She gathered her skirts in each hand, and began a curtsy. ‘You will go at your own charges,’ she whispered straight before her. ‘Oh, enviable and adorable age of youth!’ Her eyes shone through the mask-holes. ‘But I warn you you’ll repent it. Put not your trust in princes--or Queens. Philip’s ships’ll blow you out of water. You’ll not be frightened? Well, we’ll talk on it again, when I return from Rye, dear lads.’ The wonderful curtsy ended. She stood up. Nothing stirred on her except the rush of the shadows. ‘And so it was finished,’ she said to the children. ‘Why d’you not applaud?’ ‘What was finished?’ said Una. ‘The dance,’ the lady replied offendedly. ‘And a pair of green shoes.’ ‘I don’t understand a bit,’ said Una. ‘Eh? What did you make of it, young Burleigh?’ ‘I’m not quite sure,’ Dan began, ‘but--’ ‘You never can be--with a woman. But--?’ ‘But I thought Gloriana meant the cousins to go back to the Gascons’ Graveyard, wherever that was.’ ‘’Twas Virginia after-wards. Her plantation of Virginia.’ ‘Virginia afterwards, and stop Philip from taking it. Didn’t she say she’d lend ‘em guns?’ ‘Right so. But not ships--then.’ ‘And I thought you meant they must have told her they’d do it off their own bat, without getting her into a row with Philip. Was I right?’ ‘Near enough for a Minister of the Queen. But remember she gave the lads full time to change their minds. She was three long days at Rye Royal--knighting of fat Mayors. When she came back to Brickwall, they met her a mile down the road, and she could feel their eyes burn through her riding-mask. Chris Hatton, poor fool, was vexed at it. ‘“YOU would not birch them when I gave you the chance,” says she to Chris. “Now you must get me half an hour’s private speech with ‘em in Brickwall garden. Eve tempted Adam in a garden. Quick, man, or I may repent!”’ ‘She was a Queen. Why did she not send for them herself?’ said Una. The lady shook her head. ‘That was never her way. I’ve seen her walk to her own mirror by bye-ends, and the woman that cannot walk straight there is past praying for. Yet I would have you pray for her! What else--what else in England’s name could she have done?’ She lifted her hand to her throat for a moment. ‘Faith,’ she cried, ‘I’d forgotten the little green shoes! She left ‘em at Brickwall--so she did. And I remember she gave the Norgem parson--John Withers, was he?---a text for his sermon--“Over Edom have I cast out my shoe.” Neat, if he’d understood!’ ‘I don’t understand,’ said Una. ‘What about the two cousins?’