I
flung myself from my saddle and blurted out my news. The
constable snatched at his letter with an oath; James leveled the
ground with careful accuracy; I do not remember doing anything
except wiping my forehead and feeling very hungry.
"Good Lord, she's gone after him!" said Sapt, as he read. Then he
handed me the letter.
I will not set out what the queen wrote. The purport seemed to
us, who did not share her feelings, pathetic indeed and moving,
but in the end (to speak plainly) folly. She had tried to endure
her sojourn at Zenda, she said; but it drove her mad. She could
not rest; she did not know how we fared, nor how those in
Strelsau; for hours she had lain awake; then at last falling
asleep, she had dreamt.
"I had had the same dream before. Now it came again. I saw him so
plain. He seemed to me to be king, and to be called king. But he
did not answer nor move. He seemed dead; and I could not rest."
So she wrote, ever excusing herself, ever repeating how something
drew her to Strelsau, telling her that she must go if she would
see "him whom you know," alive again. "And I must see him--ah, I
must see him! If the king has had the letter, I am ruined
already.
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