CHAPTER III

For nearly a month, the old man haunted the palace, and watched in the
gardens for the little Prince until he knew the daily routine of his tiny
life with his nurses and governesses.

He saw that when the Lady Maud accompanied him, they were wont to repair to
the farthermost extremities of the palace grounds where, by a little
postern gate, she admitted a certain officer of the Guards to whom the
Queen had forbidden the privilege of the court.

There, in a secluded bower, the two lovers whispered their hopes and plans,
unmindful of the royal charge playing neglected among the flowers and
shrubbery of the garden.

Toward the middle of July De Vac had his plans well laid. He had managed
to coax old Brus, the gardener, into letting him have the key to the little
postern gate on the plea that he wished to indulge in a midnight escapade,
hinting broadly of a fair lady who was to be the partner of his adventure,
and, what was more to the point with Brus, at the same time slipping a
couple of golden zecchins into the gardener's palm.

Brus, like the other palace servants, considered De Vac a loyal retainer of
the house of Plantagenet. Whatever else of mischief De Vac might be up to,
Brus was quite sure that in so far as the King was concerned, the key to
the postern gate was as safe in De Vac's hands as though Henry himself had
it.

The old fellow wondered a little that the morose old master of fence
should, at his time in life, indulge in frivolous escapades more befitting