Again Colin raised his eyes, and the wretch put into them all the gaiety and boldness which he gave to the wenches on the farm. Then he dropped them again, and with his whole stake on the table, waited, gambler as he was, for the arbitrament. “Look at me, Colin Stanier,” said the Queen. Colin looked. There was the tiny wrinkled face, the high eyebrows, the thin-lipped mouth disclosing the discoloured teeth. “Madam!” he said. “Well, what next?” said Elizabeth impatiently. “My body and soul, madam,” said Colin, and once more he put into his eyes and his eager mouth that semblance of desire which had made Mistress Moffat, the wife of the mayor, box his ears with a blow that was more of a caress. The Queen felt precisely the same as Mistress Moffat, and drew her hand down over his smooth chin. “And it is your wish to be my shepherd-boy, Colin?” she asked. “You desire to be my page?” “I am sick with desire,” said Colin. “I appoint you,” she said. “I greet and salute you, Colin Stanier.” She bent towards him, and neither saint nor devil could have inspired Colin better at that moment. He kissed her (after all, he had been offered the greeting) fairly and squarely on her withered cheek, and then, without pause, kissed the hem of her embroidered gown. He had done right, just absolutely right. “You bold dog!” said the Queen. “Stand up.” Colin stood up, with his arms close by his side, as if at attention in all his shapeliness and beauty, and the Queen clapped her hands. The side door opened disclosing halberdiers, and through the door by which Colin had entered came the Controller. “Colin Stanier is my page,” she said, “and of my household. Summon my lords again; we have not finished with our Spanish business. The lamb--I will eat that lamb, and none other, at the feast of Easter.” Within the week Colin was established in attendance on the Queen, and the daring felicity which had marked his first dealings with her never failed nor faltered. His radiant youth, the gaiety of his boyish spirits, the unfailing tact of his flattery, his roguish innocence, the fine innate breeding of the yeoman-stock, which is the best blood in England, wove a spell that seemed to defy the usual fickleness of her favouritism. Certainly he had wisdom as far beyond his years as it was beyond his upbringing, and wisdom coming like pure water from the curves of that beautiful young mouth, made him frankly irresistible to the fiery and shrewd old woman. From being her page he was speedily advanced to the post of confidential secretary, and queer it was to see the boy seated by her side at some state council while she rated and stormed at her lords for giving her some diplomatic advice which her flame-like spirit deemed spiritless. Then, in mid-tirade, she would stop, tweak her secretary by his rosy ear, and say, “Eh, Colin, am I not in the right of it?”