The Romance Of The Silver Shoon

Front matter

sy) ROMANCE ,

REV.

Bb No,

Contents

6 CONTENTS

PAGE CHAPTER X

Tun Coronation s 7 03 0). eee ee ene 113 CHAPTER XI

CHAPTER II A CHRISTMAS BALL-DRESS he TELL you that the young Queen Marabout once

ruled over the kingdom of Lesser Potamia, is merely reminding you of what you know; while to insist overmuch on the fact that Lesser Potamia is bounded on the north and east by Great Potamia, on the west by Bonhomy, and on the south by the Milky Sea, would be an insult to your knowledge of the world’s map.

It is not wicked to be young—though, years ago, I met people who seemed to think it was; and Queen Marabout might have been much younger without blame and without reproach if—well, if she had behaved better. But her mother had died when the child was very small; when she was fifteen years old her father was killed while boar-hunting.

Fifteen is an early age at which to be crowned Queen, but Marabout was the last person in the world to shrink from occupying an elevated position; and though at first she wept a little for her father’s death, she did not try to conceal her delight at the coronation —which took place the day after his Majesty’s funeral.

Yes, she was very young, and if you wanted to get into everlasting disgrace at the Court of Lesser Potamia all you had to do was to remind the Queen of her youth. Long before she reached the age of eighteen she had imprisoned or banished or dismissed most of the old court officials, including the chaplains, who had served her father long and faithfully. She wanted younger people about her, she said, and of course she did not find the slightest difficulty in getting ladies and gentlemen as young as, in many cases much younger than, herself. Indeed she preferred that her personal attendants should be her juniors.

So she had thirty or forty maids of honour and young ladies-in-waiting, and a little band of boy pages and young gentlemen-in-waiting—every one of whom ought to have been at school. Of course the Prime- Minister, the Lord Chamberlain, and the other necessary officials were quite grown up—otherwise I don’t know what would have become of the kingdom of Lesser Potamia. |

Fortunately for the court of Lesser Potamia, the Queen, like most empty-headed persons, was never happy unless she was flying about the world at breakneck speed ‘‘enjoying,’’ as she called it, change of air and scene. She said the Court Doctor had told her that travelling was necessary for the maintenance of her health; the truth being that, like all the other court officials who were left at home, his only chance of obtaining a little rest and peace was to get rid of his royal mistress.

At one time or other the Queen had visited nearly every country in Hurope—except her own and the adjacent kingdom of Great Potamia. She knew very much less about any one of them than did the post-boys who rode the horses that pulled her chaise; for as she always put up at the grandest of grand hotels, and rarely left her card-table except to go shopping, and seldom spent more than a day or two in one city, and had no taste for anything except cards and cookery, feathers and chiffon, it seemed to her that there was very little difference indeed between one country and another. What a lover of motor-cars she would have been supposing that in her time such things had been in use!

As she always travelled incognito, she never included in her suite more than two ladies-in-waiting, one page and a courier, and you may just imagine what a sorry time of it they had. For the ladies had to act as veritable serving maids, and the boy led the life of an ill-used dog. She knew no language but her own— ‘*not even that,’’ her old governess once declared—and indeed if it had not been for the experienced courier

A CHRISTMAS BALL-DRESS iT she always employed I cannot imagine how she could have travelled at all.

Now the reason why her Majesty had never visited Great Potamia was this. The King of that country was a boy of fifteen, and Queen Marabout had quite made up her mind to marry him—when he was eighteen. As I told you before, she liked the people about her to be younger than herself, and she was determined that her future husband should be her junior. Moreover, she often told her maids that though she intended to be Queen of Great Potamia she would take particular care that its ruler did not become even King Consort of her own country. ‘‘What is his will be mine,’’ she said, ‘‘but what is mine is mine alone.’’

At Christmas-time the Queen was going home for a court ball on what the newspapers called ‘‘a scale of unexampled splendour.’’ Now among the things that she was really fond of, dress easily took the lead. She pretended to ‘‘adore’’ any number of objects; but as her uncle, the old Cardinal-Archbishop, once told her, the only person she was really in love with was herself. His Eminence was promptly exiled.

