ive tower, with a page reading to her, but in that impulsive
manner which the Court of France thought grossiere and sauvage; she
ran down the stone stairs and threw herself on the neck of her cousin,
exclaiming, however, 'But where are my sisters?'

'Are they not with your Grace? I thought to find them here!'

'Nay! They were to start two days after us, with an escort of archers,
while we visited the shrine of St. Menehould. They might have been here
before us,' exclaimed Margaret, in much alarm. 'My husband thought our
train would be too large if they went with us.'

'If we had known that they were not to be with your Grace, we would have
tarried for them,' said Dame Lilias.

'Oh, cousin, would that you bad!'

'Mayhap King Rene and his daughter persuaded them to wait a few days.'

That was the best hope, but there was much uneasiness when another day
passed and the Scottish princesses did not appear. Strange whispers,
coming from no one knew where, began to be current that they had
disappeared in company with some of those wild and gay knights who had
met at the tournament at Nanci.

In extreme alarm and indignation, Margaret repaired to her husband.
He was kneeling before the shrine of the Lady in the Chapel of Surry,
telling his beads, and he did not stir, or look round, or relax one
murmur of his Aves, while she paced about, wrung her hands, and vainly
tried to control her agitation. At last he rose, and coldly said, 'I
knew it could be no other who thus interrupted my devotions.'

'My sisters!' she gasped.

'Well, what of them?'

'Do you know what wicked things are said of them--the dear maids?
Ah!'--as she saw his strange smile--'you have heard! You will silence
the fellows, who deserve to have their tongues torn out for defaming a
king's daughters.'

'Verily, ma mie,' said Louis, 'I see no such great improbability in the
tale. They have been bred up to the like, no doubt a mountain kite of
the Vosges is a more congenial companion than a chevalier bien courtois.'

'You speak thus simply to tease your poor Margot,' she said, pleading
yet trembling; 'but I know better than to think you mean it.'

'As my lady pleases,' he said.

'Then will I send Sir Patrick with an escort to seek them at Nanci and
bring them hither?'

'Where is this same troop to come from?' demanded Louis.

'Our own Scottish archers, who will see no harm befall my blessed
father's daughters.'

'Ha! say you so? I had heard a dif