NOAILLES. But does your gracious Queen entreat you kinglike?
COURTENAY. "Fore G.o.d, I think she entreats me like a child.
NOAILLES. You"ve but a dull life in this maiden court, I fear, my Lord?
COURTENAY. A life of nods and yawns.
NOAILLES. So you would honour my poor house to-night, We might enliven you. Divers honest fellows, The Duke of Suffolk lately freed from prison, Sir Peter Carew and Sir Thomas Wyatt, Sir Thomas Stafford, and some more--we play.
COURTENAY. At what?
NOAILLES. The Game of Chess.
COURTENAY. The Game of Chess!
I can play well, and I shall beat you there.
NOAILLES. Ay, but we play with Henry, King of France, And certain of his court.
His Highness makes his moves across the Channel, We answer him with ours, and there are messengers That go between us.
COURTENAY. Why, such a game, sir, were whole years a playing.
NOAILLES. Nay; not so long I trust. That all depends Upon the skill and swiftness of the players.
COURTENAY. The King is skilful at it?
NOAILLES. Very, my Lord.
COURTENAY. And the stakes high?
NOAILLES. But not beyond your means.
COURTENAY. Well, I"m the first of players, I shall win.
NOAILLES. With our advice and in our company, And so you well attend to the king"s moves, I think you may.
COURTENAY. When do you meet?
NOAILLES. To-night.
COURTENAY (_aside_).
I will be there; the fellow"s at his tricks-- Deep--I shall fathom him. (_Aloud_) Good morning, Noailles.
[_Exit_ COURTENAY.
NOAILLES. Good-day, my Lord. Strange game of chess! a King That with her own p.a.w.ns plays against a Queen, Whose play is all to find herself a King.
Ay; but this fine blue-blooded Courtenay seems Too princely for a p.a.w.n. Call him a Knight, That, with an a.s.s"s, not a horse"s head, Skips every way, from levity or from fear.
Well, we shall use him somehow, so that Gardiner And Simon Renard spy not out our game Too early. Roger, thinkest thou that anyone Suspected thee to be my man?
ROGER. Not one, sir.
NOAILLES. No! the disguise was perfect. Let"s away.
[_Exeunt_.
SCENE IV.--LONDON. A ROOM IN THE PALACE.
ELIZABETH. _Enter_ COURTENAY.
COURTENAY. So yet am I, Unless my friends and mirrors lie to me, A goodlier-looking fellow than this Philip.
Pah!
The Queen is ill advised: shall I turn traitor?
They"ve almost talked me into it: yet the word Affrights me somewhat: to be such a one As Harry Bolingbroke hath a lure in it.
Good now, my Lady Queen, tho" by your age, And by your looks you are not worth the having, Yet by your crown you are. [_Seeing_ ELIZABETH.
The Princess there?
If I tried her and la--she"s amorous.
Have we not heard of her in Edward"s time, Her freaks and frolics with the late Lord Admiral?
I do believe she"d yield. I should be still A party in the state; and then, who knows--
ELIZABETH. What are you musing on, my Lord of Devon?
COURTENAY. Has not the Queen--
ELIZABETH. Done what, Sir?
COURTENAY. --made you follow The Lady Suffolk and the Lady Lennox?-- You, The heir presumptive.
ELIZABETH. Why do you ask? you know it.
COURTENAY. You needs must bear it hardly.
ELIZABETH. No, indeed!
I am utterly submissive to the Queen.
COURTENAY. Well, I was musing upon that; the Queen Is both my foe and yours: we should be friends.
ELIZABETH. My Lord, the hatred of another to us Is no true bond of friendship.
COURTENAY. Might it not Be the rough preface of some closer bond?
ELIZABETH. My Lord, you late were loosed from out the Tower, Where, like a b.u.t.terfly in a chrysalis, You spent your life; that broken, out you flutter Thro" the new world, go zigzag, now would settle Upon this flower, now that; but all things here At court are known; you have solicited The Queen, and been rejected.
COURTENAY. Flower, she!
Half faded! but you, cousin, are fresh and sweet As the first flower no bee has ever tried.
ELIZABETH. Are you the bee to try me? why, but now I called you b.u.t.terfly.
COURTENAY. You did me wrong, I love not to be called a b.u.t.terfly: Why do you call me b.u.t.terfly?