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Updated: June 3, 2025
Ellerey had made his peace with the Countess as speedily as possible. He was likely to make so many enemies that he could not afford to lose a friend, and he felt that this woman was a friend. He had duly humbled himself and had been forgiven, and even when she questioned him about his adventure in the Altstrasse, he refused to speak of it lest he should again offend.
"I think so, but it is not reasonable to suppose that they do," returned the Ambassador. "Such a feeling is prevalent in all grades of society in Sturatzberg, from her Majesty Queen Elena, down to the beggars in the Altstrasse." "The Queen, my lord!" exclaimed the King sharply. "I do not speak hastily, your Majesty, Queen Elena has all those attributes which go to make a great ruler.
The men had gone to swell the crowds in the Bergenstrasse, not to fight perhaps, but to hang about in side streets and seize whatever loot they could. With dead and dying men lying in the roadway, there would be much to be picked up. Many of the women had gone too, for in the Altstrasse much of the human refuse of the city had its home, and sex counted for little.
Yet only in a window here and there was there a dim light when Ellerey looked up at the gloomy house as he stood alone in the Altstrasse. Once alone, there were many questions which Ellerey regretted he had not put to his host, and some misgivings arose in his mind whether he had not been led to promise service which might be contrary to the oath which he had taken to the King.
There seemed to be no contingency he was not prepared to meet, for which he was not ready; and yet a sense of misgiving, almost amounting to a feeling of insecurity, oppressed him as he walked along the Altstrasse. The people hanging about the door saluted him, for the Frenchman had been liberal to his poor neighbors, and had an excellent name for charity.
The Altstrasse was of the old town, a narrow thoroughfare of gaunt houses which now sheltered a dozen families in rooms where the wealthy had once lived, and in which Ministers and Ambassadors had entertained the wit, beauty, and bravery of nations.
He had seen little of the face of the woman who had cried to him for help that night at the corner of the Altstrasse, being more concerned with what was required of him than with her who petitioned, but somehow this woman always reminded him of that night. Whenever she walked beside him, he recalled that other woman who had run hand-in-hand with him through the deserted streets.
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