“Your prisoner is incommunicado then?” said she.

“Have no fears, he is comfortable, here in this very house?”

“He has sent no word to Maximilian of his arrival?”

“Not as yet, mademoiselle.”

“And why not, pray?”

“Because I anticipated the honor of seeing you before permitting him so much. I must know the campaign better. A plain soldier is dense at guessing, mademoiselle, while you–you have talked with Napoleon. If––”

“Oh, don’t be tedious. You alone hold the knight that means royalty triumphant or checkmated, and you know that you do.”

“But you who are inspired, tell me how I shall play.”

“You forget that I left this man to be shot?”

“Then I am to destroy him?”

Jacqueline shuddered. “That was my only way, but you, monsieur, you can lift him off the board entirely.”

Bazaine rose from his chair and stood before her. “I am no poet,” he said, “and these flowers of speech hide the trenches. My American means that I may have thousands more like him, and he is a good one to be multiplied even tenfold. Mademoiselle, what am I to understand?”

“Does Napoleon’s letter satisfy none of your doubts?”

Without a word he handed her the packet. It was from Napoleon’s minister of finance, and it exuded woe. The French loans were exhausted by Maximilian’s luxury and mismanagement, and therefore Bazaine was instructed not to advance a cent further. He was, moreover, to take charge of the Mexican ports, and administer the customs. Here, then, was the annihilation of Maximilian’s sway. Here was the whispering of the Sphinx. France herself would take over the Empire.

Jacqueline sank back disheartened. Not even Napoleon would help her. The Sphinx had not the courage of his own designs, and she contemptuously flung him out of her way. She would strive alone, and against him, Napoleon, among the rest. First of all, there was his captain general, the man before her.

“Monsieur le Maréchal,” she began, as impersonally as though quoting a dry paragraph of history, “there is a party among the Mexicans who fear the republicans and what the Republic would do. Yet their hope for the Empire is gone, and they want no more of it. These, monsieur, are the moderate liberals, and strange to say, they are the clericals too; in a word, the great landowners. They are for what is good in Mexico. They demand order. But they would not take it from the United States. They look to France–to France, which is Catholic, and liberal.”

“I know,” said the marshal. “They have already hinted at annexation.”

“Annexation to France, of course. Now then, monsieur, if we stay at all, we shall have to fight the United States. But do you imagine that we would undertake such a fight for Maximilian? Parbleu, the French people would mob Napoleon over night. But, supposing we were to do it for ourselves, and not for an impecunious archduke––”

His Excellency’s eyes blazed. “Ah, it would be a fight superb!”

The plain soldier started as though shot.

“Mademoiselle,” he gasped, “you–you are Napoleon! The great Napoleon, I salute you, mademoiselle!”

“Hélas, monsieur, that I am not in a position to credit Napoleon III. with what I have said!”

“Yet you wish me to believe that you are only inspired by him? Pardon me, mademoiselle, but he is the inspired one, and–mon Dieu, I do not blame him!”

“But it’s very simple,” said Jacqueline, “and honorable too. Maximilian’s bad faith nullifies our treaty with him. Très bien, we are free, free to withdraw our troops. At least we may threaten as much. Then he will, he must abdicate, unless–well, unless he first sees Your Excellency’s prisoner.”

She arose, feeling that she was leaving a good Frenchman behind her. But Madame la Maréchale appeared to bid her adieu, and Madame la Maréchale looked sharply from one to another, noting especially Bazaine’s flush of enthusiasm. The good Frenchman straightway became uneasy. And Jacqueline, riding back to Chapultepec in her carriage with its coronet and arms and footmen, did not know that Driscoll had not been incommunicado against Madame la Maréchale. Who could be? And Madame la Maréchale betimes had paid her respects to a third woman, who also was but little more than a girl. She and the Empress Charlotte had discussed both the prisoner and Jacqueline.

In his bedroom at Buena Vista, the marshal’s residence, Driscoll the next day received a personage, and offered him a cigar. Declined, with bow from shoulder. Hoped he would have a nip of peach brandy? Declined, with sweep from hips. He was a personage. Driscoll noted regalia, medals, cordon; and apologized for the temerity of Missouri hospitality.

“Especially,” he said, “as you’re a Grand Divinity.”

“Dignity, señor,” the hidalgo corrected him, “Grand Dignity.”

“You’ll have to pardon me again,” said Driscoll, “but I really didn’t intend any short measure at all.”

