These letters I had given to Max, and there had sprung up in his untouched heart a chivalric admiration for the lady of Burgundy.

He loved an ideal.

I suppose most men and every woman will understand his condition.

It was truly an ardent love.
Max kept Hymbercourt's letters, and would hide himself on the battlements by the hour reading them, dreaming the dreams of youth and worshipping at the feet of his ideal,--fair Mary of Burgundy, his unknown lady-love.
Before the arrival of the messenger from Duke Charles, Max spoke little of the Burgundian princess; but the message gave her a touch of reality, and he began to open his heart to me--his only confidant.
There seemed to have been a reciprocal idealization going on in the far-off land of Burgundy.

My letters to Hymbercourt, in which you may be sure Max's strength and virtues lost nothing, fell into the hands of Madame d'Hymbercourt, and thus came under the eyes of Princess Mary.
That fair little lady also built in her heart an altar to an unknown god, if hints in Hymbercourt's letters were to be trusted.