euchtmar's shoulder and wept bitterly. A long
pause ensued. No one of the three could interrupt it, for speech remained
locked upon the trembling lips of all, and only their tears, their sighs
spoke. Then the door slowly opened, and the private secretary, Mueller,
appeared upon the threshold. For a moment he stood still, and looked with
quivering lips upon the Prince, who was just slowly extricating himself
from Leuchtmar's embrace, then he stepped resolutely forward.

"Your highness," he said, "forgive me for venturing to intrude my presence
here, without having been summoned. But old Dietrich dared not take the
step which I do now, and so the responsibility rests upon myself alone."

"And what is it?" asked the Prince. "What brings you to me, my dear, true
friend?"

"He calls me his dear, true friend!" rejoiced Mueller.

"All is right again, then--all is in order! We are not dismissed--we are
not sent home!"

"You may be, after all, my old friend," said the Electoral Prince, with a
feeble smile. "But what would you say to me? What sort of responsibility
have you taken upon yourself?"

"Prince, I have taken upon myself the responsibility of admitting into
your cabinet the veiled lady who has just come, and of requesting you to
grant her the audience for which she has been besieging Dietrich with
tears and lamentations. Dietrich, however, would not hear to it, and the
lady continually called for Eberhard to come--Eberhard must lead her to
the Prince. But, as Dietrich says, this is not Eberhard's week of service,
so that he can not enter here. I was attracted to the antechamber by the
loud conversation, and now the lady turned upon me, and pleaded so
touchingly and so eloquently, that I could not refuse to grant her
request. Your highness, I have conducted the lady into your cabinet, and
she awaits you there."

"But, Mueller," cried Baron Leuchtmar despairingly, "what have you done?
How could you be so inconsiderate?"

The old man drew himself up, and his mild eye grew angry. "Inconsiderate!
I was not at all inconsiderate, Baron Leuchtmar. On the contrary, I
thought it would be unworthy of a noble Prince to allow a woman to plead
in vain, and I thought, moreover, that Hercules would never have become a
hero if he had not had the valor to meet the women who greeted him at the
crossing of the roads."

"You have done right, Mueller," said Frederick William, with a faint smile;
"it will be seen whether Hercules was