands of the police." A few hours later she was forcibly
removed from her weeping and protesting ladies, hurried into a carriage,
and driven off, with a strong escort of soldiers, on her journey to
exile.

But the good people of Belgrade, who had got wind of the proposed
abduction, were by no means disposed to look on while their beloved
Queen was thus brutally taken from them. When the cortege reached the
Cathedral Square, it was stopped by a formidable and menacing mob; the
escort, furiously assailed with sticks and showers of stones, was beaten
off; the horses were taken from the carriage, and the Queen was drawn
back in triumph by scores of willing hands, to her residence.

Natalie's victory, however, was short-lived. At midnight, when her
stalwart champions were sleeping in their beds, the police, crawling
over the roofs of the houses in Prince Michael Street, and descending
into the Queen's courtyard, found it a very simple matter to complete
their dastardly work. The Queen was again bundled unceremoniously into a
carriage, and before Belgrade was well awake, she was far on her way to
her new exile in Hungary. A few days later a formal decree of banishment
was pronounced against her, forbidding her, under any pretext whatever,
to enter Servia again without the Regent's permission.

Only once more did Natalie and Milan set eyes on each other--when the
ex-King presented himself at Biarritz, to bring her news of their son's
projected _coup d'etat_, by which he designed to depose the Regents and
to take the reins of government into his own hands. Taken by surprise,
the Queen received Milan, but when she saw him standing before her, an
aged, broken man, her composure gave way. She could not speak; she
trembled like a leaf.

With Alexander's dramatic accession to his full Kingship a new, if
brief, era of happiness opened to Natalie. The Regents were no longer
able to exclude her from Servia, and by her son's invitation she
returned to Belgrade to resume her old position of Queen.

Still beautiful, in spite of all her suffering, she played for a time
the role of Queen-mother to perfection, holding her Courts, presiding at
balls and soirees, taking a prominent part in affairs of State, and
gradually acquiring more power than her easy-going son himself enjoyed.
At last, a