the warm-hearted Joanna, and the two were fast friends
already, although the Welsh girl was several years the elder of the
pair. But Joanna, who had been educated in Spain by her grandmother and
namesake, and who had only recently come to be with her own parents, had
enjoyed abroad a liberty and importance which had developed her rapidly,
and her mind was as quick and forward as her body was active and energetic.

Intercourse with Arthyn, too, had given to the younger princess a great
sympathy with the vanquished Welsh, and she was generously eager that
those who came to pay homage to her father should not feel themselves in
a position that was humiliating or galling. The gentle Eleanor shared
this feeling to the full, and was glad to give to the young knight Sir
Godfrey Challoner, who was one of her own gentlemen-in-waiting, a
gracious message for the young Lord of Dynevor to the effect that she
would be glad to receive him and his brothers in her father's absence,
and to give them places at the royal table for the evening meal shortly
to be served.

Great was the delight of Gertrude when the message was despatched. Her
companions crowded round her to hear again the story of her adventure on
the Eagle's Crag. Gertrude never knew how she had been betrayed by
Wendot's brothers. She believed that they had been accidentally hindered
from coming to her rescue by the difficulties of the climb after the
eagle's nest. There was a faint, uncomfortable misgiving in her mind
with regard to the black-browed twins, but it did not amount to actual
suspicion, far less to any certainty of their enmity; and although
Eleanor had heard the whole story from her parents, she had not
explained the matter more fully to Gertrude.

An invitation from royalty was equal to a command, and the eager
children were not kept waiting long. The double doors at the end of the
long gallery, which had closed behind the retiring form of Godfrey,
opened once again to admit him, and closely in his wake there followed
two manly youths -- two, not four -- upon whose faces every eye was
instantly fixed in frank and kindly scrutiny.

Wendot had developed rapidly during these two last years, although he
retained all his old marked characteristics. The waving hair was still
bright and sunny, the open face, with its rather square features, was
resolute, alert, manly, and strong. The fearless blue eyes had not lost
their far-away dreaminess, as though the posses