"I am sure of it," returned Sarah. "I laughed only because _she_ is so sure."

Frances then turned to her sister, not reproachfully but earnestly: "Sure?" she exclaimed. "Of course I am sure. I know myself. You have a far better mind than mine, but I have--well, I know what I have. I don't believe I am vain, but I know, sister, that you and I must rebuild the fortunes of our house, or worse will come to us than we have ever known.

You are sure to do your part because you have intellect--brains. _You_ know you have. Is it any less a matter of vanity for you to know yourself than it is for me to know myself? I know what I have, and I intend to use it."

Sarah a.s.sented by the monosyllable, "Right!" while Frances ran to the head of the table, knelt by her father's chair, and said:--

"It is all for dear old father's sake."

Sir Richard brought his daughter's head to his shoulder, affectionately smoothed her hair for a moment, and spoke with quavering earnestness:--

"It is not to be thought of one moment. Whitehall is a nest of infamy, and the king, I am told, is the worst man in it. I gave all I had to his martyred father, and now the son does not even so much as refuse to make rest.i.tution. He simply gives lying promises and leaves me to starve. I am surprised, nephew, that you come to us with this proposition."

"In that case, dear uncle, it shall be dropped at once," said I, expecting, however, to take it up at another time.

Frances was about to insist, but a glance from Sarah stopped her, and she remained silent. I knew it would require a great deal of sound argument to bring Sir Richard to our way of thinking, but I was sure that Sarah could soften him and that, at the right time, I could finish our helpless antagonist. Meantime the love affair of Frances, if there was one, should be looked into, if Frances did not object too seriously. In truth, I was a very busy man, solely with the affairs of other people.

Being so engaged in telling of other people's affairs, I have not had time to mention the fact that I had a love affair of my own, that is, if I may call that a love affair which involved only one person--myself. She who I hoped would one day be the party of the second part was Mary Hamilton, sister to Count Anthony and George Hamilton, mention of whom was made at the outset of this history.

I myself may have been lacking in morals, but at my worst I was a saint compared to George Hamilton and his friends, Lord Berkeley, young Wentworth, and the king's son, James Crofts, Duke of Monmouth. There was, however, this difference between George and his friends: he was gentlemanly picturesque in wickedness; they were nauseous in the _filthiness_ of vice.

After I became a suitor for the hand of George Hamilton's sister, I had closed my eyes to his shortcomings and, for some time prior to my Sundridge visit, had sought to further my cause with her by winning her brother's help. I had known Hamilton many years before, when we were all exiles in Holland and France, and had always liked him. In fact, we had been friends from our youth, and while in latter years I had not seen much of him, having avoided him because of his vicious mode of life, I had found no difficulty in taking up our old intimacy. At the time of which I am writing I was sure that he was my friend and had given him good reason to think the same of me. There was an attraction about him that was winning and irresistible even to men. What must it have been to women?

I speak of this friendship between George Hamilton and me at this time because of the great strain its bonds were soon to have; so great that I am still wondering why they did not break. To close this mention of my own love affair, I would say that at the time of my visit to Sundridge I had reasonable cause to hope for a favorable termination. Not that I expected ever to kindle a fiery pa.s.sion in Mary's breast, for she was not of the combustible sort, but I believed she liked me, favored my suit, and I hoped would accept me in the end. While she was very pretty, she was not of so great beauty as to mislead her family into expecting that she would catch an earl by fishing in a duck pond, and, barring the earl, I should be a husband more or less satisfactory to her and her family.

George was my friend in the matter, and to him I believed I owed much of my prospects of success. Soon the relation of my own love affair to that of my cousin Frances will be apparent.

My second day at Sundridge was spent with my uncle and my cousins, Frances remaining at home with us. Adroit Sarah had talked with her father about the maid-of-honorship and had found an opportunity to tell me that while he was not yet persuaded, he was at least in a receptive mood, ready to listen to what I had to say. In the evening Frances and Sarah went off to bed early, leaving Sir Richard to the mercies of myself and a flagon of wormwood wine which I had brought in as an ally from the Black Dog Tavern.

At first when I broached the subject of Frances becoming a maid of honor, he turned away from me, saying:--

"I fear, nephew, I fear! I confess that I did not expect the suggestion to come from you; you know the court even better than I do. My dear boy, we might as well send the little girl to the devil at once."

"Whitehall is no heaven, I admit," I answered. "But you don't know Frances. She will be as safe at court as she is in your house. The devil is everywhere, uncle, if one chooses to seek him."

"That is true, Ned."

"And Frances will not seek him anywhere. Of that I was sure before I determined to suggest this matter. It is true she has seen nothing of life beyond the pale of your influence and protection, but you are well along in years, uncle, and must face the truth that your daughters will have to confront the world without you, sooner or later--later, I hope."

"That terrible truth is my only reason to fear death," returned Sir Richard, sighing and leaning back in his chair.

"Yes, it must be a terrible thought to you," I answered, cruelly, for the purpose of forcing my dear old antagonist into the right way of thinking.

"But it is your duty to your daughters to face it squarely, and if possible, to let it help you in preparing them to meet the world. They may, if they will, find evil everywhere; they may avoid it anywhere.

Frances, with her marvellous beauty, is sure to meet good fortune at court, and good fortune is a great moral preservative of women."

