A quick laugh of intelligence rose to Judith's eyes; she had an alert brain.
"Prince Florizel?" she exclaimed. "And Princess Perdita! That were a fair match, in good sooth, and a way to heal old differences. But to the beginning, sweetheart, I beseech you; let us hear how the story is to be; and pray Heaven he gives me back my little Mamillius, that was so petted and teased by the court ladies."
However, as speedily appeared, she had anticipated too easy a continuation and conclusion. The young Prince Florizel proved to be enamored, not of one of his own station, but of a simple shepherdess; and although she instantly guessed that this shepherdess might turn out to be the forsaken Perdita, the conversation between King Polixenes and the good Camillo still left her in doubt. As for the next scene—the encounter between Autolycus and the country clown—Judith wholly and somewhat sulkily disapproved of that. She laughed, it is true; but it was sorely against her will. For she suspected that goodman Matthew's influence was too apparent here; and that, were he ever to hear of the story, he would in his vanity claim this part as his own; moreover, there was a kind of familiarity and every-day feeling in the atmosphere—why, she herself had been rapidly questioned by her father about the necessary purchases for a sheep-shearing feast, and Susan, laughing, had struck in with the information as to the saffron for coloring the warden-pies. But when the sweet-voiced Prudence came to the scene between Prince Florizel and the pretty shepherdess, then Judith was right well content.
"Oh, do you see, now, how her gentle birth shines through her lowly condition!" she said, quickly. "And when the old shepherd finds that he has been ordering a king's daughter to be the mistress of the feast—ay, and soundly rating her, too, for her bashful ways—what a fright will seize the good old man! And what says she in answer?—again, good Prue—let me hear it again—marry, now, I'll be sworn she had just such another voice as yours!"
"To the King Polixenes," Prudence continued, regarding the manuscript, "who is in disguise, you know, Judith, she says:
'Welcome, sir!
It is my father's will I should take on me
The hostess-ship o' the day:—you're welcome, sir.'
And then to both the gentlemen:
'Give me those flowers there, Dorcas.—Reverend sirs,
For you there's rosemary and rue; these keep
Seeming and savor all the winter long:
Grace and remembrance be to you both,
And welcome to our shearing!'"
"Ah, there, now, will they not be won by her gentleness?" she cried, eagerly. "Will they not suspect and discover the truth? It were a new thing for a prince to wed a shepherdess, but this is no shepherdess, as an owl might see! What say they then, Prue? Have they no suspicion?"
So Prudence continued her patient reading—in the intense silence that was broken only by the twittering of the birds in the orchard, or the crowing of a cock in some neighboring yard; and Judith listened keenly, drinking in every varying phrase. But when Florizel had addressed his speech to the pretty hostess of the day, Judith could no longer forbear: she clapped her hands in delight.