rds no revenue. Therein
waste beauty and a shrewd wit and an illimitable charity which of their
pride go in fetters and achieve no increase. To-day the young King
junkets with his flatterers, and but rarely thinks of England. You
have that beauty in desire of which many and many a man would blithely
enter hell, and the mere sight of which may well cause a man's voice to
tremble as my voice trembles now, and in desire of which-- But I tread
afield! Of that beauty you have made no profit. O daughter of the
Caesars, I bid you now gird either loin for an unlovely traffic. Old
Legion must be fought with fire. True that the age is sick, that we
may not cure, we can but salve the hurt--" Now had his hand torn open
his sombre gown, and the man's bared breast shone in the sunlight, and
everywhere heaved on it sleek and glittering beads of sweat. Twice he
cried the Queen's name aloud, without prefix. In a while he said: "I
bid you weave incessantly such snares of brain and body as may lure
King Richard to be swayed by you, until against his will you daily
guide this shallow-hearted fool to some commendable action. I bid you
live as other folk do hereabouts. Coax! beg! cheat! wheedle! lie!" he
barked like a teased dog, "till you achieve in part the task which is
denied me. This doom I dare adjudge and to pronounce, since we are
royal and God's satraps, you and I."

She answered with a tiny, wordless sound. He prayed for even horror as
he appraised his handiwork. But presently, "I take my doom," the Queen
proudly said. "I shall be lonely now, my only friend, and yet--it does
not matter," the Queen said, with a little shiver. "No, nothing will
ever greatly matter now, I think."

Her eyes had filled with tears; she was unhappy, and as always this
knowledge roused in Maudelain a sort of frenzied pity and a hatred,
quite illogical, of all other things existent. She was unhappy, that
only he realized; and half way he had strained a soft and groping hand
toward his lips when he relinquished it. "Nay, not even that," said
Edward Maudelain, very proudly, too, and now at last he smiled; "since
we are God's satraps, you and I."

Afterward he stood thus for an appreciable silence, with ravenous eyes,
motionless save that behind his back his fingers were bruising one
another. Everywhere was this or that bright color and an incessant
melody. It was unbearable. Then it was over; the ordered progress of
all happenings wa