"Now! So soon as you can get the horses ready?"
"But your Grace must have time to make her preparations!"
"I am not going to Kernsberg. I stay here!" said Joan, stating a fact.
Werner von Orseln was just going out of the door, jubilantly confiding to Alt Pikker that as soon as he saw the Princess put her hand in their lady"s he knew they were safe. At the sound of Joan"s words he was startled into crying out loudly, "What?" At the same time he faced about with the frown on his face which he wore when he corrected an irregularity in the ranks.
"I am not going to Kernsberg. I bide here!" Joan repeated calmly. "Have you anything to say to that, Chief Captain von Orseln?"
"But, my lady----"
"There are no buts in the matter. Go to your quarters and see that the arms and armour are all in good case!"
"Madam, the arms and armour are always in good case," said Werner, with dignity; "but go to Kernsberg you must. The enemy is near to the city, and your Highness might fall into their hands."
"You have heard what I have said!" Joan tapped the oaken floor with her foot.
"But, madam, let me beseech you----"
Joan turned from her chief captain impatiently and walked towards the door of her private apartments. Werner followed his mistress, with his hands a little outstretched and a look of eager entreaty on his face.
"My lady," he said, "thirty years I was the faithful servant of your father--ten I have served you. By the memory of those years, if ever I have served you faithfully--"
"My father taught you but little, if after thirty years you have not learned to obey. Go to your post!"
Werner von Orseln drew himself up and saluted. Then he wheeled about and clanked out without adding a word more.
"Faith," he confided to Alt Pikker, "the wench is her father all over again. If I had gone a step further, I swear she would have beat me with the flat of my own sword. I saw her eye full on the hilt of it."
"Faith, I too, wished that I had been better helmeted!" chuckled Alt Pikker.
"Well," said Werner, like one who makes the best of ill fortune, "we must keep the closer to her, you and I, that in the stress of battle she come not to a mischief. Yet I confess that I am not deeply sorry. I began to fear that Isle Rugen had sapped our la.s.s"s spirit. To my mind, she seemed somewhat over content to abide there."
"Ah," nodded Alt Pikker, "that is because, after all, our Joan is a woman. No one can know the secret of a woman"s heart."
"And those who think they know most, know the least!" concurred the much experienced Werner.
For a moment, after the door closed upon the men, Joan and Margaret stood in silence regarding each other.
"I must go and make me ready," said Margaret, speaking like one who is thinking deeply. Joan stood still, conscious that something was about to happen, uncertain what it might be.
"I shall see you before I depart," Margaret was saying, with her hand on the latch.
Suddenly she dropped the handle of the door and ran impulsively to Joan, clasping her about the neck.
"_I know!_" she said, looking up into her face.
With a great leap the blood flew to Joan"s neck and brow, then as slowly faded away, leaving her paler than before.
"What do you know?" she faltered; and she feared, yet desired, to hear.
"That you love him!" said Margaret very low. "I came in--I could not help it--I did not know--when Conrad was bidding you goodbye. Joan, I am so glad--so glad! Now you will understand; now you will not think me foolish any more!"
"Margaret, I am shamed for ever--it is sin!" whispered Joan, with her arms about her friend.
"It is love!" said the wife of Maurice von Lynar, with glowing eyes and pride in her voice.
"I hope I shall die in battle----"
"Joan!"
"I a wife, and love a priest--the brother of the man who is my husband!
I pray G.o.d that He will take my life to atone for the sin of loving him.
Yet He knows that I could neither help it nor yet hinder."
"Joan, you will yet be happy."
The d.u.c.h.ess shook her head.
"It were best for us both that I should die--that is what I pray for."
"May Heaven avert this thing--you know not what you say. And yet,"
Margaret continued in a more meditative tone, "I am not sure. If he were there with you, death itself would not be so hard; at all events, it were better than living without each other."
And the two women went into the attiring-room with arms still locked about each other"s waists. And as often as their eyes encountered they lingered a little, as if tasting the sweet new knowledge which they had in common. Then those of Joan of the Sword Hand were averted and she blushed.
CHAPTER XLVIII
JOAN GOVERNS THE CITY
It was night in the city of Courtland, and a time of great fear. The watchmen went to and fro on the walls, staring into the blank dark. The Alla, running low with the droughts, lapped gently about the piles of the Summer Palace and lisped against the bounding walls of the city.
But ever and anon from the east, where lay the camps of the opposed forces, there came a sound, heavy and sonorous, like distant thunder.
Whereat the frighted wives of the burghers of Courtland said, "I wonder what mother"s son lies a-dying now. Hearken to the talking of Great Peg, the Margraf"s cannon!"
At the western or Brandenberg gate there was yet greater fear. For the news had spread athwart the city that a great body of hors.e.m.e.n had paused in front of it, and were being held in parley by the guard on duty, till the Lady Joan, Governor of the city, should be made aware.
"They swear that they are friends"--so ran the report--"which is proof that they are enemies. For how can there be friends who are not Courtlanders. And these speak an outland speech, clacking in their throats, hissing their s"s, and laughing "Ho! ho!" instead of "Hoch!
hoch!" as all good Christians do!"
The Governor of the city, roused from a rare slumber, leaped on her horse and went clattering off with an escort through the unsleeping streets. When first she came the folk had cheered her as she went. But they were too jaded and saddened now.
"Our Governor, the Princess Joan!" they used to call her with pride. But for all that she found not the same devotion among these easy Courtlanders as among her hardy men of Hohenstein. To these she was indeed the Princess Joan. But to those in Castle Kernsberg she was Joan of the Sword Hand.