Master Savage, landlord of the Bell Inn, was in close and voluble converse with the soldier, as Rupert with a peremptory voice called to his own driver to pull up a little closer.
At the sound, Master Savage turned, and the musketeer now came up to the little party in the door.
"Which of you two gentlemen," he said, looking from Rupert Kestyon to Master Legros, "is Master Legros, tailor-in-chief to His Majesty the King of France?"
Papa Legros, hearing his name thus mentioned, instinctively stepped forward, more fussy than ever, poor man, wondering indeed if some fresh misfortune was not coming his way. Rupert, pale to the lips, stood mutely staring at the musketeer.
"By order of His Majesty the King!" resumed the soldier now addressing Legros, and presenting a paper to him, which the worthy tailor, hopelessly bewildered and not a little frightened, now took from him.
"My orders are to intimate to Master Legros, tailor-in-chief to His Majesty the King of France, that he is not to leave his present place of abode without express permission from the Lord Chief Justice of England."
"Qu'est ce qu'il dit?" queried Papa Legros, turning helplessly toward his daughter.
"That we may not leave England just now," she said, feeling not a little bewildered, too, for this was so unexpected. "Let me see that paper, Father dear."
Rupert, whom this incident had thrown into a well-nigh unbearable state of fear, had kept silent all this while, longing yet not daring to question the officer closer. But the latter seemed in no way concerned with him, his errand was apparently solely confined to these peremptory orders to Master Legros.