"Aye! she is affianced to the Duke of Wessex."
"Well, and what of it, child?"
"What of it?" retorted the girl indignantly, "she is never allowed to see him. The moment His Grace is expected to arrive in the Queen's presence, 'tis—'Lady Ursula, you may retire. I shall not need your services to-day.'"
And looking straight down her pretty nose, dainty Lady Alicia Wrenford pursed her lips and put on the starchy airs of a soured matron of forty.
The Duchess of Lincoln threw up her hands in horror.
"Fie on you, child!" she said sternly, "mimicking Her Majesty."
"'Tis quite true what Alicia says," here interposed Barbara, pouting; "everything is done to keep Ursula out of His Grace's way. And we, too, are made the scapegoats of this silly intrigue."
"Barbara, I forbid you to talk like that!"
"I mean nothing disrespectful, madam, yet 'tis patent to every one. Why are we relegated to this dreary old chamber this brilliant afternoon, when my lord the Cardinal and all the foreign ambassadors are at the Palace? Why are we not allowed to join the others at tennis, or watch the gentlemen at bowls? Why were Helen and Margaret kept from seeing the jousts? Why? Why? Why?"
She was stamping her little foot, eager, impatient, excited. The Duchess felt somewhat bewildered before this hurricane of girlish wrath.