“How old are you?  Show me your teeth,” she said.  The heir to Derby smiled uneasily, and drew his hand across his nose.

“Ah, you have a touch of the distemper, I see.  Are you subject to it?”

Stanley smiled, and the earl said:—­

“Sir George, this insult has gone far enough.”

“Stand back, my Lord Derby,” said the queen.  “Do not interfere with this interesting barter.”

The earl reluctantly lapsed into silence.  He remembered the insult of her Majesty’s words all his life.

“Now step off,” said Dorothy to Lord James.

The young man stood in helpless confusion.  Dorothy took a step backward from him, and after watching Stanley a moment said:—­

“What!  You can neither trot, pace, nor gallop?  I don’t believe you can even walk alone.”  Then she turned toward Sir George.  A smile was on her lips, but a look from hell was in her eyes as she said:—­

“Father, take a lesson from this day.  I gave you fair warning.  Bring me no more scurvy cobs for barter nor trade.”  Then she turned to the Earl of Derby and to her cousin Lord James, made a deep courtesy, and said:—­

“You can have no barter with me.  Good day.”

She ran from the room, and a great peal of laughter from all save Sir George and the Stanleys followed her as she passed out through the double door.  When the laughter had subsided, the Earl of Derby turned to Sir George and said:—­

“Sir George, this insult is unbearable, and I shall expect satisfaction for it.”  Then he turned to the queen:  “I beg that your Majesty will give me leave to depart with my son.”

“Granted,” answered Elizabeth, and father and son started to leave the room, moving backward toward the great doors.  Sir George asked the earl and Lord Stanley to remain, and in the presence of the company who had witnessed the insult, he in the humblest manner made abject apology for the treatment his distinguished guests had received at the hands of his daughter.  He very honestly and in all truth disclaimed any sympathy with Dorothy’s conduct, and offered, as the only reparation he could make, to punish her in some way befitting the offence.  Then he conducted the guests to the mounting block near the entrance tower and saw them depart.  Dorothy had solved her father’s dilemma with a vengeance.

Sir George was not sure that he wanted to be angry at Dorothy, though he felt it was a duty he owed to himself and to the Stanleys.  He had wished that the girl would in some manner defer the signing of the contract, but he had not wanted her to refuse young Stanley’s hand in a manner so insulting that the match would be broken off altogether.

As the day progressed, and as Sir George pondered over Dorothy’s conduct, he grew more inclined to anger; but during the afternoon she kept well under the queen’s wing, and he found no opportunity to give vent to his ill-temper.