It was the Imperial Grand Chamberlain himself. There were no incomunicado doors before him; he came from the Emperor. The Empress had spoken to His Majesty, having just had her discussion aforementioned with Madame la Maréchale, so that Monsieur le Maréchal had had to lift from his prisoner the ban of the incomunicado. But monsieur had been extremely reluctant about it.

“Just tell them to let me out of here,” said the prisoner, “then I’ll call in on the Emperor whenever it’s convenient for him.”

“But, señor,” the don objected testily, “with what status, pray? Has your country a representative here? You must obtain a letter from your ambassador, or have him present you.”

Driscoll shook his head. “Can’t,” he said, “haven’t any country.”

The minion of etiquette despaired.

“But,” Driscoll added, “I’ve got as good as credentials from what used to be my country.”

Velasquez de Leon grasped at the straw. “Then,” he cried, “we can register you as an ambassador.”

“Bringing my country with me,” Driscoll suggested.

So it was all straightened out pleasantly, and quite in the orthodox manner, too. The American’s status was defined. His reception would fall under the rubric: “Private Audience.” There remained only one grave drawback. The protocol allowed no hints as to the un-protocol aspect of an ambassador’s wardrobe. The hidalgo could only finger nervously the Imperial Crown in his Grand Uniform, and with stiff dignity take his leave.

“I wonder how they can fight and yet keep their clothes so pretty,” thought the Missourian.

The gallant carpet-knighthood of uniforms was bothering him again. They were dashing, militant, these paladins, a bal masqué of luxurious oddity and color. They twisted waxed moustaches, and their coursers cantered to and fro in the gay parade, and among them only the charro cavaliers with a glitter of spangle let one guess that this could be Mexico. There was the Austrian dragoon with his Tyrolean feather, and the Polish uhlan, fur fringed, and the Hungarian hussar, whose pelisse dangled romantically, and there were some fellows in low boots and tights and high busbies, who were cross-braided on the chest and scroll-embroidered on the front of the leg, and looked exactly like Tzigane bandmasters or lion tamers. The Slav, the Magyar, the Czech, and yet others of the Emperor’s score of native races, all were here out of the nearer Orient, with curved swords and ferocious bearing. There were the countrymen of the Empress, too; the Belgians, who were as bedecked of sleeve as a drum corps. And as to the French, there they were in green and silver, in sky blue, in cuirassier helmets, in the zouave fez, or in any of the other ways in which they bore their chips on the shoulder.

But there was the pantalon rouge, the little soldier boy of France who did the work, and the sight of him put the American into a friendly humor. He was everywhere, the little pantalon rouge, streaming the walks, dotting the cafés with red, and every wee piou-piou under the great big epaulettes of a great big comic opera generalissimo. His huge military coat fitted him awkwardly, and the crimson pompon cocked on his little fighting képi was more often awry, and he could not by any effort achieve a strut. He was only bon enfant, this unconquered soldier lad; so he gave over trying to be martial, and left to his officers the rôle of the Gallic rooster, taking it all as a droll joke on himself, while his vivacious eyes danced with fun.

The ambassador’s coach passed under the cypresses and wound round the Aztec hill of the Grasshopper, and came at last to the castle on the summit. And as Guatemotzin had once ventured to this place to plead with Moctezuma to save his empire, and to show him how to do it, so Driscoll now entered the portals of Chapultepec on a very similar errand.

The superb Indian lord was never so hedged in with barbaric ceremony as was his Teuton successor of three centuries later. But Driscoll was patient. He advanced as the red tape gave way, humming under his breath “Green Grows the Grass,” a schottische which the American invaders of ’48 had sung in taking this same fortress, which also had given all Americans the name of “Gringo.”

The Emperor was there, tall, white browed, refined. He bowed. Driscoll bowed, and started toward him, for they were scarcely in speaking distance. But His Imperial Highness bowed again. He was absent-minded, evidently, but Driscoll bowed also, and pretended not to notice. Then yet a third time the monarch bowed. And with true courtesy the American overlooked what was growing ridiculous, and did likewise. Thus the ritualistic three obeisances were accomplished.

Maximilian dismissed the Lesser Service, and he and his guest were alone. Now Driscoll supposed, considering the discommoding interest his mission had awakened in everybody except in the Emperor, that the Emperor himself would this time be concerned enough to “get down to business.” But not so. There were yet the formalities.

