"Well? I can fare forth, if you have not had enough. What right hath your King thus to use me? I never was his vassal. I entreated his aid, truly, as prince to prince; and had he kept his bond and word, he had been the truer man. I never brake mine, and I had far more need than he. Wherefore played he at see-saw, now aiding me, and now Charles, until none of his knights well knew which way he was bent? I brought Charles de Blois to him a prisoner, and he let him go for a heap of yellow stuff, and fiddled with him, off and on, till Charles brake his pledged word, and lost his life, as he deserved, at Auray. I desire to know what right King Edward had, when I came to visit him after I had captured mine enemy, to make _me_ a prisoner, and keep me so, now and then suffering me, like a cat with a mouse, to escape just far enough to keep within his reach when he list to catch me again. But not now, for eight long years--eight long years!" "Dame, I cannot remain here to list such language of my sovereign." "Then don't. I never asked you. My tongue is free, at any rate. You can go." And the Countess turned back to the black satin on which she was embroidering a wreath of red and white roses. "Follow me, Amphillis," said Lady Foljambe, with as much dignity as the Countess's onslaught had left her. She led the way into the opposite chamber, the one shared by Perrote and Amphillis. "It were best, as this hath happed, that you should know quickly who this lady is that wotteth not how to govern her tongue. She is the Duchess of Brittany. Heard you ever her story?" "Something, Dame, an' it please you; yet not fully told. I heard, as I think, of some quarrel betwixt her and a cousin touching the succession to the duchy, and that our King had holpen her, and gave his daughter in wedlock to the young Duke her son." "So did he, in very deed; and yet is she thus unbuxom. Listen, and you shall hear the inwards thereof. In the year of our Lord 1341 died Duke John of Brittany, that was called the Good, and left no child. Two brothers had he--Sir Guy, that was his brother both of father and mother, and Sir John, of the father only, that was called Count de Montfort. Sir Guy was then dead, but had left behind him a daughter, the Lady Joan, that man called Joan the Halting, by reason she was lame of one leg. Between her and her uncle of Montfort was the war of succession--she as daughter of the brother by father and mother, he as nearer akin to Duke John, being brother himself. [Note 1.] Our King took part with the Count de Montfort, and the King of France espoused the cause of the Lady Joan." Lady Foljambe did not think it necessary to add that King Edward's policy had been of the most halting character in this matter--at one time fighting for Jeanne, and at another for Montfort, until his nobles might well have been pardoned, if they found it difficult to remember at any given moment on which side their master was.