When Captain Norris heard this, he bit his mustaches. He looked so stern that Merrylips, who had stolen near, hoped with all her heart that he would never learn how she had helped the brother-in-law of this boastful Colonel Hatcher.
Soon the guns were cracking again, all along the walls, but to-day Merrylips had no wish to go upon the ramparts and see men hurt and slain. She was turning away to the great house, when whom should she meet but Rupert. She was glad to see him, for she remembered how friendly they had been, only the day before. She halted, and would have spoken, but she saw that he was scowling upon her in his old way.
"How is it with thee, little sister?" he jeered.
Merrylips thought that now surely he had hit upon her secret. She was so frightened that she could only stare at him without speaking.
"I thought thou hadst mettle in thee, for a young one," Rupert went on. "But to go sneaking away and coddle a vile rebel, only for that he had come by a bump in the head, as he well had merited! Tibbott Venner, thou art no better than a girl!"
In her relief that she was not yet found out, Merrylips did not care what she said.
"Then is a girl a better gentleman than thou, thou horseboy!" she answered back. "And I be glad that I am like a girl!"
So saying, she trudged away to her own chamber. There she put on a fresh shirt, and then she fumbled in the hole in her mattress and drew out the silver ring that had been Lady Sybil's. She hung it about her neck on a cord, within her shirt, just as she had used to wear it. It was like a girl to wear it so, and she wanted to remember always that she was indeed a girl.
While she sat fingering the ring, she felt that she did not care what Rupert or the Monksfield garrison thought of her. She knew that she had done what Lady Sybil would have wished a tender-hearted little maid to do. But as the afternoon passed, and the room grew dark, and the rebel watchfires kindled on the hills, she began to think how far away was Lady Sybil, and how near were the Monksfield garrison. And since Rupert knew that she had helped their captive enemy, all the garrison must know, and surely all would cease to be her friends.
As she was thinking thus, and remembering the stern face that Captain Norris had worn, she heard a knock upon her door. When she called, "Come!" there appeared on the threshold a slender figure that she knew could be only Rupert's.