‘This is the last thing I have to give you. Naked I came to you; naked I go from you. I had everything I possessed from you and to you everything I have, I return.’

The tears were falling down the King’s cheeks. He tried to speak, but he was too overcome by grief.

‘Do not grieve too long for me,’ she said. ‘When I am gone you should marry again.’

‘No,’ cried the King. ‘Never. I shall have mistresses.’ And her dying face was twisted suddenly in a smile as she said, ‘That would not stop you.’

Then the King began to weep again and to tell her that he had never loved as he loved her. That he would never know happiness again when she was lost to him.


* * *

She rallied and sank, but the end was in sight.

The King was at her bedside when she died. Frantically he kissed her face and hands as though by doing so he could persuade her to return. Then he sent for a picture of her and shut himself in his room with it and stayed there for two hours.

After that he came out and said: ‘Take the picture away. There was never a woman worthy to buckle her shoe.’