“We are saved.”
The horrible Book People had not attacked the Palace; they had gone furtively through the country killing stray fish and destroying any beautiful thing they happened to find. For these people hate beauty and happiness. They were now holding a meeting in the Palace gardens, near the fountain where the Princesses had been wont to do their source-service, and they were making speeches like mad. You could hear the dull, flat murmur of them even from the Palace. They were the sort of people who love the sound of their own silly voices.
The newcomers were ranged in orderly ranks before the Queen, awaiting her orders. It looked like a pageant or a fancy-dress parade. There was St. George in his armor, and Joan of Arc in hers—heroes in plumed hats and laced shirts, heroes in ruffs and doublets—brave gentlemen of England, gallant gentlemen of France. For all the differences in their dress, there was nothing motley about the band which stood before the Queen. Varied as they were in dress and feature, they had one quality in common, which marked them as one company. The same light of bravery shone on them all, and became them like a fine uniform.
“Will you,” the Queen asked of their leader—a pale, thin-faced man in the dress of a Roman—“will you do just as you think best? I would not presume,” she added, with a kind of proud humility, “to teach the game of war to Caesar.”
“Oh, Queen,” he answered, “these brave men and I will drive back the intruders, but, having driven them back, we must ourselves return through those dark doors which we passed when your young defenders called our names. We will drive back the men—and by the look of them ’twill be an easy task. But Caesar wars not with women, and the women on our side are few, though each, I doubt not, has the heart of a lioness.”
He turned toward Joan of Arc with a smile and she gave him back a smile as bright as the sword she carried.
“How many women are there among you?” the Queen asked, and Joan answered:
“Queen Boadicea and Torfrida and I are but three.”
“But we three,” cried Torfrida, “are a match for three hundred of such women as those. Give us but whips instead of swords, and we will drive them like dogs to their red and blue cloth-bound kennels.”