It is possible that the Queen loved dress just because she was so much in love with herself; at any rate, she certainly did adore fine clothes. What is more, she ‘very nearly rather liked’’ anybody who suggested a new fashion. As a rule, however, she invented her own robes and confections.

For a dress for the grand State ball we have mentioned she one morning told her ladies that she had conceived the most brilliant idea that ever entered the brain of a Queen. As she began to explain it to them in detail they all sat spellbound—as well they might.

‘‘The dress will be entirely of feathers,’’ said the Queen, ‘‘the feathers of birds—chiefly singing birds. Blackbirds, thrushes, nightingales, blackcaps, bullfinches, meadow-warblers, robins—each will contribute aflounce. The skirt will be of wings, but for the bodice we shall reserve the breast feathers. We have not yet made up our mind whether to have a belt made of robins’ or of bullfinches’ breasts. Which do you suggest, ladies?’’

But though all the girls had their mouths wide open not one of them could say anything but ‘‘Oh!”’

‘Yes, isn’t it a lovely idea?’’? asked the Queen, who quite misunderstood the ‘‘Oh!’’ chorus, and thought all her ladies were in eestasies. ‘‘But which pink do you recommend for a belt, Lady Rose? Both are so pretty, it is rather hard to choose, is it not?’’

‘*Tt is indeed, madame,’’ answered Lady Rose with a gasp, ‘‘but—but——’’

““Well?’’ asked the Queen. ‘‘Don’t stutter in our presence—if you please.’’

*‘T humbly beg your Majesty’s pardon,’’ said the maid of honour, ‘‘but—but—but——’”’

‘*What! you’re stuttering again!’’ shouted the Queen, slapping the girl’s bare arms: all the ladies wore sleeveless frocks so that the Queen could the more easily slap their arms.

‘‘Begging your Majesty’s pardon,’’ said Lady Rose desperately as she rubbed her arms, ‘‘but your Majesty can’t kill robins.’’

““Can’t? can’t? ? can’r? ? 2’? exclaimed Marabout, punctuating each interrogation with a slap on Lady Rose’s face; ‘‘do you dare to tell us that there is any thing we can’t do?’’

‘¢No, no!—oh no, your Majesty, of course not,’’ cried the now weeping Lady Rose. ‘‘Of course, if your Majesty wants robins, your Majesty must have them.’’

‘“We should just think so,’’ said the Queen with a laugh. ‘‘In fact your impertinent remark has helped us to make up our royal mind. Our belt shall be composed of robins’ breasts. We will reserve the bullfinches for a collarette. But how very glum you all are!’’ continued the Queen, looking round upon her ladies. ‘‘ Ah, we quite understand: you are all as jealous as you can be. You are envious of our superior cleverness and inventiveness, we suppose. Well, no wonder. However, you may all go now. Send to us the Lord Chamberlain and the Master of the Royal Pages. The birds have yet to be killed.’

When the maids of honour and ladies-in-waiting left the royal presence they talked to one another for over two hours without stopping. And as they all shouted at once and nobody listened, you may imagine the kind of confusion that reigned in the ladies’ quarters. Yet this was a small family tea-party compared with the row that went on that same evening in the dormitory of the pages and the young gentlemen-in-waiting. For the boys had been interviewed by the Lord Chamberlain and their own Master, and a list of the birds they had to begin to shoot on the following morning was already posted up on the wall of the guard-room. Before they went to bed they each and all resolved that not one little bird should be shot by them.

The Chamberlain was a gentleman of rank who had been a great favourite of the Queen’s father. He was of middle age, and his experience of court life was ripe and particular. The ruling of royal personages he had made into an exact science, or if you like, into the finest of fine arts. His leading principle was to agree with everything they said, to promise that everything they commanded should be done immediately, and then —to do what he knew would be best.

So when the Queen told him how many hundreds of singing birds she required for her ball-costume, he did not express the smallest surprise, but answered her Majesty that the finding and killing of so many songsters was just the easiest thing in the world, and that he would lose no time in distributing to the boys the necessary bows and arrows.