“I understand, Señor Embajador,” Maximilian began in the language of his court, “that Your Excellency––”

“Thank you, sir, but my name is Driscoll.”

“That Your Excellency comes accredited from a government that no longer exists. But We will waive that, since the said power existed at the moment of Your Excellency’s departure.”

This was to harmonize the absurdity with the Ritual. Maximilian liked to play at receiving an American representative. It grieved him sorely that the United States had never recognized his dignity, but that it had consistently rated him as merely “the Prince Maximilian.”

Driscoll’s first words cut short the make-believe.

Maximilian took the note handed him, but stared at the emissary. Charlotte had induced the monarch to grant the audience. She had hinted at its importance, but not until now did Maximilian recognize his guest. Driscoll was attired in the full uniform of a lieutenant colonel of cavalry, which, by the way, was what he had carried so jealously in the bundle behind his saddle. From the dignified young officer in gray back to the desperado young giant in homespun proved considerable of a reach for the Hapsburg; but at last, by virtue of much caressing of his silky beard with delicate finger tips, he arrived.

“So, it was you the marshal saved!” he exclaimed. “Yes, yes, I should have remembered sooner. Colonel Lopez told me. A capable, faithful officer, is Lopez! I could not but approve the finding of his court martial. And yet, against his urgent advice, I have decided to pardon you.”

“To apologize, you mean?”

The Emperor looked hurt. As a foil for his royal clemency, there should be humble gratitude. Maximilian often mistook fawning for such.

“Isn’t it a bit odd,” Driscoll queried whimsically, “that an ambassador should be arrested?”

“Jove, that’s a fact! I hadn’t thought.”

“Certainly. But if it don’t occur again, we’ll just let the apology go.”

“No, no,” protested the monarch. “You must have your apology. You will receive it from the Grand Chamberlain to-morrow, and it will appear in the Journal Officiel.”

“Oh, all right,” said Driscoll, “anything to clear the way.” Whereupon he plunged and stated his business.

“But,” said Maximilian, smiling bitterly, “you forget that the United States would still object to my poor Empire.”

“Not when the French leave, they wouldn’t. We would become citizens. We would not be a foreign intervention. You would be backed up by Mexicans against Mexicans, and the North could not interfere. But, suppose that the French remain, wouldn’t they have to fight? And they would need our aid to do it, too. Don’t you see, sir, that in any case you should make us very welcome?”

“There is assuredly no other way to look at it!” admitted the prince uneasily.

“Can–can they really come?” he demanded breathlessly.

Driscoll smiled. “Of course, there’s no time to lose,” he replied. “For instance, if I’d had your answer there at Murguía’s ranch, I’d have gotten back in time to head off whole regiments who’ve probably given up their arms since then. But you can still count on an army west of the Mississippi that hasn’t surrendered yet. At least my general hasn’t, not Old Joe, and he won’t either. But you must say ‘yes’ pretty quick. We’re restless, and might conclude to run the French out of here. We haven’t forgotten how Napoleon forgot to help us.”

It was a cunning stroke. Maximilian would have asked nothing better than independence from his “dear imperial brother,” and just this was the bribe so temptingly held out by the instrument of Destiny. But the Hapsburg of the heavy, trembling underlip credited wavering as statesmanlike prudence.

“To-morrow,” he said, “no, the day after, you shall have my decision.”

Then, she noted his uniform. After the ornate regimentals of all Europe, what a relief was the simple gray! There was the long coat, the belt, the dragoon sabre, the unobtrusive insignia on the collar, and she murmured her verdict advisedly. It was beautiful! Next she noted the man–as though she had not in the first place. His easy frame still had that charm of gaucherie, and the rollicking daredeviltry lurked quiescent in the brown eyes, but enough to recall the rider of fury, her chevalier de Missour-i, plunging through a wall and cloud of dust on a big-boned yellow charger. And though now he was in this beautiful simplicity of gray, she looked in vain for some hint of martial stride or pompous chest.

She wondered for a moment why he had worn the uniform. It signified nothing, since the Confederacy had fallen. Then she understood. He had not surrendered. Nor had those he represented. The gray, for him, still had its reason, and was a power yet; the power to decide an empire’s fate. It was the grave dignity of a lost cause; striving, before being doffed forever, to leave behind a new cause. Or, if failing, to accept the lot of surrender. In either case, her chevalier de Missour-i was wearing the dear uniform for the last time. With her keenness for intuition and sympathy, Jacqueline knew. She knew what it must mean. And he looked so strong, so splendid! Her eyes unexpectedly dimmed in tenderness for him.

