"What sort of room?"
"Well, the walls were covered with gay frescoes from Saxon history; the fireplace was covered with very handsomely carved stone dragons; and the floor was covered with new rushes. Indeed, the Queen has one of the neatest bedrooms I have ever seen."
"Ah, yes," said Niafer: "and what did you talk about during the time that you spent in your dear friend's bedroom?")
Well, he found all going well with Queen Alianora (Dom Manuel continued) except that she had not yet provided an heir for the English throne, and it was this alone which was troubling her. It was on account of this that she had sent for Count Manuel.
"It is considered not to look at all well, after three years of marriage," the Queen told him, "and people are beginning to say a number of unkind things."
"It is the common fate of queens," Dom Manuel replies, "to be exposed to the criticism of envious persons."
"No, do not be brilliant and aphoristic, Manuel, for I want you to help me more practically in this matter."
"Very willingly will I help you if I can. But how can I?"
"Why, you must assist me in getting a baby,—a boy baby, of course."
"I am willing to do all that I can, because certainly it does not look well for you to have no son to be King of England. But how can I, of all persons, help you in this affair?"