Joanna's eyes were alight with excitement; her hands were locked together tightly. Her animated face was set in lines of the greatest determination and happiest anticipation.
"Wendot," she said, "there is a wolf up yonder in that wild valley we can see from yon window, as you look towards the heights of Snowdon. Some of our people have seen and tracked it, but they say it is an old and wily one, and no one has got near it yet. Wendot, we have set our hearts on having a wolf hunt of our very own. We do not want all the men and dogs and the stir and fuss which they would make if we were known to be going. I know what that means. We are kept far away behind everybody, and only see the dead animal after it has been killed miles away from us. We want to be in the hunt ourselves -- Britten, Alphonso, Arthyn, Gertrude, and I. Godfrey would perhaps be won over if Gertrude begged him, and I know Raoul Latimer would -- he is always ready for what turns up -- but that would not be enough. O Wendot, if you and your brothers would but come, we should be safe without anybody else. Raoul has dogs, and we could all be armed, and we would promise to be very careful. We could get away early, as Gertrude did that day she slipped off to the Eagle's Crag.
"Wendot, do answer -- do say you will come. You understand all about hunting, even hunting wolves. You are not afraid?"
Wendot smiled at the notion. He did not entirely understand that he was requested to take part in a bit of defiant frolic which the young princes and princesses were well aware would not have been permitted by their parents. All he grasped was that the Lady Joanna requested his assistance in a hunt which she had planned, and with the details of which he was perfectly familiar, and he agreed willingly to her request, not sorry, either for his own sake or for that of his more discontented brothers, that the monotony of the days spent in waiting the return of the king should be beguiled by anything so attractive and exciting as a wolf hunt.
The Dynevor brothers had often hunted wolves before, and saw no special peril in the sport; and Joanna and Gertrude felt that not even the most nervous guardian could hesitate to let them go with such a stout protector.
"I do like him, Gertrude," said Joanna, when Wendot and his brother had retired. "I hope if I ever have to marry, as people generally do, especially if they are king's daughters, that I shall find somebody as brave and handsome and knightly as your Wendot of Dynevor."
For Gertrude and Joanna both took the view that the breaking of the king's gold coin between them was equivalent to the most solemn of troth plights.
[CHAPTER VI]. WELSH WOLVES.
The Princess Joanna was accustomed to a great deal of her own way. She had been born at Acre, whilst her parents had been absent upon Edward's Crusade, and for many years she had remained in Castile with her grandmother-godmother, who had treated her with unwise distinction, and had taught her to regard herself almost as a little queen. The high-spirited and self-willed girl had thus acquired habits of independence and commanding ways which were perhaps hardly suited to her tender years; but nevertheless there was something in her bright vivacity and generous impetuosity which always won the hearts of those about her, and there were few who willingly thwarted her when her heart was set upon any particular thing.
There were in attendance upon the king and his children a number of gallant youths, sons of his nobles, who were admitted to pleasant and easy intercourse with the royal family; so that when Joanna and Alphonso set their hearts upon a private escapade of their own, in the shape of a wolf hunt, it was not difficult to enlist many brave champions in the cause quite as eager for the danger and the sport as the royal children themselves. Joanna was admitted to be a privileged person, and Alphonso, as the only son of the king, had a certain authority of his own.