“I am Monsieur Éloin,” the stranger announced in English that could be understood, “of Her Majesty’s household. Also aide and secretary in private to the Emperor. I see, you go to horse. It is well, sir. Mine is outside.”

“What’s the answer?” asked Driscoll. “I’m not up on conundrums.”

“It is that we go to Cuernavaca.”

“You don’t say! Now where’s that, and what for?”

“Cuernavaca is His Majesty’s country sit-down, about a douzaine of leagues from here. You have not read of this morning the Journal Officiel? Here it is. The court went there yesterday. His Majesty has to need rest.”

“But he was to see me to-day! What’s the matter with him?”

M. Éloin’s brow contracted narrowly, and he shrugged his shoulders. “His Imperial Highness is much worked. He is worse of good health. Her Majesty sought at having him stay, to give you that same-self answer he had promised already. And the Marshal Bazaine, sensible this once, did talk yesterday night before last, after you were there, and beseeched him to accept your offer. And they all beseeched, Her Majesty and Madame la Maréchale, and I.–But, what would you?”

“I’m sure I don’t know. What the devil––”

“No, not him! But her, sir, her!”

“Her, who?”

“But who is the ‘she?’ You don’t mean––”

“Yes, we others call her Jacqueline. She did it, against everybody who beseech. But we–how you say?–we fool her, you and me. Come, we are there to-night, at Cuernavaca.”

“Just that little girl––” Driscoll murmured wonderingly.

Everybody he met seemed to twist Driscoll’s business into a vital personal issue, and it did not take him long to place M. Éloin. The supercilious Belgian of the rancid brow, as Driscoll mentally described him, wanted the perpetuation of the empire, and he wanted it for the very simple reason that the favorite of a realmless prince does not amount to much. Hence he intrigued for the acceptance of Driscoll’s offer and for the confusion of Jacqueline.

A small escort of Belgians joined him and Driscoll at the garita, or little customs house, on the edge of the City. Accompanying them was a burly priest with a head shaped like a pear. The padre had very small eyes for so large a man, but they were exceedingly bright and roved adventurously. They would settle with crafty calculation on Éloin time and again, though his manner toward the favorite was always a thing of humble deference.

“His Dutch Holiness from Murgie’s!” Driscoll observed to himself.

Late in the afternoon they arrived at the quaint old Aztec village of Cuernavaca, which had been the country seat of Cortez, and was now that of a second fair god and a second Hernando. After dismounting at the hotel near the conquistador’s palace, Éloin hurried Driscoll across the plaza into the beautiful Italian gardens where Maximilian made his home. At the villa, Charlotte’s own residence in the gardens, Éloin had himself announced to Her Majesty. The American reflected that women seemed to have a great deal to do with the reigning business. In the drawing room, the Empress received them.

She was a slender young woman whose lips were thin and proud, whose eyes were dark and lustrous. Her hair was black and very heavy, coiled in the old fashioned style away from a high forehead that was beautifully white. She could not be older than twenty-five, and there was even a girlishness in her bearing. But she had a steadiness of gaze–one eye seemed the least heavy lidded–and there was a firmness to the slightly large mouth, which gave an impression of strong lines to what was really a soft, oval face. Yet the temperament could not be mistaken. She was a woman of acute nerves. She was tensely strung, inordinately sensitive.

Carlota, for so the natives called her, amiably greeted the Missourian. She was a woman of tact, and though one Din Driscoll was for her as impersonal a thing as some opportune event, yet events must be neatly turned to account.

“His Majesty and I have discussed your presence in our country, sir,” she began in English, “and feeling that he desires to see you again, I requested M. Éloin to bring you to Cuernavaca.”

“Why, thank you, ma’am,” said Driscoll.

She all but reproved the form of address. But, for her at least, common sense was beginning to prevail. The rigid court punctilio, largely of her own enthusiastic designing, had gone hard with her. Her husband had proved no more than consistent to the medieval revival. He was but true to that old chivalry which distinguished between the divinely fair damsel to be won and the mere woman won already. He was the monarch, she his consort. Classifying others, the Empress found herself classified. He was her liege, and she might not even enter his presence unannounced. But how much happier was she in the blithe sailor prince who came a-wooing, who wooed for love, in accordance with that same ancient chivalry!

