compact mass of humanity surge towards the centre, the cardinals above
raised like proud peacocks over a golden harvest-field shaken in the
breeze.

The queen appeared, hand in hand with her uncle, the old Cardinal of
Perigord, and her aunt, the Countess Agnes. Her gait was so modest and
proud, her countenance so melancholy and pure, her looks so open and
confident, that even before she spoke every heart was hers. Joan was now
twenty years of age; her magnificent beauty was fully developed, but an
extreme pallor concealed the brilliance of her transparent satin skin,
and her hollow cheek told the tale of expiation and suffering. Among the
spectators who looked on most eagerly there was a certain young man with
strongly marked features, glowing eyes, and brown hair, whom we shall
meet again later on in our narrative; but we will not divert our
readers' attention, but only tell them that his name was James of
Aragon, that he was Prince of Majorca, and would have been ready to
shed every drop of his blood only to check one single tear that hung
on Joan's eyelids. The queen spoke in an agitated, trembling voice,
stopping from time to time to dry her moist and shining eyes, or to
breathe one of those deep sighs that go straight to the heart. She
told the tale of her husband's death painfully and vividly, painted
truthfully the mad terror that had seized upon her and struck her down
at that frightful time, raised her hands to her brow with the gesture
of despair, as though she would wrest the madness from her brain--and a
shudder of pity and awe passed through the assembled crowd. It is a
fact that at this moment, if her words were false, her anguish was both
sincere and terrible. An angel soiled by crime, she lied like Satan
himself, but like him too she suffered all the agony of remorse and
pride. Thus, when at the end of her speech she burst into tears and
implored help and protection against the usurper of her kingdom, a cry