The Faery Tales of Weir | Page 4

would know that one glove is of no use to anyone."
"If you were a beggar, Sir," she replied, "you would be glad to have one hand warm."
"I shall never be a beggar," returned the Prince proudly.
"Yet you begged your father for a cloth-of-silver falcon hood this morning."
Prince Richard laughed and his brother stared. "Are you a witch?" asked the latter.
"No, I am not a witch. I lost my way in the gardens before I found the right path. You were talking in the arbor by the edge of the lake, and you implored your father, the King, like a beggar on the street corner."
Prince Hugh's cheeks were red as peonies. "Your words are too bold, beggar-maid. If you will not sell your glove, I will take it."
She stretched out her arm. "You will not be able to take what is not yours!"
"Will I not!" and he rushed at her and began to tug at the glove. His face grew redder and redder, but he could not strip off the glove, which seemed to have grown to the maid's arm. Suddenly he caught sight of his fiery countenance in the little round mirror, and he left off pulling at the glove, but his failure aroused emulation in the heart of Prince Richard, who now began to tug at the glove as if it were heavy armor.
The Princess Myrtle grew as white as a snow-drop in pale wintry sunshine, for it seemed to her that all three of the princes were of base metal beneath their noble bearing. "Look in the mirror," she said pitifully, "and tell me what you see!"
"His own red face, I warrant, as I saw mine," cried Prince Hugh; then Prince Richard seeing how flushed his face was, drew away sulkily; and the Princess walked from them up and up through the parterres of flowers to the terrace where the King stood in the evening light, his cloak blown out, so that the satin lining showed like a great magnolia petal. His long fingers rested on the marble balustrade, and the royal rings winked wickedly at the Princess.
The King said to her, "What did my sons say and do to you?"
Then she related everything.
The King frowned. "But how do I know whether you are really the Princess Myrtle? You may for all that be but a goose-girl or a beggar-maid."
She replied, "Let me remain in your court three days as a beggar-maid. If at the end of that time you are not sure, turn me out. I, too, will be sure of something at the end of three days."
"Of what will you be sure?" asked the King.
"Which of you is the real king here."
Then King Cuthbert grew red like old leather, and laughed and sighed and frowned. "God knows, I should myself like that knowledge." Then he signed to a court lady, who was looking on with proud eyes. "Come, Dame Caecilia, take this beggar-maid to one of the suites in the palace, and put fair clothes on her, and conduct her to the dining-hall when the hour strikes."
The court lady smiled to hide her anger, for she dared not disobey, and she beckoned the Princess Myrtle to follow her. They went through a vast door into a corridor that ran beneath heavy arches, and the walls of this passage moved as if alive, but it was only the draught swaying the tapestries with their gray trees and knights who rode among the trees like heavy shadows, and long-haired women who watched the knights ride while they wove flower-wreaths.
Then the proud court lady took the Princess up a winding stair, like the twisted ways of life, down more corridors, then into a room, through whose windows high cypresses looked, and upon whose ceiling little cupids flew about.
"Now, beggar," she said angrily, throwing open the door of a wardrobe where hung silken things, "make the most of your luck. What will you wear? Here is mallow satin sewn with pearls, and with a running border of jasmine flowers done in sweet embroidery silks. Will it please you? Here is a silver cloth, studded with little coral beads over a petticoat of ancient lace. Here is black velvet softly lined with apricot brocade!"
"Nay, none of these will I wear, but my gown of good wool, and in my bundle are changes of linen, for I want no lace on my limbs. Send me fresh flowers for my hair, I entreat you, and I will bathe and so prepare myself for the court dinner."
Dame Caecilia stared at her, and moved the golden combs and mirrors about angrily on the dressing-table. "You will lose me my place at court," she cried.
"Perhaps it is already lost," answered the Princess.
"You speak not at all like a beggar."
"You never took the trouble to learn what