"'Twas he who tricked and fooled me . . . with smooth and lying tongue he cajoled me! . . . he and his friend . . . then they threatened to have me whipped . . . if I did not depart in peace!"
Awed, horrified, every one listened. Mary Tudor herself hung upon the girl's lips. The Cardinal made a final effort to preserve his outward composure.
"A madwoman!" he murmured with a shrug of the shoulders. "Your Majesty would do well to retire; there's danger in the creature's eyes."
But Wessex was slowly coming to himself. His horror had vanished, leaving him calm before this terrible revelation. With the privilege ever accorded to him by the fond Queen, he now placed a firm hand upon her arm.
"In the name of Your Majesty's ever-present graciousness to me, I entreat you to listen to this woman," he said quietly. "Meseems that some dastardly trick hath been played upon us all."
The Cardinal tried to protest, but already Mary had acquiesced in Wessex' wish, with a nod of the head.
"I have naught to refuse you, my dear lord," she said sadly.
Vaguely she too had begun to guess the appalling riddle which had puzzled her for so long, and though her heart dimly felt that she was even now losing for ever the man whom she so ardently loved, she was too fearless a Queen, too much of a proud Tudor, not to see justice done in the face of so much treachery.
"Tell me, girl," he said with utmost calm and gentleness, lest he should scare again her poor, wandering wits, "tell me without any fear. . . . I am the Duke of Wessex and I saved thy life . . . then thou hadst the wish to warn me of some danger . . . and came to the Palace here . . . and my lord Cardinal tricked thee. . . . How?"
"I do not know," she said piteously, turning appealing, dog-like eyes upon him. "They dressed me up in fine clothes . . . and then . . . then . . . when I saw thee . . . and wished to speak with thee . . . he . . . the dark foreigner barred the way . . . and I know not how it happened . . ." she added, as a trembling suddenly seized her whole body, "he jeered at me . . . and . . . and I killed him!"
"'Twas thou, wench, who killed Don Miguel?" ejaculated the Queen, horrified. "Oh! . . ."
But Wessex only bent his head and murmured in the intensity of his misery--