“I am sure that is enough about Uncle Oliver, considering that we never saw him,” Lucy declared. “Why cannot the King and Queen, and so many wise men, settle matters so that there may not be all this quarrelling? I am sure, Henrietta, that you and Harry have been quarrelling again. Ah! you may pretend what you like—and so may Harry; but we know very well when you have been disputing. Kitty will tell you so. Harry’s face is red, and you look—”
“Lucy, I think you are talking very unkindly,” said Lady Carewe, who had been listening in another direction till her son’s name caught her ear. Lucy was duly abashed.
“I will tell you,” said Henrietta, panting with emotion of some sort, “why the King and these wonderfully wise men cannot settle their quarrel. It is because the wise men will not. They cry out for a parliament—”
“There now, Henrietta! you are speaking of a parliament!”
“I am speaking on behalf of the King,” Henrietta said, with dignity, as if this gave her a right to a topic which all others must avoid. “Those who cry out for a parliament choose to forget that when there was one, it refused the King the money he wanted; and that, if there were to be another, it would be obstinate in its own way, and disoblige and check its sovereign in every possible case.”
“That would be very rude and very wicked,” Nathanael sagely declared. This much support animated Henrietta.
“All this talk about the ship-money, and about the soap, and the beer and wine, and the saltpetre and sedan-chairs, and all the rest of the monopolies, is disgusting,” she declared, “when we all know that the King must have money, like any other gentleman, and more of it—”
“Yes, certainly,” said Nathanael, nodding assent.
“And that if the nation will not give him the means of living, he must take them as he can. There is as much stir about the salt, as if the King was doing something wicked on purpose—”
“So he is,” said Edmund. “You should have heard what the fishermen below were saying about that this morning. When the salt becomes as bad as the soap is now, there will be an end of their trade.”
“Then they should ask themselves how the King can call a parliament which would only contradict and vex him. For my part, I think he is only consulting his own dignity, and what is due to the Queen and her family, in making himself independent of his undutiful people, and showing them how he can do without them.”
“That is a point which remains to be proved,” Edmund Eliot observed. Harry was no longer present, to hear or to reply. When Henrietta began to speak her mind, he had pushed his hat from his brow, and slowly walked away from the party.
“I know I am saying what no one else here will believe,” Henrietta declared, with a slight trembling in her voice. Nathanael came round to her and held her hand; and she kissed his forehead, addressing her remaining words to him.
“When everybody is harsh with a sovereign who is above human judgment,” she said, “it is the right and the duty of even the humblest of his subjects to declare for right and duty. It might be easier to be silent—”
“Not to you surely, Henrietta,” said Alice.
“I think it is easier to Henrietta to speak than to be silent,” Lady Carewe observed with a smile. “But I trust we are all willing that everyone should think and speak his or her own thoughts and feelings. When we are strong for the freedom of the whole country, we must see to it that every one has liberty at home.”
“Thank you, aunt,” Henrietta sighed.
“But that there may be liberty on either part, I must observe that everything that Henrietta has taken for granted in what she has said is the very subject-matter of the controversy between the King and his people. Your father, and Cousin Oliver, and Mr. Pym, Henrietta, are strong in one common conviction as they consult together round the lamp at Hampden, or at St. Ives, or in London: and you are confident of the direct contrary, on the lawn here at sunset, by the sea-side. Be faithful to what you believe; but can you really be displeased with those who differ from you? I do not seek an answer, my love—”
“But, aunt, I must answer. If it is right that kings should be obeyed—”
“That is the very question under the circumstances,” Edmund observed. He would have explained the “circumstances,” but that Henrietta covered her face with her hands in horror. She could not reason with any one who could make a question of obedience to God’s vicegerent upon earth. As she ran towards the house, Nathanael sped after her. She waited for him, put her arm round his neck, and was evidently talking caressingly with him.
“Do look at Harry!” Edmund whispered to Alice. “One would think he was jealous of her own young brother.”
Harry was gazing after her from the shadow of an arch in the ruins. His mother was of opinion that it was growing too late to sit out of doors—not for fear of the pirates, but of the dews. She rose from her seat, and all followed her into the house.
It was not a happy evening for anybody. The young men went out at dark to see the watch set, and visit the stations on the rocks for a mile or two on either hand. The servants came in, every half-hour, with painful accounts of the increasing anguish of the bereaved parents, who had been assured by some Job’s comforters that their children were gone into a slavery, the horrors of which were indescribable. Lady Carewe saw enough this night of the effect of such a calamity on the young people to determine her to remove them homewards as soon as the journey could be arranged. It was little like a bridal-party, from the bride herself, who wept afresh at every detail of the grief below, to the frightened Kitty, who would not leave hold of her aunt’s hand. That kind aunt moved about the room, speaking a word of comfort to one and another. Leaning over Margaret, she whispered:
“These are dark early days, my child, for you: but you have a special blessing in a husband who does what he can to protect and console.”
Margaret looked up, smiling through her tears, and promised to try to do her part worthily. Richard thought there might be darker days coming: but he would never be found faltering, she was sure, in the very darkest.
“There is a light for the people of God, to guide their feet, amidst the snares of a false church,” said Lady Carewe.
“God’s light is the crown of the King,” Henrietta said. “In disobeying the King, the people choose darkness rather than light.”
“Let us take refuge in the Word, and in prayer,” said Lady Carewe. And she summoned the servants to worship. She read from the Old Testament of the wars and the promises of the chosen people, and prayed for a share in the promises for all who were under chastisement through the sins of rulers. When the household rose from their knees, she dismissed them to their rest. She and one or two of the servants would sit up for the young men’s return.
The young men returned before Margaret and Henrietta were in bed, and the sisters listened from the stair-head for the news. Nothing had happened to cause any fresh alarm. Yet Henrietta could not sleep. She believed that her aunt and Harry were still below when all the house was quiet; and it was late when she heard Harry’s step softly mounting the stairs, and saw her aunt’s light under the door as she passed. Lady Carewe was the last up, though she had invited Henrietta to an early walk down to the fishermen’s cottages, where she wished to visit the unhappy mothers betimes, before the neighbours should crowd in with their
