“And now,” Robert went on impudently, “to show that my new title is not illusory, while you are busy about signing documents, let me have the privilege of taking part in the councils of the crown:  make a declaration that, subject to your good pleasure, my mother and I are to have a deliberative voice in the council whenever an important matter is under discussion.”

“Never!” cried Joan, turning pale.  “Philippa and Robert, you abuse my weakness and treat your queen shamefully.  In the last few days I have wept and suffered continually, overcome by a terrible grief; I have no strength to turn to business now.  Leave me, I beg:  I feel my strength gives way.”

“What, my daughter,” cried the Catanese hypocritically, “are you feeling unwell?  Come and lie down at once.”  And hurrying to the bed, she took hold of the curtain that concealed the Count of Artois.

The queen uttered a piercing cry, and threw herself before Philippa with the fury of a lioness.  “Stop!” she cried in a choking voice; “take the privilege you ask, and now, if you value your own life, leave me.”

The Catanese and her son departed instantly, not even waiting to reply, for they had got all they wanted; while Joan, trembling, ran desperately up to Bertrand, who had angrily drawn his dagger, and would have fallen upon the two favourites to take vengeance for the insults they had offered to the queen; but he was very soon disarmed by the lovely shining eyes raised to him in supplication, the two arms cast about him, and the tears shed by Joan:  he fell at her feet and kissed them rapturously, with no thought of seeking excuse for his presence, with no word of love, for it was as if they had loved always:  he lavished the tenderest caresses on her, dried her tears, and pressed his trembling lips upon her lovely head.  Joan began to forget her anger, her vows, and her repentance:  soothed by the music of her lover’s speech, she returned uncomprehending monosyllables:  her heart beat till it felt like breaking, and once more she was falling beneath love’s resistless spell, when a new interruption occurred, shaking her roughly out of her ecstasy; but this time the young count was able to pass quietly and calmly into a room adjoining, and Joan prepared to receive her importunate visitor with severe and frigid dignity.

The individual who arrived at so inopportune a moment was little calculated to smooth Joan’s ruffled brow, being Charles, the eldest son of the Durazzo family.  After he had introduced his fair cousin to the people as their only legitimate sovereign, he had sought on various occasions to obtain an interview with her, which in all probability would be decisive.  Charles was one of those men who to gain their end recoil at nothing; devoured by raging ambition and accustomed from his earliest years to conceal his most ardent desires beneath a mask of careless indifference, he marched ever onward, plot succeeding plot, towards