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Page 145
The queen herself, although not clever, had realized her mistake as soon as she saw Braybrook still standing formally before Joanna. She had not, of course, expected that Joanna would yield herself in the garden in the middle of the day, but she had hoped that she and her women would catch them in a more compromising situation. She did her best, turning aside with a shocked air to take another path, but Joanna frustrated that move. Leaping to her feet and tugging Brian, she called loudly, "Madam, pray wait, I beg you.
The sudden move his mistress made startled Brian, who also leapt to his feet. Meanwhile, Braybrook had stretched a hand toward Joanna to hold her back and half turned. Brian's shoulder caught the courtier on the hip, spun him round, and knocked him backward right into the prickly arms of the roses. He emitted a shriek, half-startled and half-pained. The dog, seeing a human on his own level and apparently troubled, lunged forward and swiped a large, moist tongue comfortingly across Braybrook's face, effectively pinning him into his ignominious position. Joanna stood quite paralyzed, choking, her only thought at the moment that this had happened at the wrong time. The oversetting of the sly lover did not come until the end of the play.
The laughter of the other women spurred Joanna into movement. She pulled Brian away with a breathless apology, curtsied, and ran toward the queen.
"Yourerfriend seems in need of help," Isabella remarked coldly.
The play was over as far as Joanna was concerned. It was necessary to return to serious matters. "Worse happens to men in war," she remarked humorously, not even glancing toward the thrashing sounds and low oaths that emanated from the roses. "I must beg a leave of you, madam, for a week or a fortnight."
"Do you beg leave for Braybrook also?" Isabella asked.
Joanna's eyes widened and an expression of total puzzlement covered her face. The jest was over and she had put it out of her mind. "What use could he be to me?" Joanna asked contemptuously. "I have serious business to do," she

 
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