The King walked on in silence for a minute. Then he paused abruptly.

"I do not like it, De Launay!"--he said decisively--"I do not like his
abnormal love of solitude. Books are all very well--poetry is in its
way excellent,--music, as we are told 'hath charms'--but the boy broods
too much, and stays away too much from Court. What woman attracts him?"

Sir Roger's eyes opened wide as the King turned suddenly round upon him
with this question.

"Woman, Sir? I know of none. The Prince is but twenty----"

"At twenty," said the King,--"boys love--the wrong girl. At thirty they
marry--the wrong woman. At forty they meet the only true and fitting
soul's companion,--and cry for the moon till the end! My son is in the
first stage, or I am much mistaken,--he loves--the wrong girl!"

He walked on,--and De Launay followed, with a vague sense of amusement
and disquietude in his mind. What had come to his Royal master, he
wondered? His ordinary manner had changed somewhat,--he spoke with less
than the customary formality, and there was an expression of freedom
and authority, combined with a touch of defiance in his face, that was
altogether new to the observation of the faithful equerry.

Arrived at the palace, and passing through one of the long and spacious
painted corridors, lit by richly coloured mullioned windows from end to
end, the King came face to face with a lady-in-waiting carrying a large
cluster of Madonna lilies. She drew aside, with a deep reverence, to
allow him to pass; but he stopped a moment, looking at the great