hatted, emerged into the open. The night had drawn a singularly dark mantle over the woods. Banks of cloud obscured the sky; the tall elm trees with their ivy-covered branches, and their impenetrable shadows beneath, formed a dense wall which the sight of human creatures was not keen enough to pierce. Sir Marmaduke de Chavasse, in spite of this darkness, which he hailed gleefully, peered cautiously and intently round as he descended the steps.
He had not met Lady Sue in the capacity of her romantic lover since that evening a week ago, when his secret had been discovered by Mistress de Chavasse. The last vision he had had of the young girl was one redolent of joy and love and trust, sufficient to reassure him that all was well with her, in regard to his schemes; but on that same evening a week ago he had gazed upon another little scene, which had not filled him with either joy or security.
He had seen Lady Sue standing beside a young man whose personality — to say the least — was well-nigh as romantic as that of the exiled scion of the house of Orléans. He had seen rather than heard a young and passionate nature pouring into girlish ears the avowal of an unselfish and ardent love which had the infinite merit of being real and true.
However well he himself might play his part of selfless hero and of vehement lover, there always lurked the danger that the falseness of his protestations would suddenly ring a warning note to the subtle sense of the confiding girl. Were it not for the intense romanticism of her disposition, which beautified and exalted everything with which it came in contact, she would of a surety have detected the lie ere this. He had acted his dual rôle with consummate skill, the contrast between the surly Puritanical guardian, with his round cropped head and shaven face, and the elegantly dressed cavalier, with a heavy mustache, an enormous perruque and a shade over one eye, was so complete that even Mistress de Chavasse — alert, suspicious, wholly unromantic, had been momentarily deceived, and would have remained so but for his voluntary revelation of himself.
But the watchful and disappointed young lover was the real danger: a danger complicated by the fact that the Prince Amédé d'Orléans actually dwelt in the cottage owned by Lambert's brother, the blacksmith. The mysterious prince had perforce to dwell somewhere; else, whenever spied by a laborer or wench from the village, he would have excited still further comment, and his movements mayhap would have been more persistently dogged.
For this reason Sir Marmaduke had originally chosen Adam Lambert's cottage to be his headquarters; it stood on the very outskirts of the village and as he had only the wood to traverse between it and the pavilion where he effected his change of personality, he ran thus but few risks of meeting prying eyes. Moreover, Adam Lambert, the blacksmith, and the old woman who kept house for him, both belonged to the new religious sect which Judge Bennett had so pertinently dubbed the Quakers, and they kept themselves very much aloof from gossip and the rest of the village.
True, Richard Lambert oft visited his brother and the old woman, but did so always in the daytime when Prince Amédé d'Orléans carefully kept out of the way. Sir Marmaduke de Chavasse had all the true instincts of the beast or bird of prey. He prowled about in the dark, and laid his snares for the seizure of his victim under cover of the night.
This evening certain new schemes had found birth in his active mind; he was impatient that the victim tarried, when his brain was alive with thoughts of how to effect a more speedy capture. He leaned against the wall, close by the gate as was his wont when awaiting Sue, smiling grimly to himself at thought of the many little subterfuges she would employ to steal out of the house, without encountering — as she thought — her watchful guardian.
A voice close behind him — speaking none too kindly — broke in on his meditations, causing him to start — almost to crouch like a frightened cat.
The next moment he had recognized the gruff and nasal tones of Adam Lambert. Apparently the blacksmith had just come from the wood through the gate, and had almost stumbled in the dark against the rigid figure of his mysterious lodger.
"Friend, what dost thou here?" he asked peremptorily. But already Sir Marmaduke had recovered from that sudden sense of fear which had caused him to start in alarm.
"I would ask the same question of you, my friend," he retorted airily, speaking in the muffled voice and with the markedly foreign accent which he had assumed for the rôle of the Prince, "might I inquire what you are doing here?"
"I have to see a sick mare down Minster way," replied Lambert curtly, "this is a short cut thither, and Sir Marmaduke hath granted me leave. But he liketh not strangers loitering in his park."
"Then, friend," rejoined the other lightly, "when Sir Marmaduke doth object to my strolling in his garden, he will doubtless apprise me of the fact, without interference from you."
Adam Lambert, after his uncivil greeting of his lodger, had already turned his back on him, loath to have further speech with a man whom he hated and despised.
Like the majority of country folk these days, the blacksmith had a wholesale contempt for every foreigner, and more particularly for those who hailed from France: that country — in the estimation of all Puritans, Dissenters and Republicans — being the happy abode of every kind of immorality and debauchery.
Prince Amédé d'Orléans — as he styled himself — with his fantastic clothes, his airs and graces and long, curly hair was an object of special aversion to the Quaker, even though the money which the despised foreigner paid for his lodgings was passing welcome these hard times.
Adam resolutely avoided speech with the Prince, whenever possible, but the latter's provocative and sarcastic speech roused his dormant hatred; like a dog who has been worried, he now turned abruptly round and faced Sir Marmaduke, stepping close up to him, his eyes glaring with vindictive rage, a savage snarl rising in his throat.
"Take notice, friend," he said hoarsely, "that I'll not bear thine impudence. Thou mayest go and bully the old woman at the cottage when I am absent — Oh! I've heard thee!" he added with unbridled savagery, "ordering her about as if she were thy serving wench . . . but let me tell thee that she is no servant of thine, nor I . . . so have done, my fine prince . . . dost understand?"
"Prithee, friend, do not excite yourself," said Sir Marmaduke blandly, drawing back against the wall as far as he could to avoid close proximity with his antagonist. "I have never wished to imply that Mistress Lambert was aught but my most obliging, most amiable landlady — nor have I, to my certain knowledge, overstepped the privileges of a lodger. I trust that your worthy aunt hath no cause for complaint. Mistress Lambert is your aunt?" he added superciliously, "is she not?"
"That is nothing to thee," muttered the other, "if she be my aunt or no, as far as I can see."
"Surely not. I asked in a spirit of polite inquiry."
But apparently this subject was one which had more than any other the power to rouse the blacksmith's savage temper. He fought with it for a moment or two, for anger is the Lord's, and strict Quaker discipline forbade such unseemly wrangling. But Adam was a man of violent temperament which his strict religious training had not altogether succeeded in holding in check: the sneers of the foreign prince, his calm, supercilious attitude, broke the curb which religion had set upon his passion.
"Aye! thou art mighty polite to me, my fine gentleman," he said vehemently. "Thou knowest what I think of thy lazy foreign ways . . . why dost thou not do a bit of honest work, instead of hanging round her ladyship's skirts? . . . If I were to say a word to Sir Marmaduke, 'twould be mightily unpleasant for thee, an I mistake not. Oh! I know what thou'rt after, with thy fine ways, and thy romantic, lying talk of liberty and patriotism! . . . the heiress, eh, friend? That is thy design. . . . I am not blind, I tell thee. . . . I have seen thee and her . . ."
Sir Marmaduke
