Darrell spoke to him in low stern tones.
"It may be more than ears, if you will not bridle your tongue. It's not for you to question why the King comes or goes."
I saw Jonah's face at the door, pale with fright as he looked at the two men. The interest of the scene grew on me; the talk of Dover seemed to pursue me strangely.
"But this young man," pursued Phineas, utterly unmoved by Darrell's threat, "is not of you; he shall be snatched from the burning, and by his hand the Lord will work a great deliverance."
Darrell turned to me and said stiffly:
"This room is yours, sir, not mine. Do you suffer the presence of this mischievous knave?"
"I suffer what I can't help," I answered. "Mr Tate doesn't ask my pleasure in his coming and going any more than the King asks Mr Tate's in his."
"It would do you no good, sir, to have it known that he was here," Darrell reminded me with a significant nod of his head.
Darrell had been a good friend to me and had won my regard, but, from an infirmity of temper that I have touched on before, his present tone set me against him. I take reproof badly, and age has hardly tamed me to it.
"No good with whom?" I asked, smiling. "The Duke of York? My Lord Arlington? Or do you mean the Duke of Monmouth? It is he whom I have to please now."