"His grandfather fell at Naseby, his father in the siege of Deny, and with those two lives, twice were the fortunes of the family lost."
The King rose from his table and came over to me. He laid a hand upon my shoulder.
"And so your father died for mine," he said, and there was something new, something more personal in the kindliness of his accent, as though my father's death raised me from a unit in the aggregate of his servants into the station of a friend; "and your grandfather for my grandfather."
"Your Majesty sees that it is a privilege which I inherit," I replied. From the tail of my eye I saw my kinsman smiling appreciation of the reply.
"Lawrence has the makings of a courtier, your Majesty," said he, with a laugh.
"Nay," I interrupted hotly, "this is honest truth. Let the King prove me!"
It was the King who laughed now, and he patted my shoulder with a quite paternal air, though, in truth, he was not so many years older than myself.
"Well," he said, "why not? He is a hawk of the right nest. Why not?" and he turned him again to Bolingbroke. "As you say, he is not known in Cumberland, and there is, besides, a very natural reason for his presence in the county." He stood looking me over for a second, and then went back abruptly to his papers on the table. "But I would you could give me reliable news as to those parts."
"News I can give your Majesty," I answered, "though whether it is reliable or not I cannot take it upon oath to say. But the man who passed it to me was the steward of Blackladies, and he spoke in that spirit wherein I would have all men speak." And I told him all that Ashlock had recounted to me.
"Oh," said the King, when I had ended, and he made the suggestion eagerly to Bolingbroke. "Perhaps it were best, then, that I should land upon the coast of Cumberland in England. What say you?"