But it was plain that his good-nature did not please the handsome lady. She bit her lip angrily. "You know very well, John, that you are not to talk to me in that idiotic way," she said decidedly. "You know that there is no necessity for it as well as I do." "All right, Miss," he replied, soothingly. "And you are lying when you say that children come here," she went on, controlling herself with a great effort, "for they do not." The gardener scratched his head doubtfully and walked away, muttering to himself. The girl turned to Caroline. "Tell me," she demanded eagerly, her voice low and hurried, "how did you come here? Are you with friends? Where are they? What were you saying to that queen woman?" "I--I--we were--I was Mary Queen of Scots," Caroline stammered, struggling, as the happy dreamer struggles, not to wake. The girl started back from her, pale with an emotion that left her handsome face drawn and old. "Good Heavens!--it can't be--a child! A _child_!" she cried. Tears stood in her dark eyes. "How pitiful!" she said, softly, to herself. Then, forcing a smile, she leaned coaxingly over Caroline. "I am only too delighted to make your Majesty's acquaintance," she said, her voice a little husky, but very sweet. "I have read of you often. But surely your Majesty has not been here long? I do not recall having seen you before to-day." "N--no, you haven't," Caroline answered, a little grudgingly, "I only just came." "Ah!" said the girl, "and how did you come? Not through the house surely?" "I came under the fence," said Caroline, "the gates were locked. I was Marie Antoinette then, but I changed after she said she was." "Oh! Oh!" the girl groaned, covering her face with slender, ringless hands. "But I'd just as soon," Caroline assured her--"honestly I would. Only you need a Bothwell for her. I only thought of Marie Antoinette after the tumbrel went by. I suppose she's used to Marie Antoinette, prob'ly, and so you can't get her to change." She nodded in the direction of the little lady, now far from them, white against the shrubbery. The girl drew in her breath in little gasps, as if she had been running. "Y--yes," she assented, "she's used to being Marie Antoinette. Where is the hole you got through? Is it big enough for--for anybody?" "Oh, yes," said Caroline indifferently, "but nobody knows about it but me and a few other k--prisoners, I mean; I've used it when I was escaping before. I think it was a rabbit-hole first, and then we made it bigger. Isn't that funny--Alice got in by a rabbit-hole, too, didn't she? I thought of her as soon as I saw the gardener. He's very polite, isn't he?" The girl pressed her lips together. "They are all polite here," she said briefly. "Do you mean that you go in and out of this hole as you like? Do they know of it? Is it far from here?" "It's over there," Caroline waved, vaguely. "Why? Do you want to escape, too? Are you a queen?"