One of his eyelids moved delicately, but he said no word. The Lady Mary turned her back on him and he expected her order to be gone. But she turned again-- 'Common report?' she uttered once more. 'I do bid you give me the common report upon this, that the Queen sends to me every day this little Prince to be alone with me two hours.' He winced with his eyebrows again. 'Out with the common report,' she said. 'Madam,' he uttered, 'it is usually commended that the Queen should seek to bring sister and Prince-brother together.' She shrugged her stiff shoulders up to her ears. 'What a poor liar for a spy,' she said. 'It is more usually reported'--and she turned upon the little Prince--'that the Queen sends thee here that I may work thee a mischief so that thou die and her child reign after the King thy father.' The little Prince looked at her with pensive eyes. At that moment Katharine Howard came to the room door and looked in. 'Body of God,' the Lady Mary said; 'here you spy out a spy committing treason. For it is still treason to kneel to me. I am of illegal birth and not of the blood royal.' Katharine essayed her smile upon the black-avised girl. 'Give me leave,' she said. 'Your Grace's poor room,' Mary said, 'is open ever to your Grace's entry. _Ubi venis ibi tibi._' The Queen bade her waiting women go. She entered the room and looked at Lascelles. 'I think I know thy face,' she said. 'I am the Archbishop's poor gentleman,' he answered. 'I think you have seen me.' 'No. It is not that,' she said. 'It was long ago.' She crossed the room to smell at the pinks in the window. 'How late the flowers grow,' she said. 'It is August, yet here are still vernal perfumes.' She was unwilling to bid the gentleman rise and go, because this was the Lady Mary's room. 'Where your Grace is, there the spring abideth,' Mary said sardonically. '_Ecce miraculum sicut erat, Joshua rege._' The little Prince came timidly down to beg a flower from the Queen and they all had their backs upon the spy. He ran his hands down his beard and considered the Queen's words. Then swiftly he was on his feet and through the door. He was more ready to brave the Lady Mary's after-wrath than let the Queen see him upon his knees. For actually it was a treason to kneel to the Lady Mary. It had been proclaimed so in the old days when the King's daughter was always subject to new debasements. And who knew whether now the penalty of treason might not still be enacted? It was certain that the Queen had no liking for the Archbishop. Then, what use might she not make of the fact that the Archbishop's man knelt, seeming to curry favour, though in these days all men knelt to her, even when the King was by? He cursed himself as he hastened away. The Queen looked over her shoulder and caught the glint of his red heel as it went past the doorpost. 'In our north parts,' she said, and she was glad that Lascelles had fled, 'the seasons come ever tardily.'