"Your Highness, I have been under a similar belief regarding yourself."
"Knowing, as you do," she continued, aimlessly tracing lines on the paper before her, "that I cannot be the real Princess Natalie, you are perhaps of opinion that I have no right to the throne of Czernova?"
"Princess--no! I will believe anything rather than that you are an usurper or an impostor."
The energy with which he spoke attested the sincerity of his belief.
Now for the first time since his entrance the princess raised her eyes, and their flash of gratitude thrilled Paul.
"Your faith in me is not misplaced, for I am truly the lawful Princess of Czernova, though a strange necessity has compelled me to assume the name of my sister Natalie. You shall have the story anon, Captain Cressingham," she continued, in a curiously labored voice, as if the choice of words were a difficulty, "we were parted in a very strange way. You will perhaps have guessed that I was carried off by the orders of Cardinal Ravenna, who acted, however, under the authority of my father, Prince Thaddeus.
"They justified the secret abduction on the ground that in my new sphere it would be wise, nay absolutely necessary, to break entirely with the past. But for my own part," added the princess softly, and with the color mantling her cheek, "I do not see the necessity for ignoring all former ties."
"Your Highness has not forgotten the days spent at Castel Nuovo?"
"No, nor that day in Isola Sacra. Captain Cressingham, I am a Lilieska, and the herald will tell you that the motto of the House of Lilieski is '_Keep to troth_.'"
Paul caught his breath at these words, the significance of which was not to be mistaken.
That the lovely convent maiden should care for such an unworthy fellow as himself had been a marvel to him two years previously; but that now, when a princess, and capable of forming a brilliant alliance with king or noble, she should still adhere to him, was more marvellous still.
Barbara, no longer able to endure this state of tension, rose to her feet, and with unsteady step moved towards Paul.
"When the suitor is of inferior rank," she said with a strange catch in her voice, "court etiquette permits a princess to make the first advance in love. Thus, then, do I avail myself of the privilege. Paul," she continued, taking his hands in her own, and striving to look into his averted face, "have you forgotten your words to me on that sunny day in the old Greek temple? Day and night for two years I have never ceased to think of them. Yes, though you may reproach me with the name of Bora, your image has never been absent from my mind. Does my new rank embarrass you? To you I am the same Barbara now as I was then. I long to lay aside my state; to wander again through the pine-woods of Dalmatia; to handle an oar on the blue Adriatic as on that day when we were so cruelly parted. Ah, heaven! how cold, how silent you are! Why do you turn away your eyes? Paul, look at me," she entreated wistfully.