"Bad doctrine, Ned, bad doctrine," said my uncle, shaking his head.

"But good truth," I answered. "Vice, like disease, breeds best in poverty."

"You have just admitted that Whitehall is a nest of vice. Wealth has not prevented it there," returned my uncle, beating me in the argument for a moment.

But I soon rallied: "Wealth will not help those who want to go wrong, but it has saved many a woman who wanted to be good. However, all this argument is impertinent. Frances is strong, and she is good, and you may rest your mind of all fear that she will ever be otherwise. Hers is not only the virtue of goodness, but of stubbornness and pride."

"I believe you are right, nephew," returned my uncle, smiling for the first time that evening. "Stubbornness is a good thing in a woman, and my Frances has a store of it 'that might surprise one knowing her but slightly."

"Yes," I replied. "And now, while her beauty is reaching its climax, is the time for her to make the most of it. I know the world, uncle, and I know the court, only too well, I am ashamed to say. But above all, I know my cousin, and knowing also the evil state of your fortune, I unhesitatingly urge you to seize the opportunity presented by the d.u.c.h.ess of York. She is a good woman and my dear friend. Frances will be under her care and mine. Of my care I need not boast. It shall be that of a brother. But Frances will need no one's care for long. She will soon find a husband, rich and of high rank, and then--"

"Would you send my girl out angling for a husband?" asked Sir Richard.

"Yes, if you insist on putting it so," I replied. "What is every girl doing? What else is every good mother doing for her daughter? Marriage is the one way in which a gentlewoman may find settlement in life.

Frances has no mother. Let us help her to win the happiness she deserves.

'Angling' is an ugly word, and in Frances's case is not the right one.

Great men and rich men will soon be angling for her. Let us place her where the bait is worth taking. Let us not mince matters, but admit between ourselves that we are sending Frances to court to make a good marriage. No one less than a rich duke or a wealthy earl will satisfy me. If you wish to allow a mere jealous fear in your heart to blight her prospects, she will be the sufferer, and hereafter may thank your folly for her misfortune."

Sir Richard remained silent a moment or two and then spoke tremulously: "The saddest thing about age is its hesitancy, its doubts, its fears."

Here the tears began to stream down the old man's cheek as he continued: "Through all my misfortunes Frances has been my joy, my solace. Sarah is a good daughter, but she lacks the ineffable tenderness, the calm, ready sympathy of her sister. If evil were to befall Frances, my heart would break--break." He covered his face with his hands and sobbed, murmuring as though to himself: "My G.o.d, I fear! I fear! She is my all--all! The king has taken everything else, and now you ask me to give her to him."

A great lump came to my throat, but in a moment I was able to say: "Do not fear, uncle, do not fear! Rather, rejoice! Let me be your staff, your courage, your strength! Think it over till morning, and then give your consent with the full a.s.surance that it will mean happiness for the girl whom you and I so dearly love."

The old man rose, took my hand, held it in his feeble grasp for a moment, and went to his room without another word.

As I was going down the narrow pa.s.sageway to my bedroom, Frances opened her door and asked: "What does father say? I know it almost kills him."

"Yes," I answered. "But he will consent in the morning."

Tears came to her eyes and she gave me her hand, saying: "Thank you, brother Ned. We are wounding him only for his own sake. If it were not to help him, all the wealth in the world would not tempt me to give him this pain nor to go to Whitehall, for I fear the place."

As she stood at the door, candle in hand, her low-cut gown exposing her beautiful throat with its strong full curves, its gleaming whiteness and the pulsing hollow at the base, her marvellous hair of sunlit gold hanging in two thick braids to below her waist, her sweet oval face of snowy whiteness, underlaid with the faint pink of roses, her great luminous eyes with their arched and pencilled brows, and the tears pendant from the long black lashes, I could not help knowing that there was not in all Whitehall beauty to compare with hers. And when her full red lips parted in a tearful smile, showing a gleam of ivory between their curving lines, I knew that if our king were an unmarried man, she could be our queen, but barring that high estate, I felt sure that a score of t.i.tles and great fortunes would lie at her feet before she had been a month in Whitehall. That is, I knew all this would happen if she kept her head. The king himself would be her greatest danger, for in a way, he was handsome of person when he kept his mouth closed, and even a little beauty in a king, like a candlelight in a distant window, shines with magnified radiance.

I went to bed that night having great faith in my cousin's strength and discretion, but my confidence was to receive a shock the next day.

CHAPTER II

A MAIDEN ST. GEORGE

After breakfast the following morning, while Sir Richard and I were sipping our morning draught in the dingy little library, he brought up the subject of the night before.

"As you justly observed, Baron Ned," my uncle began, restraining his emotion as best he could, "sooner or later my daughters will have to face the world alone. I am of no help to them now, and perhaps shall be no loss when I am gone, but it is like taking the heart out of me to send my beautiful girl to this unholy king; the wickedest man in the vilest court on earth. But it must be done. G.o.d help me and save her!"

"I will not go!" cried Frances, running into the room from the hallway, and kneeling by her father's chair.

"I fear you must, Frances," answered Sir Richard. "There, there, we'll say it is settled and let it rest a few days, so that we may grow used to the thought before making our plans in detail."

* * * * *

After dinner I missed Frances, and when I asked Sarah where she had gone, I received answer in one word: "Walking."