The servant moved as if to shut the door.
"Come," said Phil quietly, "enough of that! I will have speech of Sir John Bristol."
For a moment the servant hesitated, then from within a great voice cried, "Come, Cobden, what's afoot?"
In haughty disapproval of the lad without, the servant turned his back, but to the man within he spoke with deference, as if apologizing. "Yea, Sir John. The fellow is insistent, but I shall soon have him off."
"Go, Cobden. Leave him to me."
The servant moved away and disappeared.
The virginalling had ceased, and on the lawns and the avenue and the park, which stretched away into the dark valley, a deep silence had come with the twilight. The sun had set and the long shadows across the grass were lost in the greater shadow of evening. As the world without had grown darker, the lights within seemed to have grown brighter.
"Come, fellow, come into the hall. So! Have I not seen thee before?"
"Yea, Sir John."
"Ha! I can remember faces. Aye, there are few that escape me. Let us consider. Why, on my life! This is the lad that gave Barwick such a tumbling that the fellow walked lame for a month. Speak up! Have I not placed thee right?"