Diane! Diane!--My loyal wife!
[_He embraces her_.
DIANE.
[_Shrinking from him_.]
No, no! I am not worthy of your love! I must save my father's life, no
matter what it costs me.
PAUL.
Courage, dear heart! I hold here salvation for you both.
DIANE.
You?
PAUL.
Yes! This very night your father shall fly with us to England.
DIANE.
Ah! Then I am free! I need owe him nothing!
PAUL.
Owe whom nothing?
[_The tramp of_ SOLDIERS _is heard outside_.
DIANE.
Hark!--The Guard!--Take care!
_Enter the_ DUKE, _with_ GUARD _and_ POTIN.
DUKE.
[_Contemptuously to_ PAUL.]
You here, traitor?
DIANE.
[_Aside to the_ DUKE.]
You must not call him that. He did not betray. The proof is this--that
he has come to save you.
DUKE.
And so make my debt to him a means of reaching you;--but I would not
accept my life from hands unclean with treachery.
PAUL.
There's not a drop of traitor's blood within my veins!
DUKE.
Yet you signed the warrant for my arrest.
PAUL
Then another hand than mine--unknown to me--filled in your name.
DUKE.
Plausible trickster!--We have here double proof that you are guilty.
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