“No, I have not seen her, but she is a little older than I am. She is fourteen and is extraordinarily beautiful. They say her wedding to the Dauphin is to take place very soon. If father had been alive I might have seen it.” “Was your father good looking?” asked Audry. “Yes, he was said to be the handsomest man in the Lothians.” “That explains it, then,” she went on, looking somewhat enviously at her companion; “but I wish you cared more for games and horses and running and a good romp and were not so fond of old books. Fancy a girl of your age being able to read the Latin as well as a priest. Father says that you know far more Latin than he does and that you can even read the Greek.” “But I _can_ run,” Aline objected, “and I can swim, too.” “Yes, you can run, though you do not look like it, you wee slender thing, but you do not love it as I do;” and Audry stood up to display her sturdy little form. “Now if we were to wrestle,” she said, “where would you be?” Aline only laughed and said: “Well, there is one good thing in reading books, it gives one something to do in wet weather. Let us go down to the library and see if I cannot find something nice to read to you.” “Come along, then, and read to me from that funny old book by Master Malory, with the pictures.” “You mean the ‘Morte d’Arthur,’ I suppose, with the stories of King Arthur and the Round Table. That certainly is exciting and I am so fond of it. I often wish that there were knights going about now to fight for us in tourney and to rescue us from tyrants. It would be nice to have anybody care for one so much.” “You silly little one, they would not trouble their heads about you, you are only twelve years old.” “Perhaps not,” answered Aline with a half sigh, as she thought of her present condition. “I do not believe there is anybody in the world that cares for me,” she said to herself, “except perhaps Audry, and I have only known her such a little time that she cannot care much. I don’t suppose there are many little girls who can be as lonely as I am. I have not even an aunt or uncle. Yes, I do want some one to love me, it is all so very hard; I wish I had a sister or a brother.”