His jaw fell. 'Ye have so much madness?' he asked.
She stretched towards him the hand that held her sewing now.
'I swear to you,' she said—'and ye know me well—I seek a way to bring these rumours to the King's ears.'
He said nothing, revolving these things in his mind.
'Goodly servant,' she began, and he knew from the round and silvery sound she drew from her throat that she was minded to make one of the long speeches that appalled and delighted him with their childish logic and wild honour. 'If it were not that my cousin would run his head into danger I would will that he came to the King. Sir, ye are a wise man, can ye not see this wisdom? There is no good walking but upon sure ground, and I will not walk where the walking is not good. Shall I wed this King and have these lies to fear all my life? Shall I wed this King and do him this wrong? Neither wisdom nor honour counsel me to it. Since I have heard these lies were abroad I have at frequent moments thought how I shall bring them before the King.'
He thrust his hands into his pockets, stretched his legs out, and leaned back as though he were supporting the chimney-piece with his back.
'The King knoweth how men will lie about a woman,' she began again. 'The King knoweth how ye may buy false witness as ye may buy herrings in the market-place at so much a score. An the King were such a man as not to know these things, I would not wed with him. An the King were such a man as not to trust in me, I would not wed with him. I could have no peace. I could have no rest. I am not one that ask little, but much.'
'Why, you ask much of them that do support your cause,' he laughed from his private thinking.
'I do ask this oath of you,' she answered: 'that neither with sword nor stiletto, nor with provoked quarrel, nor staves, nor clubs, nor assassins, ye do seek to stay my cousin's coming.'
He cut across her purpose with asking again: 'Ha' ye seen the King rage jealously?'