e had borne during the period, and squalor, and hunger
even. But now at last she rode toward the dear southland; and
presently she would be rid of this big man, when he had served her
purpose; and afterward she meant to wheedle Alphonso, just as she had
always done, and later still she and Etienne would be very happy; and,
in fine, to-morrow was to be a new day.

So these two rode ever southward, and always Prince Edward found this
new page of his--this Miguel de Rueda--a jolly lad, who whistled and
sang inapposite snatches of balladry, without any formal ending or
beginning, descanting always with the delicate irrelevancy of a
bird-trill.

Sang Miguel de Rueda:

"_Lord Love, that leads me day by day
Through many a screened and scented way,
Finds to assuage my thirst
No love that may the old love slay,
None sweeter than the first._

"_Ah, heart of mine, that beats so fast
As this or that fair maid trips past,
Once and with lesser stir
We spied the heart's-desire, at last,
And turned, and followed her._

"_For Love had come that in the spring
When all things woke to blossoming
Was as a child that came
Laughing, and filled with wondering,
Nor knowing his own name--_"

"And still I would prefer to think," the big man interrupted, heavily,
"that Sicily is not the only allure. I would prefer to think my wife
so beautiful-- And yet, as I remember her, she was nothing
extraordinary."

The page a little tartly said that people might forget a deal within a
decade.

For the Prince had quickly fathomed the meaning of the scheme hatched
in Castile. "When Manfred is driven out of Sicily they will give the
throne to de Gatinais. He intends to get both a kingdom and a handsome
wife by this neat affair. And in reason England must support my uncle
against El Sabio. Why, my lad, I ride southward to prevent a war that
would convulse half Europe."

"You ride southward in the attempt to rob a miserable woman of her sole
chance of happiness," Miguel de Rueda estimated.

"That is undeniable, if she loves this thrifty Prince, as indeed I do
not question my wife does. Yet is our happiness here a trivial matter,
whereas war is a great disaster. You have not seen--as I have done, my
little Miguel--a man viewing his death-wound with a face of stupid
wonder?--a man about to die in his lord's quarrel and understanding
never a word of it? Or a woman, say--a woman's twisted and n