"The scoundrel! It was he! He has deluded us most handsomely. He was in Louis' pay, and Louis has a use for him! I'll slit the knave's throat if I get at him."
"I pray your Grace's leave to be the first man at him."
"In truth I'm much obliged to you, my Lord Carford," said I to myself under the window.
"There's no use in going to Deal," cried Monmouth. "Oh, I wish I had the fellow here! She's gone, Carford; God's curse on it, she's gone! The prettiest wench at Court! Louis has captured her. 'Fore heaven, if only I were a King!"
"Heaven has its own times, sir," said Carford insidiously. But the Duke, suffering from disappointed desire, was not to be led to affairs of State.
"She's gone," he exclaimed again. "By God, sooner than lose her, I'd have married her."
This speech made me start. She was near him; what if she had been as near him as I, and had heard those words? A pang shot through me, and, of its own accord, my hand moved to my sword-hilt.
"She is beneath your Grace's station. The spouse of your Grace may one day be——" Carford interrupted himself with a laugh, and added, "What God wills."
"So may Anne Hyde," exclaimed the Duke. "But I forget. You yourself had marked her."