Driven to expediency for her very Empire’s sake, she herself trampled on the Ritual. Waiving all formalities, they would go and seek out His Majesty. He must be somewhere in the gardens, perhaps beside the pond with its fringe of deep shadows from the trees. There they expected to find him, breathing the air of orange blossoms, gazing enraptured into the water, and on the gold fish and the swans and the fountains. He would be teasing Nature for a sonnet’s inspiration.

Driscoll went ahead, since Carlota and Éloin talked earnestly in French, intent on their plot for the persuasion of the Emperor. But as the American parted a clump of oleanders and laden rosebushes that hid the little lake, he stopped, his eyes wide on something just beyond. In the instant he fell back, and confronted the other two with such a look on his face that both started in vague alarm. They saw the sickened look of one who turns from a revolting sight. A wretch stricken suddenly blind may know at once the fact of a terrible grief, yet he cannot quite at first gather to himself the fullness of the horror. He is only aware that, afterward, the meaning will slowly take shape, like a gradually darkening despair.

Driscoll gazed uncertainly at the Empress, as though she had somehow arrested his thoughts. Then, as a strong man rushing from danger, he comprehended that here was a frail woman near the same peril.

“You will not go, ma’am,” he ordered in a kind of terror for her.

Éloin had already hastened on to the screen of roses. Being a fellow of the arras and closets, he scented a royal secret. The Empress lifted her shoulders and would have followed, but Driscoll did not hesitate. He took her by the elbow and gently turned her the other way.

She bridled indignantly, but when she saw how white he was, and how earnest, something there awed her. In a flash she understood. Her lip curled, baring teeth of the purest pearl, and a sneer quivered on the highbred nostrils. But suddenly, in piteous tumult, her breast heaved once, and betrayed the wound. It gave him to know the knighthood which covets blows in a woman’s behalf. But she, with a will that held him in admiration and reverence for her, spoke to him, and her tone was even, was unbroken.

“I dare say you are right,” she said, and turned to retrace her steps. But, as if to drink deeper of the bitter cup, she paused, and forced herself to a last word.

“I suppose I should thank you,” she went on, and her eyes, still dry of tears, were lustrous as they lifted to his, “but a gentleman–and I have never known one more than you, sir, this minute past–will understand that I cannot–There, I am going now. And after–after this that you have just beheld, I shall never see you again, sir. Alas, it’s the more pity. Such as you are rare, even in–in my world.”

Driscoll watched her blankly as she left him, her head poised high, her step as slow as dignity itself. His own face was cruelly drawn, with the first sickened ghastliness still on him. He stumbled to a bench, and sat down. But there was nothing to think about, nothing he could think about, just then. Yet his brain was full to throbbing, and he had no consciousness of where he was, nor of the passage of time.

Stealthily Éloin drew aside the bushes, and peered through. The tiny pond with its crystal surface sunk deep in foliage, its flowering island in the centre, looked not unlike a mirror on a dining table luxuriantly wreathed by garlands. The Belgian stared greedily. He did not see quite what Driscoll had seen, yet he saw enough to draw his brow to a narrowing fold of keenest interest. Jacqueline was seated on the raised edge of the basin, pensively dipping a hand into the water. Her plump wrist showed rosy, like coral, and glancing sideways now and again at a poor agitated prince striding up and down, she looked as she did that day in the small boat, while tempting a shark. As she leaned over, the line of her waist and neck was stately and beautiful; and there were the maddening baby tendrils of soft, glowing copper. Maximilian had evidently found her there, in a reverie perhaps, and was at sight of her lured to some act bold and desirous; for just as evidently, if his flushed face and the way he bit his lip were tokens, he had that moment been repelled. Éloin watched them avidly, the tall archduke pacing up and down, the demure lady seated on the basin’s edge.

“It was but the lowly homage of a prince,” Maximilian cried out peevishly. Such was his apology.

“Homage of a play-king,” she corrected him with exasperating sweetness.

“Whose embassies,” she proceeded calmly, “cringe for recognition. Like beggars they prowl about that White House at Washington, yet never cross the threshold.”

Maximilian was too amazed for denial. “How do you know?” he exclaimed.

“While at the same time,” she went on, “the same neighbor receives the minister of the Mexican republic, and sends one in turn. But no matter. The marionettes of empire can dance, so long as Napoleon holds the strings. Was the princely homage a make-believe, too?”

