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Page 301
"Hiding!" An enormous horror filled Alinor's voice. "Hiding from whom?"
The chuckle deepened. "From you."
There was a short silence. Then, "Does love look elsewhere?" Alinor asked softly.
He caught her wrist so hard she gasped. "Do not be a fool. I feared you would weep and break my spirit with it and I would doGod knows what folly to pacify you. Alinor, I beg you again to have some mercy. I have come to love too old. I dote. I do things I know are wronglike standing here holding you," he said bitterly, and dropped his voice still lower. "There are those who look in hope to carry tales."
"They are supposed to look and to carry tales," Alinor replied smiling up at him. "It is the Queen's will. That is what she would have told you had you gone to her. It is to be bruited about in the next few months that you pay your court to me and I do not reject it."
Simon did not reply, merely stared at her.
"So that I can write to you and you to me 'in secrecy,'" Alinor continued irritably. Thus the Queen can have news untainted by suspicion.
"You agreed to this?"
"Most certainly. Oh, Simon, do not look so aghast. I said to her outright that this would do my name no good, and she replied that it might well do me all the good I wished done despite the slur on my name."
"And you took that to be her promise to press for our marriage? Alinor" Simon's voice faltered. He loved the Queen, but he did not deceive himself about her. In defense of her Richard and her ambition she was ruthless. Yet to say so much in plain words to Alinor who needed to live with her day by day might be dangerous.
"You mean she will not hold by the promise should other needs press upon her," Alinor said slowly. "I

 
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