Then he told her that the king had made peace with the murderous Irish, and that he was a false and wicked man.
At that Merrylips used the oldest argument in the world. She clenched her little fists, as she had not done since her eighth birthday, two full years before, and she gave Herbert a smack that sent him blubbering to his mother.
To be sure, Merrylips was well punished for that blow. Mistress Lowry whipped her hands, and prayed over her. Then she sent her supperless to her chamber, and bade her pray that her naughty spirit might be broken.
But Merrylips did not pray. Instead she curled up on the window-seat, and from within her gown took the silver ring that Lady Sybil had left with her, and kissed it and stroked it and talked to it.
"I do think long to be at Walsover," she whispered. "But ere I go, I'd fain smack Herbert once again for a tittling talebearer. Ay, and I'd fain fight the wicked Roundheads, for Herbert and his mother be of their party, and O kind Lord! Thou knowest that they have used me much unhandsomely!"
And if, at that point, under cover of the twilight, a tear or two fell on the silver ring, even Merrylips' big brothers could scarcely have blamed that poor little captive maid.
CHAPTER XII
A VENNER TO THE RESCUE!
"Sybil! Hey, Sybil! Why dost not answer when I speak thee fair?"
It was Herbert Lowry that spoke from the threshold of the hall, where Merrylips sat alone at her knitting. She raised her eyes from the tiresome stitches, and saw him standing there, and she thought to herself that never had she seen him look so well.