'At all events let the woman be condemned unheard,' said Silvia. 'She looks dangerous, and may intend to do your Majesty some harm.'
'Be silent, everyone!' thundered King Yellow-cap at the top of his voice. 'I say I will hear these persons, and I will hear the woman first. Stop--where is the Headsman?'
'Here I be, your Majesty, quite at your service,' said the Headsman, shouldering through the crowd, and saluting the young King with his axe. He was an immensely strong man, seven feet high, with short red hair standing up over his head, and a butcher's apron tied on in front of him.
'Headsman,' said the King, 'if anyone stirs or says a word except by my leave, off with his head! Do you understand?'
For answer the Headsman tossed his terrible axe high up in the air, caught it lightly as it came down, and then, swinging it round his head, he cut off the tall feather that was fastened in the cap of the Chancellor of the Jingle. An inch more would have buried the blade in his skull.
'Very good,' said King Yellow-cap; 'I see you know your business. Now, then, bring me hither that cart. Let the woman come down.'
Amidst a total silence, during which the Headsman was seen to feel the edge of his axe with his thumb--keeping his right eye upon King Yellow-cap the while, and the left upon the Home Doggerel--the veiled woman got down from the cart and came forward to the donkey which served the King as a throne. Here she dropped a curtsey.
King Yellow-cap gazed steadfastly upon her for several moments. The black veil still hung before her face, but round her neck was visible a bit of pink ribbon.
'I am a village maiden, Sire,' she answered in a voice so sweet and clear that it was heard all over the theatre.
At this question the Home Doggerel and the other members of the Cabinet made a movement as if they wished to step behind the scenes; but King Yellow-cap noticed it, and in an awful voice he cried out--
'Ready, your Majesty,' said that officer, poising his axe to strike.
'One step more,' said the King, turning to the six courtiers, 'and your heads fly into the pit. Keep your axe poised,' he added to the Headsman.
'Right you are, young man!' said the person in the pit whom the police had tried to arrest for hissing. 'Right you are, Master Yellow-cap; you're just about the sort of king I goes in for, and so I tells you.'