th passion out of an ivory-coloured face, and her voice rang high and
harsh, and her hands continually clenched and unclenched as she screamed
at him.

"God's Body! you are the ungratefullest hound that ever drew breath. I
send for you to my presence, and talk and walk with you like a friend. I
offer you a pardon and you fling it in my face. I offer you a post at
Court and you mock it; you flaunt you in your treasonable livery in my
very face, and laugh at my clemency. You think I am no Queen, but a weak
woman whom you can turn and rule at your will. God's Son! I will show you
which is sovereign. Call Sir Richard in, sir; I will have him in this
instant. Sir Richard, Sir Richard!" she screamed, stamping with fury.

The door into the ante-room behind opened, and Sir Richard Barkley
appeared, with a face full of apprehension. He knelt at once.

"Stand up, Sir Richard," she cried, "and look at this man. You know him,
do you not? and I know him now, the insolent dog! But his own mother
shall not in a week. Look at him shaking there, the knave; he will shake
more before I have done with him. Take him back with you, Sir Richard,
and let them have their will of him. His damned pride and insolence shall
be broken. S' Body, I have never been so treated! Take him out, Sir
Richard, take him out, I tell you!"

CHAPTER XV

THE ROLLING OF THE STONE

It was a week later, and a little before dawn, that Isabel was kneeling
by Anthony's bed in his room in the Tower. The Lieutenant had sent for
her to his lodging the evening before, and she had spent the whole night
with her brother. He had been racked four times in one week, and was
dying.

* * * *

The city and the prison were very quiet now; the carts had not yet begun
to roll over the cobble-stones and the last night-wanderers had gone
home. He lay, on the mattress that she had sent in to him, in the corner
of his cell under the window, on his back and very still, covered from
chin to feet with her own fur-lined cloak that she had thrown over him;
his head was on a low pillow, for he could not bear to lie high; his feet
made a little mound under the coverlet, and his arms lay straight at his
side; but all that could be seen of him was his face, pinched and white
now with hollows in his cheeks and dark patches and lines beneath his
closed eyes, and his soft pointed brown be