“But–but, if I should convince you, mademoiselle, that the majesty which only asks to kneel is genuine?”

Her eyelids narrowed, and she looked at him with the oddest smile.

“You know–sire–that I only ask to be convinced. Where will Your Imperial Highness begin?”

“Know then that the American peasant named Lincoln, who would not recognize a Hapsburg, is dead. He has been assassinated. He will no longer encourage our rebels in Mexico.”

“That poor gentleman whom you call a peasant,” she returned with galling frankness, “was greater than any Hapsburg. He was fifty million people, and one million are still under arms. Your rebels know it. They still cry, ‘Viva la Intervención del Norte!’ But go on, sire.”

He chafed under her mockery in the title. But sitting there, goading an imaginary shark, she was no less inciting than when he had ventured his caress.

“They are of no consequence,” he burst forth, “neither the Americans, nor the dissidents. Your own countrymen, mademoiselle, will, and must, assure my empire.”

“Then I shall depend on my subjects alone!”

She contented herself with repeating, “Viva la Intervención del Norte!” That too, was ample comment as to the loyalty of his subjects. The Emperor paused in his walk. “Alas,” he sighed wearily, “a Hapsburg sacrifices himself to regenerate a people, and–they do not appreciate it.”

Jacqueline bent her head to hide a smile. She dreamily made rings in the water, and seemed to fall into his mood of poetic melancholy. “A comedietta of an empire,” she mused sympathetically, “a harlequinade, nothing more. Grands dieux, I do not wonder that Your Highness finds it unworthy!”

There is no such incense to a man as when he imagines himself understood by a pretty woman.

Yet the temptress now found herself the harder to master. It was the thought of what she must yet do. But she gave her head an impatient toss, and the tears that had come were gone. The lines of her mouth tightened, and the dangerous glint shone in her eyes. “So,” she added, almost in a whisper, “you did not mean it, sire, when you offered only a play-empire–to me.”

She knew that he started violently, and was looking down at her. But she kept her gaze averted, that he might not see the hard expression there that was merciless for them both. He did see, though, the long lashes, and the warm pink of her forearm, so tantalizing for shark or man.

“These imperial gardens, they are beautiful,” she went on softly, “but, hélas, they are not the Schönbrunn. Nor is Chapultepec more than a feeble miniature of the Hofburg. Oh, the wretched farce! The wretched farce, sire, in your pretension to–to honor me! A wooer from the throne, indeed? A straw throne–no, no, I do not like it!”

“And if,” he cried, “and if we were in the Schönbrunn––”

“Yes, yes,” and she clapped her hands with delight, “yes, where the heroic figures on the crest of the hill are silhouetted against the sky, where––”

“Never mind the heroic figures! But where I shall be really an emperor, the Emperor over Austria, over Hungary. Then, what then? Jeanne–Jacqueline, tell me!”

She had brought him to it. Yet her face clouded pitifully, as that day in the small boat, when she told Ney that a woman might only give. Such a woman too, would be lost for the reason that she would not hesitate. Here was the errand of the Sphinx, and achievement at her hand. Dainty flower of France, yes! But in truth, what was she?

“And then?” she repeated, and the maddening promise in her voice thrilled him. “Why, sire, I suppose that I could not help but listen to you. Yet first,” she hastened to add with subtle emphasis, “first, you would have to give up your play kingdom here.”

His blue eyes flashed. “I will!” he cried. “It shall be mine, the Roman empire of Charles V. They are tired of my brother Franz. Already they cry out for me. Our mother made an uncle abdicate for him, I will do as much for myself. I will, Jeanne, I will!”

Éloin behind his screen moved uneasily.

“The devil go with her!” the eavesdropper muttered. “She’ll have him abdicating himself in another minute. She must be stopped, she must!”

He tiptoed back, and once out of hearing, he ran. He found Driscoll on a bench, slowly passing his fingers through his hair, and staring fixedly at the ground.

“Coom,” said Éloin, “coom quick! He is alone. You find your chance. He is that happy, he say yes to anything.”

“No, not that way,” the Belgian directed. “The path here, it leads the more direct at the pond, so. Quick!” He knew that foliage would hide the couple until Driscoll should turn the corner of the hedge and burst on them squarely. The American hastened down the walk. “A nice surprise, mutual.” Éloin chuckled to himself.

