He presently said, "You may go, Yeck." He had risen, the magisterial
attitude with which he had awaited her entrance cast aside. "Oh, God!"
he said; "you, madame!" His thin hands, scholarly hands, were plucking
at the air.
Dame Alianora had paused, greatly astonished, and there was an interval
before she said, "I do not recognize you, messire."
"And yet, madame, I recall very clearly that some thirty years ago the
King-Count Raymond Berenger, then reigning in Provence, had about his
court four daughters, each one of whom was afterward wedded to a king.
First, Meregrett, the eldest, now regnant in France; then Alianora, the
second and most beautiful of these daughters, whom troubadours hymned as
the Unattainable Princess. She was married a long while ago, madame, to
the King of England, Lord Henry, third of that name to reign in these
islands."
Dame Alianora's eyes were narrowing. "There is something in your voice,"
she said, "which I recall."
He answered: "Madame and Queen, that is very likely, for it is a voice
which sang a deal in Provence when both of us were younger.
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