shade with other shadows, then seek the company of thy dead father and
of other loyal and gallant gentlemen of thy name. Perchance, one and
all, they would have blenched had the pinch but been severe enough. I
have heard of common men--ay, of thieves and murderers--whose lips the
rack could not unlock! It seems that our English knights grow less
resolved.... My lords, the sun is declining. If we would take the water
to-day, we must make no farther tarrying. Your hand, my Lord of
Leicester."

Once more her train put itself into motion. Lords and ladies, lips that
smiled and hearts all busy with the next link in Ambition's golden
chain, on they swept into the pleasant outer air. The one man of the
motley throng of suitors to whom Elizabeth had spoken rose from his
knee, picked up his frieze coat, and turned a face that might have gone
unrecognized of friend or foe towards the door by which he had entered
the gallery.



IX

Giles Arden, having ridden far as required the tale of miles from the
tavern of the Triple Tun, came, upon a sunshiny afternoon of early
spring, to an oak knoll where one might halt to admire a fair picture of
an old house set in old gardens. Old were the trees that shadowed it,
and ivy darkened all its walls; without sound a listless beauty breathed
beneath the pale blue skies; for all the sunshine and the bourgeoning of
the spring, the picture seemed but sombrely rich, but sadly sweet. To
the lips of a light-of-heart there was that in its quality had brought a
sigh: as for Arden, when he had checked his horse he looked upon the