'Madame,' said William, 'it was my lord the King.' The Queen fumed.
Then the Archbishop said, 'She is nobly born, of the house of Saint-Pol. I understand that she has a clear mind.'
'More,' cried the Marshal, 'she has a clear heart!'
'If she had nothing clear about her I have that which would bleach her white enough,' said the Queen-Mother; and Longchamp, who had said nothing at all, grinned.
In the event, the Queen one day took to her barge, crossed the river, and confronted the girl who stood between England and Navarre.
Jehane, who was sitting with her ladies at needlework, was not so scared as they were. Like the nymphs of the hunting Maid they all clustered about her, showing the Queen-Mother how tall she was and how nobly figured. She flushed a little and breathed a little faster; but making her reverence she recovered herself, and stood with that curious look on her face, half surprise, half discontent, which made men call her the sulky fair. So the Queen-Mother read the look.
'No pouting with me, mistress,' she said. 'Send these women away. It is with you I have to deal.'
'Do we deal singly, Madame?' said Jehane. 'Then my ladies shall seek for yours the comforts of a discomfortable lodging. I am sorry I have no better.' The Queen-Mother nodded her people out of the room; so she and Jehane were left alone together.
'Mistress,' said the Queen-Mother, 'what is this between you and my son? Playing and kissing are to be left below the degrees of a throne. Let there be no more of it. Do you dare, are you so hardy in the eyes, as to look up to a kingly seat, or measure your head for a king's crown?'
Jehane had plenty of spirit, which a very little of this sort of talk would have fanned into a flame; but she had irony too.