so cold that it belied his words. "That it please you, is reason enough
why you should marry... Whom did your Majesty say?"

"Nay. I named no names. Yet one so astute might hazard a shrewd guess."
Half-challenging, half-coy, she eyed him over her fan.

"A guess? Nay, madame. I might affront your Majesty."

"How so?"

"If I were deluded by appearances. If I named a subject who signally
enjoys your royal favour."

"You mean Lord Robert Dudley." She paled a little, and her bosom's heave
was quickened. "Why should the guess affront me?"

"Because a queen--a wise queen, madame--does not mate with a
subject--particularly with one who has a wife already."

He had stung her. He had wounded at once the pride of the woman and the
dignity of the queen, yet in a way that made it difficult for her to
take direct offense. She bit her lip and mastered her surge of anger.
Then she laughed, a thought sneeringly.

"Why, as to my Lord Robert's wife, it seems you are less well-informed
than usual, sir. Lady Robert Dudley is dead, or very nearly so."

And as blank amazement overspread his face, she passed upon her way and
left him.

But anon, considering, she grew vaguely uneasy, and that very night
expressed her afflicting doubt to my lord, reporting to him de Quadra's
words. His lordship, who was mentally near-sighted, laughed.

"He'll change his tone before long," said he.

She set her hands upon his shoulders, and looked up adoringly into his
handsome gipsy face. Never had he known her so fond as in these
last days since her surrender to him that night upon the terrace at
Whitehall, never had she been more the woman and less the queen in her
bearing towards him.

"You are sure, Robin? You are quite sure?" she pleaded.

He drew her close, she yielding herself to his embrace. "With so much
at stake could I be less than sure, sweet?" said he, and so convinced
her--the more easily since he afforded her the conviction she desired.

That was on the night of Saturday, and early on Monday came the news
which justified him of his assurances. It was brought him to Windsor
by one of Amy's Cumnor servants, a fellow named Bowes, who, with the
others, had been away at Abingdon Fair yesterday afternoon, and had
returned to find his mistress dead at the stairs' foot--the result of an
accident, as all believed.

It was not quite the news that my lord had been expecting. It staggered
him a little that an accident so very opportune shou