Opening his
mouth to make a flourishing announcement, the words were checked on his tongue
by four white hands motioning stern commands for silence.
"It is the King's Marshal," he framed with protesting lips. But even that
failed to gain him admittance.
Rising, flushed and smiling, the girl with the blue lilies in her hair tiptoed
toward him. "I have orders to receive the Marshal," she whispered. "Where is
he?"
"He is in the Old Room," the page answered rather resentfully, but resigned
himself as he remembered that, however this curtailed his importance, it left
open a prompter return to his game of leap-frog along the passage.
In all probability his nimble departure saved him from a scolding for, as she
tripped after him down the corridor, a little frown was forming between
Randalin's brows. "I think it is not well-mannered of the fellow to say 'the
King's Marshal' as though my lord were Canute's thane," she was reflecting,
"and I shall put an end to it. Whatever others say, one never needs to tell me
that Sebert is not suffering in his service."
With this thought in her mind, she raised the moth-eaten tapestry and stood
looking at him with a face full of generous indignation. Except for the
noble's embroidered belt and gold-hilted sword, his dress now differed in no
way from that of the hundreds and hundreds of red-cloaked guards who were
spread over the country like sparks after a conflagration.
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