The Duchess looked at the work with admiration, and bade the little Mary, the damsel of Burgundy, look on and see how the dainty web was woven, while she signed the maker to seat herself on a step of the alcove.
When the child’s questions and interest were exhausted, and she began to be somewhat perilously curious about the carved weights of the bobbins, her grandmother sent her to play with the ladies in the ante-room, desiring Grisell to continue the work. After a few kindly words the Duchess said, “The poor child is to have a stepdame so soon as the year of mourning is passed. May she be good to her! Hath the rumour thereof reached you in the city, Maid Griselda, that my son is in treaty with your English King, though he loves not the house of York? But princely alliances must be looked for in marriage.”
“Madge!” exclaimed Grisell; then colouring, “I should say the Lady Margaret of York.”
“You knew her?”
“Oh! I knew her. We loved each other well in the Lord of Salisbury’s house! There never was a maid whom I knew or loved like her!”
“In the Count of Salisbury’s house,” repeated the Duchess. “Were you there as the Lady Margaret’s fellow-pupil?” she said, as though perceiving that her lace maker must be of higher quality than she had supposed.
“It was while my father was alive, madame, and before her father had fixed his eyes on the throne, your Highness.”
“And your father was, you said, the knight De—De—D’Acor.”
“So please you, madame,” said Grisell kneeling, “not to mention my poor name to the lady.”
“We are a good way from speech of her,” said the Duchess smiling. “Our year of doole must pass, and mayhap the treaty will not hold in the meantime. The King of France would fain hinder it. But if the Demoiselle loved you of old would she not give you preferment in her train if she knew?”