The Master of the Pages was quite a different sort of man. In the royal presence he did nothing but bow and smile: out of it he did little but grumble and growl. He was supposed to teach the three R’s to the pages: and this he did indifferently well. As a disciplinarian he was not particularly notable; but then, as he said (to the Queen’s face), her Majesty was such an admirable ruler of all her subjects, including the pages, that his own office was a sinecure. Behind the Queen’s back he was wont to say that boys who were constantly being thumped, boxed, smacked, often enough put in irons or set in the stocks, had nearly all the punishment that could be got into a day’s work.

On the following morning when the two officials met, they both looked thoughtful, and walked together in perfect silence until they reached the courtyard of the castle. The Chamberlain was the first to speak.

‘“‘T suppose your young wretches will be only too delighted with this royal order?’’ he asked. ‘‘The destructive little beasts will just kill off every bird in the countryside.’’

The Master smiled and shook his head; then abide a pause he remarked: ‘‘Your lordship has some knowledge of Queens, but, if I may say so, your understanding of boys is imperfect.’’

‘‘Do you mean to say that they will refuse to do the Queen’s bidding?’’

‘‘They have already done so.’’

‘«She’ll have them all hanged—to a boy.’’

‘‘Don’t think she will,’’ said the Master. ‘‘They are nearly all noble, and their parents would appeal to the King of Great Potamia. You know, my lord, what our army is like.’’

‘‘One hundred and twenty-three men, all told,’’ mused the Chamberlain. ‘‘Yes, you are right. Besides, the one person on earth she really fears—and hopes some day to marry—is the young King of Great Potamia. All the same, you know, piace got to be done.’’

‘*Yes, I suppose something’s got to be done; but you may bet. your gold stick the boys won’t do it. No, my lord, you’d better go to your chamber and think something out.’’

‘‘Can’t you have an epidemic—measles, for instance?’’

‘*Afraid it won’t do. You see when she ordered those sixteen boys to get forty lashes apiece we had to go in for whooping-cough. That is so recent that if we had another epidemic she might be suspicious.”’

‘*Ah,’? whispered the Chamberlain, ‘‘I shall have to send for old Magus, the jester’s uncle.’’

The Chamberlain and Magus were sitting together in consultation in one of the former’s apartments, high up in the southwestern tower. A beautiful room it was, hung with ancient tapestry in which the green and gold and crimson glistened in the noon-day sun. From the Gothic windows there was a view of quite onehalf of the entire kingdom of Lesser Potamia.

‘‘No kill so many birds at once is of course quite out of the question,’’ Magus was saying. ‘‘The crops were bad enough last year, my lord, but such wholesale destruction would inevitably lead to a famine. No birds, no corn; no birds, no fruit: that is what it would mean, my lord.’’

‘‘T know it,’’ said the Chamberlain, sadly, ‘‘I know it well. Moreover, I fear the people would rise in rebellion.’’

“Tf they did not revolt on account of the killing of the birds they would certainly do so when they found that their crops were ruined. You see, my lord, they have already been greatly tried by her Majesty’s—may T eall it erratic conduct?’’

‘You certainly may,’’ answered the Chamberlain. ‘You could not find a milder word for such extraordinary doings as hers. Between ourselves I sometimes think ——’’ here the Chamberlain got up, opened his door and looked down the stairway outside. Then he returned and for half-an-hour or more the two men spoke in whispers. They were not plotting against the Queen—they were much too honest and loyal to do that; but they were considering what would be best and wisest to do supposing some day her Majesty’s subjects should rise in rebellion. They both came to the conclusion that the only possible thing would be to beg the help of the King of Great Potamia.

However, this did not assist the poor Chamberlain in the matter of the Queen’s ball-dress of feathers.

“‘T must think it out,’’ said Magus when his companion harked back to the original question. ‘‘It is such a large order that at this moment I cannot see my way to help you. But I will go back to my hut and consider it. Could your lordship ride over and see me just after sunset?’’

The Chamberlain said he could and would. And he did. Though he had ridden his horse thither at a fast trot, he returned to the castle at a gallop, and the groom who relieved him of his steed declared that his lordship whistled and sang all the way upstairs to his apartments in the tower.

