Up the stair she went, to the accustomed chamber, where an additional chair was on the dais under the canopy, the half circle of ladies as usual, but before she had seen more with her dazzled, swimming eyes, even as she rose from her first genuflection, she found herself in a pair of soft arms, kisses rained on her cheeks and brow, and there was a tender cry in her own tongue of “My Grisell! my dear old Grisell! I have found you at last! Oh! that was good in you. I knew the forget-me-nots, and all your little devices. Ah!” as Grisell, unable to speak for tears of joy, held up the pouncet box, the childish gift.
The soft pink velvet bodice girdled and clasped with diamonds was pressed to her, the deep hanging silken sleeves were round her, the white satin broidered skirt swept about her feet, the pearl-edged matronly cap on the youthful head leant fondly against her, as Margaret led her up, still in her embrace, and cried, “It is she, it is she! Dear belle mère, thanks indeed for bringing us together!”
The Countess of Poitiers looked on scandalised at English impulsiveness, and the elder Duchess herself looked for a moment stiff, as her lace-maker slipped to her knees to kiss her hand and murmur her thanks.
“Let me look at you,” cried Margaret. “Ah! have you recovered that terrible mishap? By my troth, ’tis nearly gone. I should never have found it out had I not known!”
This was rather an exaggeration, but joy did make a good deal of difference in Grisell’s face, and the Duchess Margaret was one of the most eager and warm-hearted people living, fervent alike in love and in hate, ready both to act on slight evidence for those whose cause she took up, and to nourish bitter hatred against the enemies of her house.
“Now, tell me all,” she continued in English. “I heard that you had been driven out of Wilton, and my uncle of Warwick had sped you northward. How is it that you are here, weaving lace like any mechanical sempstress? Nay, nay! I cannot listen to you on your knees. We have hugged one another too often for that.”
Grisell, with the elder Duchess’s permission, seated herself on the cushion at Margaret’s feet. “Speak English,” continued the bride. “I am wearying already of French! Ma belle mère, you will not find fault. You know a little of our own honest tongue.”
Duchess Isabel smiled, and Grisell, in answer to the questions of Margaret, told her story. When she came to the mention of her marriage to Leonard Copeland, there was the vindictive exclamation, “Bound to that blood-thirsty traitor! Never! After the way he treated you, no marvel that he fell on my sweet Edmund!”
“Ah! madame, he did not! He tried to save him.”
“He! A follower of King Henry! Never!”