“Your words are sweet,” said Charles, thoughtfully observing her.
She sighed again.
“My thoughts stumble in your speech,” she said. “I regret I have not English blood within my veins.”
“And why?”
“The King would trust and love me then. He does not now. I am French and powerless to do him good.”
There was a touch of honest sadness in her speech which awakened the King’s sympathy.
“Nay,” he said hastily, to comfort her; “’tis thy fancy. Thy entertainment hath made me grateful–to Louis and Louise.”
“Think not of Louis and Louise,” she said, sadly and reproachfully, “but of thy dear self and England’s glory. For shame! Ah, Sire, my childhood-dreams were of sunny France, where I was born; at Versailles–at Fontainebleau among the monarch trees–my early womanhood sighed for love. France gave me all but that. It came not till I saw the English King!”
The siren of the Nile never looked more bewitchingly beautiful than this siren of France as she half reclined upon the couch, playing upon the King’s heart with a bit of memory. His great nature realized her sorrow and encompassed it.
“And am I not good to thee, child?” he asked. He took her hand and responded to her eyes, though not with the tenderness of love–the tenderness for which she sought.