Guards, do you hear? Take him away!"
The dwarf's face grew black as a thunder-cloud, and he jumped to
his feet and confronted the queen with a look so intensely ugly
that no other earthly face could have assumed it. But that lady
merely met it with one of cold disdain and aversion, and, keeping
her dark bright eyes fixed chillingly upon him, waved her white
hand, in her imperious way, to the guards. Those warlike
gentlemen knew better than to disobey her most gracious majesty
when she happened to be, like Mrs. Joe Gargary, on the "rampage,"
which, if her flashing eye and a certain expression about her
handsome mouth spoke the truth, must have been twenty hours out
of the twenty-four. As the soldiers approached to lead him away,
Sir Norman tried to catch her eye; but in vain, for she kept
those brilliant optics most unwinkingly fixed on the dwarf's
face.
"Call Lady Castlemaine," commanded the duke, as Sir Norman with
his guards passed through the doorway leading to the Black
Chamber. "Your highness, I presume, is ready to attend to her
case."
"Before I attend to hers or any one else's case," said the dwarf,
hopping over the table like an overgrown toad, "I will first see
that this guest of ours is properly taken care, of, and does not
leave us without the ceremony of saying good-bye.
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