the house. But in that radiance the words died.

"Virginia, what is it? You look--I scarcely know how you look. But
you make me feel that something has happened."

The Princess came slowly across the room, smiling softly, with an air
of one who walks in sleep. Hardly conscious of what she did, she sank
down in a big chair, and sat resting her elbows on her knees, her chin
nestling between her two palms, like a pink-white rose in its calyx.

"You may go, Ernestine," said the Grand Duchess to her maid. "I'll
ring when I want you again."

The elaborate process of waving and dressing her still abundant hair
had fortunately come to a successful end, and Ernestine had just
caused a diamond star to rise above her forehead. She was in a robe de
chambre, and the rest of her toilet could wait till curiosity was
satisfied.

But Virginia still sat dreaming, her happy eyes far away. The Grand
Duchess had to speak twice before the girl heard, and started a
little. "My daughter--have you anything to tell me?"

The Princess roused herself. "Nothing, Mother, really. Except that I'm
the happiest girl on earth."

"Why--what has he said?"

"Not one word that any one mightn't have listened to. But I know now.
He does care. And I think he will say something before we part."

"There's only one more day of his visit here, after to-night."

"One whole long, beautiful day--together."

"But after all, dearest," argued her mother, "what do you expect? If
in truth you were only Miss Mowbray, marriage between you and the
Emperor would be out of the question. You've never gone into the
subject of your feelings about this, quite thoroughly with me, and I
do wish I knew precisely what you hope for from him; what you will
consider the--the keystone of the situation?"

"Only for him to say that he loves me," Virginia confessed. "If I'm
right--if I've brought something new into his life, something which
has shown him that his heart's as important as his head, then there
will come a moment when he can keep silence no longer--when he'll be
forced to say; 'I love you, dear, and because we can't belong to each
other, day is turned into night for me.' Then, when that moment comes,
the tide of my fortune will be at its flood. I shall tell him that I
love him too. And I shall tell him _all the truth_."

"You'll tell him who we really are?"

"Yes. And why I've been masquerading. That it was because, ever since
I was a little girl, he'd been the o