ac, might have been a seen a black-haired woman gowned in a violet cyclas, richly embroidered with gold about the yoke and

her waist so that the upper portion fell outward over the girdle after the manner of a blouse. In the girdle was a long dagger of beautiful w

was a close-fitting tunic of white silk. His doublet was of scarlet, while his long hose of white were cross-gartered with scarlet from his tiny sandals to his knees.

n too arrogant and haughty for such a mere baby. As he talked with his companion, little flashes of peremptory authority and dignity, which sat st

inting at a little bush near them, said, "Stand you t

w the ball to her. Thus they played beneath the windows of the armory, the boy running blithely after th

gray, old man, leaning upon his folded arms, his brows drawn together i

ly young woman beneath him, but with eyes which did not see, for D

for the insult which Henry had put upon him. Many schemes had presented themselves to his shrewd and cunning m

f Henry's reign, for from these he felt he might wrest that opportunity which could be

sword with his friends and favorites, De Vac had heard much which passed between Henry III and

Vac had gleaned from scraps of conversation dropped in the armory: that Henry was even now negotiating with the leaders of foreign mercenaries, and with Louis IX of France, for a sufficient force of knig

ing of the foreign troops; their numbers; the first point of attack. Ah, would it

ing the barons and their retainers forty th

uld depose Henry, and place a new king upon England's throne, and then De Vac would mock the Plantagenet to his face. Sweet, kind,

ge melted as the fog before the noonday sun; and in its stead there opened to him the whole hideous plot of fearsome vengeance as clearly as it were writ upon the leaves of a great book that had

ntions this little lost prince; only the secret archives of the kings of England tell the story of his strange and adventurous life. His name has been blotted from t