ifth and third strings,' she said. 'The king string
holds your wrist,' and whilst the old face was still intent upon the
problem she said:

'I think that if a woman come to be Queen it is odds that she will
live chastely, how lewd soever she ha' been aforetime.'

Lady Rochford set her fingers in between Katharine's, but when she
drew them back with the strings upon them, they wavered, lost their
straightness, knotted and then resolved themselves into a single loop
as in a swift wind a cloud dies away beneath the eyes of the beholder.

'Why, 'tis pity,' Katharine said.

All the lords and all the ladies were now upon the terrace above. The
old lady had the string in her broad lap. Suddenly she bent forward,
her eyes opened.

'She was the enemy of your Church,' she said. 'But this I will tell
you: upon occasions when men swore she had been with other men o'
nights, the Queen was in my bed with me!'

Katharine nodded silently.

'Who was I that I dare speak?' the old woman sobbed; and Katharine
nodded again.

Lady Rochford rubbed together her fat hands as she were ringing them.

'Before God,' she moaned, 'and by the blessed blood of Hailes that
cured ever my pains, if a soul know a soul I knew Anne. If she was a
woman like other women before she wedded the King, she was minded to
be chaste after. Madam Howard,'--and she rocked her fat body to and
fro upon the seat--'they came to me from both sides, your Papists and
her heretics; they threatened me to keep silence of what I knew. I was
to keep silence. I name no names. But they came o' both sides, Papists
and heretics; though she was middling true to the heretics they could
not be true to her.'

Katharine answered her own thoughts with:

'Ay; but my cause is the good cause. Men shall be true to it.'

The old lady leaned forward and stroked her hands.

'Dearie,' she said, 'dandling piece, sweet bit, there are no true
men.' She had an entreaty in her tone, and her large blue eyes gazed
fixedly. 'Say that my cousin Anne was a heretic. I know naught of it
save that my bones have ached always since the holy blood of Hailes
was done away with that was wont to cure me. But the Queen Anne was
hard driven because of a plotting; and no man stood her friend.' With
her large and tear-filled eyes she gazed at the palace, where the pear
trees upon the walls shewed new, pale leaves in the sunlight. 'The
great Cardinal was hard driven because of a plot, and no man was true
t