Everybody at the ball said, truly enough, that such a costume as that of Queen Marabout’s had never before been seen in any age of the world’s history. Some, however, were struck dumb with admiration—so the Queen thought. When she asked them pointedly how they liked her unique creation, they replied that words entirely failed them when they tried to express their feelings. Yet, strangely enough, once they had left the eastle they could talk of nothing else. In fact, the Queen’s feather-costume became the talk of Lesser Potamia, and you may be sure that whatever was discussed in that country soon became the favourite topic of Great Potamia.

The secret was shared by only a few very reliable people. For the truth is that not one single small bird had been killed to furnish feathers for the Queen’s ball-dress. The materials used for the costume by the Queen’s dressmakers were just the feathers of geese and turkeys, dyed and painted to resemble the plumage of the robin, the bullfinch, the thrush, and all the other birds she had mentioned.

For, as you know, at Christmas-time the slaughter of geese and turkeys in Lesser Potamia is enormous, and, as Magus had told the Chamberlain, to buy up their feathers, big and little, and to dye them appropriately would be a comparatively easy operation. Magus himself superintended the entire business, and the result was in every way satisfactory. The dressmakers were not in the secret, for as they had stipulated that every feather should come into their hands ready dried and cured, and as not one of them could have distinguished the plumage of a plover from that of an owl, they were the last people in the world to be suspicious.

The young jester knew the secret, of course, and so did his friend the cook; but not one of the pages or the maids of honour was aware that every feather in the Queen’s dress had come from the poultry-yard. They had been bought wholesale, said my Lord Chamberlain, and the statement was a true one. When somebody remarked to the jester that there must have been a lot of killing, he replied, ‘‘Yes, and by villains of the deepest dye.’’

‘‘And what about those four negro pages?’’ somebody else asked him.

‘‘Ah!’’? he exclaimed, ‘‘corkers, weren’t they? Sooted the colour of the Queen’s dress—didn’t they?”

Chapter III Queen Marabout’s Difficulties

H*® Majesty the King of Great Potamia had promised to pay Queen Marabout a visit; but as she was so rarely at home, and as he was not particularly fond of paying visits, they had not met since she was a girl of ten, and he a little lad of seven. And as he was now only fifteen, of course there was no sort of hurry, and she would take great care that his Majesty should visit her in state before ever she set foot in his kingdom.

Now the court officials, particularly the Secretary of State and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, were feeling very anxious about this forthcoming marriage. Indeed they heartily wished that the King and Queen might at least become engaged, for to say truth her Majesty’s money-bags were getting very empty, and so many of the best people had gone to live in Great Potamia that how to raise the enormous sums of money the Queen constantly demanded, the Chancellor of the Exchequer simply could not imagine. They had reduced the army until its dimensions had become those of a guard of honour, and as to the navy—well, when I tell you that it consisted of one pleasure-barge, one sailing yacht, and one gunboat, you will understand. The salaries of the officials were all in arrears, and the Queen’s debts to dressmakers, milliners, and tailors were simply enormous. The very handsome liveries worn by the pages had not been paid for for three or four years, and when you hear that the court tailors had to design a new doublet for each boy every three months, and that every suit had to be of a distinctive colour, you will get an idea of the colossal size of the tailors’ bills.

‘*You really must not expect me to remember your wretched names,’’ the Queen had said to the pages at the beginning of her reign. ‘‘You shall each have a suit of a different colour, and I shall call you Scarlet, Crimson, Purple, Green, Blue, Yellow, Pink, and so on.’’ Similarly the young ladies were called Lady Rose, Lady Mauve, Lady Cerise, and the rest.

Now as some of these boys and girls had names that the writing of took up nearly half a sheet of notepaper, you may imagine what their feelings were; but then at the court of Lesser Potamia nobody was supposed to have any feelings except the Queen herself. Moreover, as she fancied that she had an eye that was exceedingly sensitive to colour—the lads had to group themselves in a certain order, and woe betide the unfortunate boys whose colour sense was not educated or who forgot their exact position in the royal circle.

So it was no wonder that the confabulations of the Chamberlain and the Chancellor became frequent and prolonged. Almost at any hour you might see them striding up and down the inner courtyard of the castle, talking together in a low voice and trying in vain to hit upon some plan of raising money without adding to the existing weight of the taxes.

