are sure of the latter in any case, my child,” replied Strafford, rising. “And now, De Courcy, I think we understand each other, and I may rely upon you.”
“To the death, my lord,” cried the young man, with another of his courtly genuflections.
“Oh, let us hope ’t will not be necessary quite so far as that. I bid you good-day. To-morrow at this hour I shall look for a report from you. For the moment, good-bye, my daughter.”
No sooner was the Earl quit of the room, and the door closed behind him, than De Courcy, with an impetuous movement that startled the girl, flung himself at her feet. Her first impulse was to step quickly back, but she checked it and stood her ground.
“Oh, divine Frances!” he cried, “how impatiently I have waited for this rapt moment, when I might declare to you——”
“Sir, I beg of you to arise. ’T is not seemly you should demean yourself thus.”
“ ’T is seemly that the whole world should grovel at your feet, my lady of the free forest; for all who look upon you must love you, and for me, who have not the cold heart of this northern people, I adore you, and do here avow it.”
“You take me at a disadvantage, sir. I have never been spoken to thus. I am but a child and unaccustomed. Only sixteen this very day. I ask you——”
“Most beauteous nymph! How many grand ladies of our Court would give all they possess to make such confession truly. Aye, the Queen herself. I do assure you, sweetest, such argument will never daunt a lover.”
“I implore you, sir, to arise. My father may return.”
“That he will not. And if he did, ’t would pleasure him to see my suit advancing. I loved you from the first moment I beheld you; and though you used me with contumely, yet I solaced my wounded heart that ’t was me you noticed, and me only, even though your glance was tinged with scorn.”
Notwithstanding a situation that called for tact, she was unable to resist a touch of the linguistic rapier, and her eyes twinkled with suppressed merriment as she said, “You forget, sir, that I also distinguished the keeper of the hounds with my regard;” but, seeing he winced, she recollected her position and added, “In truth, I was most churlishly rude in the forest, and I am glad you spoke of it, that I now have opportunity to beg your pardon very humbly. I have learned since then that you stand high in my dear father’s regard, and indeed he chided me for my violence, as ’t was his duty to do by a wayward child.” The gallant was visibly flattered by this tribute to his amour propre. He seized her hand and pressed his lips to it, the tremor which passed over her at this action being probably misinterpreted by his unquenchable vanity. The tension was relieved by a low roar from the street, a sound that had in it the menace of some wild beast roused to anger. It brought to the girl a reminiscence of her disturbed dreams.
“Good heaven! What is it?” she exclaimed, snatching away her hand and running to the window. Her suitor rose to his feet, daintily dusted the knees of his silken wear with a film of lace that did duty for a handkerchief, and followed her.
The street below was packed with people howling round a carriage that seemed blocked by the press. The stout coachman, gorgeous in splendid livery, had some ado to restrain the spirited horses, maddened and prancing with the interference and the outcry. Cudgels were shaken aloft in the air, and there were shouts of “Traitor!”
“Tyrant!” and other epithets so degrading that Frances put her hands to her ears in horrified dismay.
“Whom are they threatening so fiendishly?” she whispered.
“That is your father’s carriage,” answered De Courcy.
Before she could make further inquiry there came up to them the cold, dominating tones of her father’s voice, clear above that tumult—
“Strike through!”
The stout coachman laid about him with his whip, and the curses for the moment abandoned the head of Strafford to alight on that of the driver. The horses plunged fiercely into the crowd. The cruel progress changed the tenor of the cries, as if a wailing stop of a great organ had suddenly taken the place of the open diapason. The press was so great that those in front could not make for safety, and the disappearing coach was greeted with screams of terror and was followed by groans of agony. Men went down before it like ripe grain before a sickle.
“Oh! oh! oh!” moaned the girl, all color leaving her face.
“It serves the dogs right,” said De Courcy. “How dare they block the way of a noble, and the chief Minister of State.”
“I—I cannot look on this,” lamented Frances, shrinking back to the table, and leaning against it as one about to faint, forgetting her desire to avoid further demonstration from her companion, in the trepidation which followed the scene she had witnessed.
“Indeed they were most mercifully dealt with, those scullions. The King of France would have sent a troop of horse to sabre them back into their kennels. ‘Strike through!’ cried his lordship, and, by God! ’t is a good phrase, most suitable motto for a coat of arms, a hand grasping a dagger above it. ‘Strike through!’ I shall not forget it. But ’t was a softer and more endearing theme I wished to——”
“Sir, I beseech your polite consideration. I am nigh distraught with what I have seen, and am filled with a fear of London. ’T is not the courtly city I expected to behold. I am not myself.”
“But you will at least bid me hope?”
“Surely, surely, all of us may hope.”
“Why, ’t was the last and only gift left in Pandora’s casket, and London were grim indeed to be more bereft than the receptacle of that deceitful woman. May I make my first draught on Madam Pandora’s box by hoping that I am to see you at this hour tomorrow?”
“Yes—to-morrow—to-morrow,” gasped the girl faintly.
CHAPTER V.—EXACTION.
A ‘drizzling rain had set in and had driven the crowds from the streets. Frances drew a chair to the window of the library and sat there meditating on the strange events in which she was taking some small part, so different from the tranquil happenings of the district she had known all her life. She had imagined London a city of palaces facing broad streets, fanciedly, if not literally, paved with gold; a town of gaiety and laughter: and here was the reality, a cavernous, squalid, gloomy, human warren, peopled with murky demons bent on outrage of some sort, ill-natured and threatening. As the day waned, she saw that in spite of the rain the mob was collecting again, its atoms running hither and thither, calling to each other; bedraggled beings labouring under some common excitement. And now its roar came to her again, farther off than before—a roar that chilled her while she listened, and the wave of sound this time seemed to have a fearful note of exultation in it. She wondered what had happened, and was anxious for her father if he were at the mercy of it. Mrs. Jarrett came into the room, followed by a man-servant, and also by one of her father’s secretaries, as the woman whispered to the girl:
“My lady, we must close the shutters and bar them tightly, for the ruffians are threatening again, and may be here in force at any moment, to stone the windows, as they have done before.”
The secretary seated himself at the table and was arranging papers. The man-servant opened the windows, from which Frances drew back, and now the cries came distinctly to her. “Death to Strafford!”
“Down with the tyrant!” “To the block with the King’s Earl!” were some of the shouts she heard lustily called forth.
“Oh! I fear my father is in danger. Do you think they have him in their power, that