Part 8

‘No, trees--perdurable trees. Her flowers all withered.’ The lady leaned her head on her hand.

‘They do if you don’t look after them. We’ve got a few. Would you like to see? I’ll fetch you some.’ Una ran off to the rank grass in the shade behind the wigwam, and came back with a handful of red flowers. ‘Aren’t they pretty?’ she said. ‘They’re Virginia stock.’

‘Virginia?’ said the lady, and lifted them to the fringe of her mask.

‘Yes. They come from Virginia. Did your maid ever plant any?’

‘Not herself--but her men adventured all over the earth to pluck or to plant flowers for her crown. They judged her worthy of them.’

‘And was she?’ said Dan cheerfully.

‘Quien sabe? [who knows?] But at least, while her men toiled abroad she toiled in England, that they might find a safe home to come back to.’

‘And what was she called?’

‘Gloriana--Belphoebe--Elizabeth of England.’ Her voice changed at each word.

‘You mean Queen Bess?’

The lady bowed her head a little towards Dan. ‘You name her lightly enough, young Burleigh. What might you know of her?’ said she.

‘Well, I--I’ve seen the little green shoes she left at Brickwall House--down the road, you know. They’re in a glass case--awfully tiny things.’

‘Oh, Burleigh, Burleigh!’ she laughed. ‘You are a courtier too soon.’

‘But they are,’ Dan insisted. ‘As little as dolls’ shoes. Did you really know her well?’

‘Well. She was a--woman. I’ve been at her Court all my life. Yes, I remember when she danced after the banquet at Brickwall. They say she danced Philip of Spain out of a brand-new kingdom that day. Worth the price of a pair of old shoes--hey?’

She thrust out one foot, and stooped forward to look at its broad flashing buckle.

‘You’ve heard of Philip of Spain--long-suffering Philip,’ she said, her eyes still on the shining stones. ‘Faith, what some men will endure at some women’s hands passes belief! If I had been a man, and a woman had played with me as Elizabeth played with Philip, I would have--’ She nipped off one of the Virginia stocks and held it up between finger and thumb. ‘But for all that’--she began to strip the leaves one by one--‘they say--and I am persuaded--that Philip loved her.’ She tossed her head sideways.

‘I don’t quite understand,’ said Una.

‘The high heavens forbid that you should, wench!’ She swept the flowers from her lap and stood up in the rush of shadows that the wind chased through the wood.

‘I should like to know about the shoes,’ said Dan.

‘So ye shall, Burleigh. So ye shall, if ye watch me. ‘Twill be as good as a play.’

‘We’ve never been to a play,’ said Una.

The lady looked at her and laughed. ‘I’ll make one for you. Watch! You are to imagine that she--Gloriana, Belphoebe, Elizabeth--has gone on a progress to Rye to comfort her sad heart (maids are often melancholic), and while she halts at Brickwall House, the village--what was its name?’ She pushed Puck with her foot.

‘Norgem,’ he croaked, and squatted by the wigwam.

‘Norgem village loyally entertains her with a masque or play, and a Latin oration spoken by the parson, for whose false quantities, if I’d made ‘em in my girlhood, I should have been whipped.’

‘You whipped?’ said Dan.

‘Soundly, sirrah, soundly! She stomachs the affront to her scholarship, makes her grateful, gracious thanks from the teeth outwards, thus’--(the lady yawned)--‘Oh, a Queen may love her subjects in her heart, and yet be dog-wearied of ‘em ‘in body and mind--and so sits down’--her skirts foamed about her as she sat--‘to a banquet beneath Brickwall Oak. Here for her sins she is waited upon by--What were the young cockerels’ names that served Gloriana at table?’

‘Frewens, Courthopes, Fullers, Husseys,’ Puck began.