One morning they were joined by the Master of the Pages and proceeded to take him into their confidence. His almost immediate suggestion that her Majesty should be strongly advised to reduce the number of her pages and gentlemen-in-waiting was received with laughter.

‘Why that was the very first thing I proposed to the Queen,’’ said the Chancellor, ‘‘and she immediately told me that that was the very last thing she would ever dream of consenting to. Then I hinted that perhaps her ladies-in-waiting were somewhat in excess; but she grew so angry that really if I hadn’t stepped back a pace or two I believe she would have hit me a blow on the head with her heaviest sceptre.’’

‘‘Well, well,’’ sighed the Chamberlain, ‘‘we must look up old Magus again. Though he is the uncle of a fool, he is by no means a fool of an uncle. I suppose the farther away from courts and cities a man gets the more clearly he can think. We must send the Fool for the Wise Man.’’

‘‘By the way,’’ asked the Master, ‘‘where is the Court Fool to-day ?’’

‘‘Ah, I’m glad you remind me. He’s in the stocks, and I think I may venture to release him.”’

The Court Jester was a boy of sixteen, and supposed to be one of the Queen’s favourites; yet this did not save him from her Majesty’s displeasure, particularly if he failed to make the right kind of jest, or showed himself unskilful in composing flattering speeches. He had asked a riddle the night before— ‘‘Why is Lesser Potamia all table-land?’’ and when everybody, including the Queen, gave it up, he answered, ‘‘’Cos you can cover it with a table-cloth.’’ Everybody laughed except her Majesty; she was furious, and ordered him to spend the night in the stocks.

“‘Well, he’s in good company,’’ said the Master, as he and the Chamberlain walked on to an inner court where stood the stocks and whipping-post, the pillory and wooden horse. ‘‘She had one of my boys laid by the heels this morning.”’

As the officials came in sight of the stocks the two prisoners immediately set up a whining cry—though a moment before they had been laughing and pelting one another with nutshells.

‘‘Oh, my Lord Chamberlain,’’ called out the young jester, ‘‘won’t you come and draw some whines from the wood?”’

‘*Better leave you to mature in the wood, I’m thinking,’’ laughed the Chamberlain—who, however, was already turning over his big bunch of keys.

‘‘Hurrah for my Lord Chamberlain!’’ shouted the page.

““Don’t you get hollering till you’re out 0’ the wood,”’ the clown remarked. ‘‘My lord didn’t say he was going to let you out o’ the stocks. Besides, you ain’t been here all night.’’

‘‘Q, my lord, please let me out!’’ cried the page. ‘‘T haven’t done anything really, my lord. I only yawned when we were on duty this morning, and that was because the Queen kept us up so late last night.’’

‘“‘This is your affair, rather than mine,’’ said the Chamberlain to the Master as he unlocked the stocks.

‘“‘Come along, boys,’’ said the Master, lifting the heavy oak board and releasing the feet of the two lads. ‘¢You go and wash yourself and make your hair tidy,”’ he said to the page.

‘‘Have you had any breakfast?’’ the Chamberlain asked the jester.

‘‘Well, my lord,’’ grinned the youngster, rubbing his aching ankles, ‘‘I did happen to catch a bird—on the wing, so to say.’’

‘‘You caught a bird and ate it—raw?”’

The grin broadened as the clown said in a low voice: ‘omwasn’t exactly raw, my lord. ’I'was a bird the cook threw at me—to keep me quiet, he said. So I just caught it and ate it.’’

‘“‘Hum!’’ laughed the Chancellor, ‘‘I don’t suppose it was a roasted sparrow.’’

‘“‘No, my lord, ’twasn’t. In fact, ’twas a roasted pheasant. The cook’s fond of trying to make game of me, my lord.’’

“‘Well, well! But now cease your fooling and be the wise lad you are capable of being. I want to see your uncle, Magus—at once. Do you think you can bring him to the castle by noon-day?”’

“Tf he ain’t blown himself up with those chemicals of his I can, my lord.’’

‘*Both of you will be blown up if you’re not here by twelve o’clock.’’

‘¢ And if we are, my lord, you’ll give us both a good blow-out, eh?’’

