SOPHY OF KRAVONIA
took orders where he had looked to rule. The death of Monseigneur was indeed avenged. But there was no place for Sophy, the Queen of a tempestuous hour.
They set their horses' heads towards the frontier. They began the descent on the other side. The lake was gone, the familiar hills vanished; only in the eye of memory stood old Volseni still set in its gray mountains. Sophy rode forth from Kravonia in her sheepskins and her silver ring—the last Queen of Kravonia, the last Bailiff of Volseni, the last chosen leader of the mountain men. But the memory of the Red Star lived after her—how she loved Monseigneur and avenged him, how her face was fairer than the face of other women, and more pale—and how the Red Star glowed in sorrow and in joy, in love and in clash of arms, promising to some glory and to others death. In the street of Volseni and in the cabins among the hills you may hear the tale of the Red Star yet.
As she passed the border of the land which was so great in her life, by a freak of memory Sophy recalled a picture till now forgotten—a woman, unknown, untraced, unreckoned, who had passed down the Street of the Fountain, weeping bitterly—an obscure symbol of great woes, of the tribute life pays to its unresting enemies.
Yet to the unconquerable heart life stands unconquered. What danger had not shaken not even sorrow could overthrow. She rode into the future with Dunstanbury on her right hand—patience in his mind, and in his heart hope. Some day the sun would shine on the summit of heaven-kissing hills.
THE END
