Rafael Sabatini

“ Outside I found her lover fuming. "Get a coach," I bade the booby, "and follow after me. Use all dispatch and drive to Lord Hedingham's door. But do nothing further. There I will bring Alicia to you."
"Odso," he cried. "Are you mad? How are you to win into Hedingham's?"
"'Tis what Sir William is wondering," I answered him. "But I think I have a key to his door. See that you make haste!" And so I left him gaping after me, and sped down the avenue to my horse. ”

“ Quitting the avenue, I struck a well-known shorter road, a pathway through the shrubbery, leading to the lower terrace; and Fate herself, I think, must have been leading me.
At the shrubbery's end I paused, however, on the edge of the gloom. The sweep of lawn before me was now alight from the risen moon, and I bethought me that I was proceeding a thought recklessly. How should I, charged with that secret business, present myself thus, all grimed and dusty from the road, to seek my lord among Sir William's guests? Such an advent must fire the train of much surmising ”

“ A truer motive lay, no doubt, in the hope of seeing another than my lord--Alicia, whom I never tired of seeing whom I sought every chance to see, although I knew that she was not for me. She was a matter that lay between Captain Percy, whom she loved, and my lord, whom she detested, yet who was insistent and persistent, and being a great man, had, every hope of winning her, her detestation notwithstanding. As for me--But why say more of myself, who, afterall, am of small account--the foster-lover, no more--in this tale of that sweet lady's nuptials? ”

“ I answered very quietly. "I am concerned to-night neither for myself nor you, my lord. But for my lady there. And she goes hence with me."
Surprise was not the only emotion on his face. He sank feebly to a chair. "Oh!" he cried. "You are mad."
"Of a most sweet madness, my lord," answered I. "Have I played trumps enough, or must I play King William?"
He rose as with an effort. Again he fell to reviling me for the double traitor and villain that undoubtedly I was. Then checking at last, he crossed the room, and threw wide the door of the inner chamber.
"Mistress Alicia!" he called. ”

“ Yet were you wiser to wed me now, and place your fair name within the shelter of mine."
"You mean, my lord?" she demanded angrily. "Swounds! but she was a girl of spirit!"
"Why," simpers he, "that Lord Hedingham does not bear the reputation of a--an anchorite; no--not quite, my dear." And he laughed in a mock deprecatory laugh. "And the world hath a way of talking--a vile, insidious way. But you shall choose. I'll never use compulsion."
I advanced, my step ringing on the paraquetry, my spurs a-jingle. Instantly my lord's face, startled and angry, appeared at the half-opened door. ”

“ I comforted him, "nor need you soil your conscience in the work that's to be done. This lady is to wed; the mistake was in the groom. You'll find the right one waiting without with a carriage.
"Jocelyn?" quoth she, with parted lips and questioning eyes, a frown between them.
"Faith! 'tis Captain Percy," I informed her. "You were best elope with him, since your fate is to elope this night. Go, Alicia, and be happy! Tarry no longer here. The air of these rooms is foul and smirching." ”

“ My lord, I neither ask nor care what manner of hold is yours upon Sir William, but I tell you that you shall relinquish it even as you shall relinquish his niece. This is the letter you been awaiting from King James that was. There is enough treason in it to bring your hoary, sinful head to the block. The lady you shall set free at once. Her lover will be growing impatient out of doors. Sir William also you shall set free. ”

“ Fool, there is one thing you have forgotten. If you pull me down, you will be crushed in my ruins. You are as deeply in it as I am. How can you incriminate me without bringing yourself to the gallows? ”

“ He snorted first, then informed me that Alicia kept her chamber.
"You have been misinformed, Sir William," answered I. "She does not keep her chamber. She has been carried off by that villain Hedingham." ”