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“Ah, ah, my Lord Rippingdale!” said Charles, half aloud, “so this is where my lord and secret history meet–my dear, dumb lord.”

Continuing, the young lady read a fair and just account of the King’s meeting with John Enderby, of Enderby’s refusal to accept the knighthood, and of his rescue of the King at Sutterby.

“Enderby? Enderby?” interjected the King, “that was not one Sir Garrett Enderby who was with the Scottish army at Dunbar?”

“No, your Majesty,” said the young lady, scarcely looking up from the page she held, “Sir Garrett Enderby died in Portugal, where he fled, having escaped from prison and Cromwell’s vengeance.”

“What Enderby did this fine thing then? My faith, my martyred father had staunch men–even in Lincolnshire.”

“The father of Sir Garrett Enderby it was, your Majesty.”

“How came the son by the knighthood? ‘S’death, it seems to me I have a memory of this thing somewhere, if I could but find it!”

“His gracious Majesty of sacred memory gave him his knighthood.”

“Let me hear the whole story. Is it all there, Mistress Falkingham?” said the King, nodding towards the pages she held.

“It is not all here, your Majesty; but I can tell what so many in England know, and something of what no one in England knows.”

The Queen put out her hand as if to stay the telling, for she saw what an impression her fair reader had made upon the King. But the young lady saw no one save Charles–she did not note the entrance of two gentle men, one of whom looked at her in surprise. This was Sir Richard Mowbray of Leicester. The other was Lord Rippingdale (now lord chamberlain), who had brought Sir Richard thither at the request of the King. Sir Richard had been momentarily expected on his return from a mission to Spain, and my Lord had orders to bring him to the King on the very instant of his arrival.

The King waved his hand when Lord Rippingdale would have come forward, and the young lady continued with the history of John Enderby. She forgot her surroundings. It seemed as though she were giving vent to the suppressed feelings, imaginations, sufferings and wrongs of years. Respectfully, but sadly, when speaking of the dead King; eloquently, tenderly, when speaking of her father; bitterly, when speaking of Oliver Cromwell, she told the story with a point, a force and a passionate intelligence, which brought to the face of Charles a look of serious admiration. He straightened himself where he sat, and did not let his eyes wander from the young lady’s face. As she spoke of Sir Garrett Enderby and his acts–his desertion when Lord Rippingdale laid siege to the house, his quarrel with his father, the trial of the son, the father’s refusal to testify against him, and the second outlawing by Cromwell–her voice faltered, but she told the tale bravely and determinedly; for she now saw Lord Rippingdale in the chamber. Whenever she had mentioned his name in the narrative, it was with a slight inflection of scorn, which caused the King to smile; and when she spoke of the ruin of Enderby House, her brother’s death and her father’s years of exile, tears came into the Queen’s eyes, and the King nodded his head in sympathy.

Sir Richard Mowbray, with face aflame, watched her closely. As she finished her story he drew aside to where she could not see him without turning round. But Lord Rippingdale she saw with ease, and she met his eyes firmly, and one should say, with some malicious triumph, were she not a woman.

“My lord Rippingdale,” said the King, slowly and bitingly, “what shall be done to the man whom the King delighteth to honour?”

“Were I Mordecai I could better answer that question, Sir,” was my Lord’s reply.

“Perhaps my Lord Rippingdale could answer for Haman, then,” returned his Majesty.

“My imagination is good, but not fifty cubits high, Sir.”