“O King,” then said Dame Anne, “I bid you go forever from the court and live forever a landless man, friendless, and without even any name.  Otherwise, you can in no way escape being made an instrument to bring about the misery and death of many thousands.  This doom I dare adjudge and to pronounce, because we are royal and God’s satraps, you and I.”

Twice or thrice his dry lips moved before he spoke.  He was aware of innumerable birds that carolled with a piercing and intolerable sweetness.  “O Queen!” he hoarsely said, “O fellow satrap!  Heaven has many fiefs.  A fair province is wasted and accords to Heaven no revenue.  So wastes beauty, and a shrewd wit, and an illimitable charity, which of their pride go in fetters and achieve no increase.  To-day the young King junkets with his flatterers, and but rarely thinks of England.  You have that beauty by which men are lightly conquered, and the mere sight of which may well cause a man’s voice to tremble as my voice trembles now, and through desire of which—­But I tread afield!  Of that beauty you have made no profit.  O daughter of the Caesars, I bid you now gird either loin for an unlovely traffic.  Old Legion must be fought with fire.  True that the age is sick, true that we may not cure, we can but salve the hurt—­” His hand had torn open his sombre gown, and the man’s bared breast shone in the sunlight, and on his breast heaved sleek and glittering beads of sweat.  Twice he cried the Queen’s name.  In a while he said:  “I bid you weave incessantly such snares of brain and body as may lure King Richard to be swayed by you, until against his will you daily guide this shallow-hearted fool to some commendable action.  I bid you live as other folk do hereabouts.  Coax! beg! cheat! wheedle! lie!” he barked like a teased dog, “and play the prostitute for him that wears my crown, till you achieve in part the task which is denied me.  This doom I dare adjudge and to pronounce, because we are royal and God’s satraps, you and I.”

She answered with a tiny, wordless sound.  But presently, “I take my doom,” the Queen proudly said.  “I shall be lonely now, my only friend, and yet—­it does not matter,” the Queen said, with a little shiver.  “No, nothing will ever greatly matter now, I think, now that I may not ever see you any more, my dearest.”

Her eyes had filled with tears; she was unhappy, and, as always, this knowledge roused in Maudelain a sort of frenzied pity and a hatred, quite illogical, of all other things existent.  She was unhappy, that only he comprehended:  and for her to be made unhappy was unjust.

So he stood thus for an appreciable silence, staying motionless save that behind his back his fingers were bruising one another.  Everywhere was this or that bright color and an incessant melody.  It was unbearable.  Then it was over; the ordered progress of all happenings was apparent, simple, and natural; and contentment came into his heart like a flight of linnets over level fields at dawn.  He left her, and as he went he sang.