I am convinced that I was wrong.

But won't you tell me, please, why you visited the Old Swan?
It is a decent tavern, I understand, but a public place of the sort should not be visited by one such as you unescorted." "Your Majesty is right, and I thank you for the reprimand," returned Frances, drying her eyes.

"But Pickering, who is the host of the Old Swan, has a daughter, Bettina, who is a good girl, far above her station.
She is my friend.

I went to see her this morning to drink a cup of wormwood wine with her.

Now you know my reason for going." Wormwood wine was considered a toper's drink.
Her confusion and modest hesitancy in confessing to the wormwood wine were so pretty and so convincing that the king laughed and seized her by the arm affectionately:-- "Ah, at last it is out!" he cried.