A slender, fair-haired boy was coming slowly down the path, one hand on the neck of a huge mastiff, whose great head was almost on a level with his shoulder.  His dress was rich, but very simple—­black velvet and silk from head to foot, save the jeweled dagger at his hip and the blue ribbon of the Garter about his knee.  His bearing was wondrous easy, and there was a calm dignity about him most unusual in one so young.  It may have been the innate consciousness of his exalted rank that raised the thirteen-year-old boy to the man, and made his majesty sit so naturally upon him; or it may have been that the resemblance he bore to his imperious father carried with it also that father’s haughty spirit; but, whatever it was, there could be no mistaking that Edward the Fifth was a true heir of the Plantagenets, the proudest and bravest family that ever sat a throne.

He was unattended, save by the dog, and as he passed he smiled a courteous greeting.

“God save Your Majesty!” said the two Knights, bowing with bent knee, while the Countess and Lady Mary curtsied low.

He turned slightly and smiled at them again, then proceeded on his way, as unruffled as a man of thrice his age.

“A brave youth,” said Sir Aymer de Lacy, gazing after him.

“Aye,” the Earl answered, “brave in person and in promise—­yet prone to melancholy, it is said; a queer trait in a child.”

“Inherited?” De Lacy asked.

Ware shrugged his shoulders.  “Doubtless—­almost anything could come through Jacquetta of Luxembourg.”

Meanwhile the Countess and Lady Mary had gone on together, leaving their escorts to follow, and presently they turned toward the wharf.

“What say you,” the Earl asked as they neared the gate, “what say you to—­an exchange of companions?”

“I am willing,” De Lacy answered instantly, thinking of Lady Mary’s
words, “and so is------” then he stopped; that was not for him to tell
Ware, and doubtless she had been only jesting.   “Suppose you suggest it
to the Lady Mary,” he ended.

The Earl gave him an amused smile.  “Suppose you suggest it to the Countess.”

Then both laughed.

Ware rubbed his chin thoughtfully.  “We might suggest it to them both together,” he said.

“How, for instance?”

“Why . . . just intimate casually that . . . that . . . that . . . we would . . . you know.”

“No,” said Aymer, “I do not.”

Ware pondered a space.  “We might put them in the wrong boats—­by accident, of course.”

“And have them get out the instant we get in.”

“Then it passes me,” said the Earl.  “I have supplied the idea; it is for you to execute it.”

De Lacy shook his head.  “It is too deep for me; had I a week I might contrive a plan.”

“I presume we will go back as we came,” the other commented.  “Marry, what a brave pair we are!”