Jacqueline did not falter before her victory. She knew that Maximilian rated the Mexican throne as a stepping-stone to another in Europe. She knew of a certain family pact among the Hapsburgs and how it rankled in Maximilian’s breast. Therein he had, on accepting the Mexican throne, solemnly renounced all right of inheritance to that of Austro-Hungary. But she knew also that he considered his oath as void, since Franz Josef had forced it on him. Craftily she pictured the Mexican enterprise, how instead of enhancing his prestige at home, it but turned him into a sorry and ridiculous figure. And so she won the child of Destiny. Yet, when in a sudden fervent outburst he came and sat beside her, and would have taken her hand, she still did not falter. Napoleon would have the glory, and she a shame unexplained, but for all that her country would have Mexico. Her country would have Mexico! Would have a vast expanse of empire, greater and more enduring than any won for her by Bonaparte himself.

Nevertheless, she brushed away the gallant’s arm with more vigor than her coy rôle demanded. “No, no,” she moaned faintly, “not yet!”

“But, cruelle––”

“Not yet, not until I know that you will try to win in Austria, not until–you abdicate here!”

“But, I shall sail this very month, I––”

“Never!”

Frankly, then, she placed her hands in his.

That moment Driscoll turned the corner of the hedge, and was before them. He fell back, and reddened as though himself caught in wrongdoing. It was strange how he noted, at such a time, that she was clothed in light blue, in the very dress he had given her. But no, he perceived at once that it was of some delicate silk from Japan. Yet the pattern was so nearly the same. She must have selected it–she had selected it!–with him in mind. And now, against a girl’s love so quaintly, shyly revealed, to behold this contrast, her hands there, wantonly surrendered!

Instantly she tore herself free and confronted him.

“Oh, why, why,” she cried fiercely, “did you not let them kill you?”

Suddenly her hands flew up to her hot face. “Then,” she moaned, “then you would not have lived to see!”

The Emperor stepped between them. Tall, severe, he was cold in anger.

“It’s the intrusion of a rowdy, mademoiselle.” To Driscoll he said, “Now, go!”

Utterly confused, the trooper turned to obey. But at the first step he swung round, looking as he had never looked in the bloodiest of cavalry charges.

“I am here for your answer, sir,” he said.

“Answer? What answer, fellow?”

Driscoll breathed once, he breathed twice, and yet again. It may be he counted them. Then he spoke.

“Save my empire?” Maximilian repeated the words.

There was a reluctant note in the query. Jacqueline heard. And the bravest act of her life was when she raised her head and faced her shame, with him to see. She must begin her fight all over again.

“Yes, your play empire, sire,” she said, wielding two weapons, the mockery in her voice, the seduction of her eyes.

Driscoll saw his cause forlorn against eyes like those.

“It’s unfair!” he protested involuntarily.

She turned on him in defiance. “It is not unfair! And you, monsieur, of all men, know that it is not. You, and you alone, know what I, what I would give–what I tried to give–that I might win in this!”

He could not help a thrill of admiration. She was battling against all men and women to change the destinies of two continents.

“W’y, I take it back then,” he said.

She stared at him in wonder, and drew farther away. It was his tone, altered as she could never have thought possible, nor had she known that aught on earth might hurt her so. She heard a decent man addressing some unavoidable word to a strumpet. All vestige of respect was gone, gone unconsciously, except that respect for himself which would not allow that the word be coarse or an insult. She looked in vain, too, for a trace of anger. Once she had sought to kill him, but that had not changed his big heart. While now! How much–oh, how much easier–was that other sacrifice of hers than this!

Driscoll turned to Maximilian direct. “Name them.”

“There is but one. We cannot give refuge to the enemies of the United States––”

“The conditions?”

“Therefore, to avoid complications, your men must lay down their arms on entering Mexico. Then we would deliver the arms to the United States on their recognizing Our Empire––”

“Trade us off, you mean?”

“Or, in case the United States still held aloof, then, as citizens of Mexico, you could take up your arms again.”

Driscoll looked at Jacqueline. She, the inspiration of such a condition, knew quite well beforehand that he would not submit.

“This is final, is it?” he demanded.

“It is, because We cannot provoke war with the United States, but,” Maximilian urged querulously, “you have only to surrender your swords.”

“After refusing them to the Federals, to the men who fought for them? And now we are to give them up to a pack of––” Driscoll stopped short and took another breath. “By God, sir, no sir!” he cried.