‘‘Get along with you, you vulgar boy!’ laughed the Chamberlain. ‘‘You’re too fat by half for a jester. What you need is exercise. Now, off you go!’

With a bow that was half a grimace the lad ran off to find his uncle, who lived about a mile from the castle. A notable man and reputed to be a magician and a wizard was the jester’s uncle; but as a matter of fact he was nothing more than a naturalist and a chemist with a fancy for making experiments. The country folk stood in awe of him, it is true, and he was glad of that; it saved him a great deal of time. He was too fond of literature and science to care very much for mere gossip, and when particularly daring people now and then came to consult him, he told them quite plainly that he had not the slightest knowledge of the future—except what Holy Church had taught him and them. In fact he was a good, pious man who only asked to be left alone to say his prayers in peace, to study nature, and to make experiments in chemistry.

Yet the people would have it that he was a wise man, and so he was; but wise with quite a different and much higher sort of wisdom to that with which they credited him. For he was a reader and a thinker, and, as he often told his nephew, he hoped one day to discover something that would prove a benefit to his fellow-men. Great friends were he and the Lord Chamberlain—who was already indebted to him for much advice and help. In fact the people at the castle were getting into the habit of referring to him in all their numerous difficulties.

Thus when the Queen one day ordered a dinner of crocodile soup, elephant steaks, lion collops, and tiger chops, though the Chamberlain had told her Majesty that nothing could be simpler or easier—the country did not contain even a menagerie—the cook immediately disguised himself as a beggar in order to run away. However, the jester said to him, ‘‘Don’t be in a hurry: let me fetch my uncle.’’

So Magus had come to the castle, and with the help of bull-beef and goat’s flesh and some very nasty chemicals, a wild beast dinner was punctually served to the Queen—who declared that though wild animals ought to be tender, as a matter of fact they were not, and on the whole she thought beef and mutton, lamb and veal, poultry and game were preferable.

Then there was that affair of the four black boys she commanded the Chamberlain to order, so that the effect of a new dress with a train thirty-five yards long might not be marred by being held and carried by any four of her own pages with their red and white complexions and their gorgeous clothes. Now there was not a black boy to be had either for love or money in the entire kingdom, and in those days there were no Army and Navy Stores, no Whiteley or Lewis.

Yet after a few minutes’ talk with Magus, and after Magus had spent a couple of hours within the precincts of the castle, four boys with frizzy hair and with faces and hands as black as ebony were very much at the Queen’s service; and though the black came off their hands and quite spoiled a breadth of the light-coloured silk worn by the Queen, there was such a length of train between them and her Majesty that she was completely unconscious of the fraud, and congratulated the Chamberlain upon the superior and shining blackness the young niggers exhibited. If only she could have seen them—and others—grinning! For the quartet consisted of two boys from the stables and two scullions from the kitchen.

And of course the stable-lads and kitchen-boys did not mind having their hands and faces blacked, for the latter were too well used to the colour to object to it, and the former said it washed off much quicker than did harness blacking. Besides, it was a rare holiday for them to assist at a State ball, or at any other court function—though their arms did ache whenever they “were called upon to carry all those yards and yards of train. Indeed they said they much preferred the famous feather costume, because it was not only lighter but its train had to be removed before the Queen could dance.

CHAPTER IV JOEL THE SILYERSMITH H’”’ Prince Olaf chose for his birthday present a

pair of silver shoon; how he received them on Christmas Eve and wore them at Midnight Mass; how on Christmas Day he visited the Carmelite priory and saw for the first time a great crowd of poor waiting for their dole; how on the following day he left his shoes in the crib that stood in the Carmelite church, begging that they might be sold in order to buy sabots for the poor children of the city—all this has been told. But what became of Olaf’s shoes after he had placed them close to the manger?

For on that day of the holy martyr Stephen when the Prince had made the sacrifice of them to the sweet Child Jesus, they had at once been placed in the hands of the Father Prior. And as the winter was an exceptionally severe one, though the day was a festival and every shop in the city was closed, the Prior sent for the silversmith, begging him for love of the Holy Child to come to the priory in order to value the work of his own hands, and if possible to dispose of it in order that Prince Olaf’s wish should be carried out as speedily as might be.