advice! Why doth he not
leave me in peace? I will go to the Lady Priscilla were it only to show
him that I regard not his words."

Nevertheless she could not but wonder why any lady should take such a
sudden interest in her, and a slight misgiving lurked in her heart as she
approached the Round Tower, entered its portals, and made her way to the
Lady Priscilla's bower.

The lady was lying on a couch surrounded by her tire women.

"So, my pretty lad," she said with a careless glance, "thou hast come.
Didst thou not have enough of flattery? Gramercy! hath it not always been
true that sugar would catch more flies than vinegar?"

"What mean you?" stammered Francis, her sensitive nature becoming aware
of the change in the lady's manner from the caressing sweetness of the
morning to the mocking air of the moment.

"Didst think thy beauty had ensnared me?" queried the lady quizzically.
"It hath. As the yellow metal of the earth hath always thrown a spell
over men so the red gold of thy hair hath fascinated me. I dote on thy
locks, my fair page. Ay! so much so that they and I shall ne'er be parted
more. Celeste! Annabelle! have at him!"

"Why, why," cried the girl, struggling to rise as the maids set upon her.
"My lady! My lady!"

But strong as her outdoor life had made her, she was no match for the
damsels of the Lady Priscilla. Soon she lay back in her chair bound hand
and foot.

"No harm is meant thee, master page," remarked the lady as, armed with a
huge pair of shears, she approached the maiden. "'Tis only that thy
silken tresses have tangled my heart in their meshes until sleep hath
fled my pillow. I think on their lustre day and night. And so do I take
them to adorn mine own pate. Thinkest thou that they could cover a fairer
head?"

"Oh, madam," cried the girl tearfully as the shears snipped relentlessly
over her head, for her hair had always been a weak point with her. "O,
spare my hair, I entreat!"

"Fie, sir page! Thou dost shame thy manhood. True, thou art yet guiltless
of beard, yet still thou shouldst not play the woman."

"But, madam, I shall report this to the queen. What think you she will
say when she knows that one of her ladies was guilty of this outrage?"

"She would not listen to thee, malapert. Should she do so, I would say
that Priscilla Rutland knew no peace until she could emulate in her own
locks the regal color that crowned her august mistress' brow. That she
would stoop to do anything