'"Nay, child, choose your own words. Tell her Majesty the plain facts just as I told you; and surely, if she has a heart at all, they will be enough for her. Farewell! Be wary. But, for God's sake, be as speedy as you prudently can."
'Lady Dalrymple turned to leave the oratory; and as I moved to open the door, it was pushed back by some one outside, and Lady Sarah Buckthorne, one of the maids of honour to the Queen, came in for a few steps, and then stopped short with a look of astonished inquiry.
'"I was called in from—— This lady wished——" I began, somewhat confused.
'"I must beg pardon for intruding here," said Lady Dalrymple courteously; "but I had occasion for a few words with my kinsman, Lord Desmond, and as the ante-chamber was crowded and noisy, he brought me here for privacy."
'Lady Sarah made a stiff courtesy, took up a breviary that lay on the Queen's prie-dieu, and departed.
'"Is that one of the Queen's ladies?" asked Lady Dalrymple sharply; and when I told her, there was a look in her eyes for a moment that was almost fierce. "If they only understood——! If they could know but for one minute——!" I heard her murmur as we passed through the passage that led to the ante-chamber.
'When I got back to the bowling-green, a game was going on, in which everybody seemed too deeply interested to notice my reappearance. I was rather glad of this, for I was in no humour to play; so I stood looking on absently, while I pondered in my own mind what I should say to the Queen. Presently Hal Verney came up to rouse me with a slap on the shoulder, and asked why I was in the dumps, and who it was that had sent for me.
'"You see you were such an unconscionable time gone," he continued, "that you could not expect one to wait for you. But this game is almost over, and then we'll have a glorious match; so cheer up, man, and don't be moody."
'I gave Hal to understand that he had hit upon quite a wrong explanation of my moodiness, and that my interest in bowls for that morning was over. Whereupon he became so curious, that I ended by telling him all. Hal was such a quick, sharp-witted fellow, that I thought it very likely he might be of some use to me in managing my suit to the Queen. I had scarcely ever spoken of Frances to Hal before—partly because, I am sorry to say, she was so very seldom in my thoughts, and partly because, when I first came to Court, it had been the fashion with him and the others to consider my very early marriage as an excellent joke, and to pity me for being tied to a wife already. However, even if that jest had not been worn out long ago, there was far too much chivalry in Hal for him to dream of alluding to it now. He listened with more interest than I had expected, and was quite as vehement in his indignation against the Lord Chief-Justice as I was myself. '"You had better say nothing to the others about what you are going to do," was his first bit of counsel. "It is as well that it should not be noised all over the Palace before you make your petition. Why, Algernon, you must have heard all about the Taunton girls and that Madame St. Aubert before? 'Tis a marvel that you should never have thought of your wife being among them!" I could not but own that I had been extremely dull. "And then," Hal proceeded, "I daresay you never noticed how, one day, when Princess Anne asked what had become of them, Lady Sarah managed to turn the conversation, and prevent any one from answering her. Ah, well, if you had kept your eyes open, as I do, you would know something of these matters." I looked at Hal with intense respect. He certainly had a wonderful talent for keeping his eyes open, and finding out all the little intrigues that were going on in every quarter of the Palace. "Do you know," he went on, in very low and mysterious tones, "that the Queen's ladies have contrived to get the fines for those girls granted to them to divide among themselves? Isn't it a shamefully mean and pitiful thing to do? It was through Philip Buckthorne that I found it out."
'"The maids of honour!" repeated I in dismay. "Then there is no chance of the Queen's showing any grace to me!"