"It is some new intrigue of which thou hast knowledge?" he questioned, striving to hold her thoughts in one direction.
"Is not the one for which I stand here, and which will send me hence, enough," she answered tantalizingly, "that thou wouldst have more?"
"If it be but for whim of speech that thou hast summoned me," he said rising, knowing well that she would yield nothing to persuasion, "I may not linger longer. If there be a way in which I may serve thy mother, the Countess—ere I take my leave——?"
She shook her head for answer, pulling impatiently at the orchids which she had gathered up again; they seemed akin to her—half elfin flowers.
"Or if there be some message of farewell for Her Majesty?"
Again she shook her head, in emphatic denial; but she was conscious that the Bernardini still lingered, although he had taken a few steps away from her: and looking up she saw that he was watching her in keen disappointment. Suddenly her cheek flamed, for his look was both compassionate and reproachful, yet despite her anger, she thought him more than ever noble while she struggled to repress the half-conscious feeling within her that dumbly answered to his appeal.
"She hath been merciful and forgiven much," he urged, in a tone that was still compassionate toward Ecciva herself; "she hath suffered much because of the grief for thy mother and thyself—and because she might not lighten the penance. Is there no little word of farewell for her?"
Dama Ecciva tossed away her flowers, and rose indignantly:
"I have a message for Her Majesty," she said in quick, hard tones. "Tell her I thank her for"—she glanced about the chamber as if summing up its comforts and elegance—"for her flowers. Tell her that the de Montferrats come of a noble house, well nigh as old as the Lusignans; that of our elder branch came a queen of Cyprus. Tell her that if I know not how to thank her for that she hath decreed banishment for a noble of our ancient house—she who hath lived in our land of Cyprus these few years of her little life—if I lack the grace to be so good a courtier—yet I humbly thank her for—these orchids—which might have sprung from some mouldering trunk in a forgotten corner of my estates. They mind me of the days before she came to Cyprus."
She crushed them angrily beneath her foot as she spoke, and her words stormed upon him.