Page:On a pincushion.djvu/45

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
32
The Seeds of Love.

party of horsemen till they were quite out of sight, and then she sighed. “I would stand at the gate all day if he would only ride by once,” she said, and her cousin laughed at her scornfully. But when the royal party rode back, Blanchelys opened the gate, and stood and gazed at the King’s son as before, and when she returned into the cottage she wept silently, and when she slept at night she dreamed of the King’s son. Every day he came across the bridge on his snow-white horse as he rode to the hunt, and every day Blanchelys came out and opened the gates and gazed on his face; but he never noticed her, and she sighed as she turned again to the cottage. So the days passed, and Blanchelys grew thin and pale. Zaire laughed at her, and asked what ailed her. “If you lose all your good looks like that,” she said, “ you will never get a husband.”

“I want no husband whom I shall ever wed,” said Blanchelys sadly ; and at that Zaire laughed the more.

One night when Zaire was sleeping soundly Blanchelys, who had lain awake all night, rose out of her little bed, and stepping softly to the window, looked out at the night. There were

This article is issued from Wikisource. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.