"What, isn't he here now?" I asked eagerly.
"Why, Simon," said my good mother with a laugh, "we looked to get news from you, and now we have news to give you! The King has sent for my lord; I saw his message. It was most flattering and spoke of some urgent and great business on which the King desired my lord's immediate presence and counsel. So he set out two days ago to join the King with a large train of servants, leaving behind my lady, who was too sick to travel."
I was surprised at these tidings and fell into deep consideration. What need had the King of my lord's counsel, and so suddenly? What had been done at Dover would not be opened to Lord Quinton's ear. Was he summoned as a Lord of Council or as his daughter's father? For by now the King must know certain matters respecting my lord's daughter and a humble gentleman who had striven to serve her so far as his station enabled him and without undue forwardness. We might well have passed my lord's coach on the road and not remarked it among the many that met us as we drew near to London in the evening. I had not observed his liveries, but that went for nothing. I took heed of little on that journey save the bearing of Mistress Barbara. Where lay the meaning of my lord's summons? It came into my mind that M. de Perrencourt had sent messengers from Calais, and that the King might be seeking to fulfil in another way the bargain whose accomplishment I had hindered. The thought was new life to me. If my work were not finished—. I broke off; the Vicar's hand was on my knee again.
"Touching the prophecy——" he began.
"Indeed, sir, in good time you shall know all. It is fulfilled."
"Fulfilled!" he cried rapturously. "Then, Simon, fortune smiles?"
"No," I retorted, "she frowns most damnably."
To swear is a sin, to swear before ladies is bad manners, to swear in talking to a clergyman is worst of all. But while my mother and my sister drew away in offence (and I hereby tender them an apology never yet made) the Vicar only smiled.
"A plague on such prophecies," said I sourly.
"Yet if it be fulfilled!" he murmured. For he held more by that than by any good fortune of mine; me he loved, but his magic was dearer to him. "You must indeed tell me," he urged.