She could handle them where others would have failed.
Having accepted their homage and heard the details of their latest raids against her enemy, the false Duke of Dallas--he whose treachery had made her what she was--she assumed her throne and held formal court.
The throne was a low, flat rock beside a stream, and usually Ma removed her shoes and stockings and paddled her feet in the water while she gave audience to visiting potentates.

Those enlarged joints never seemed to accommodate themselves wholly to the sort of shoes Allie made her wear.

Court "let out" when Ma's feet had become rested, after which there were less formal affairs of state to settle.

These out of the way, it was time for the queen's recreations, which took the form of singing, dancing, conversations with animals, visits with the invisible fairy folk who lived in flowers and gave them their pretty smells.
Ma never had any trouble putting in the whole day in some such manner as this; evening came all too soon, as a matter of fact.

Then it was that she bade good-by to her faithful subjects and prepared once more to fare forth and mingle, in the cunning guise of an old woman, with the followers of the false and lying Duke of Dallas.