He wondered whether this was the attempt of a frivolous girl to get news to which she had no right. He inclined his head gravely and made no reply.
She went on, still with an obvious effort: “I know he is ... and I wanted to wish you success, and that—that no accident may happen to you.”
“I hope for all our sakes that there will be no accident,” he answered wearily, “but you never know.” He waited a few moments; but she seemed to have nothing more to say. He saluted her again and left her, continuing his slow way to the Speaker’s room. He did not see that she stood there looking after him until he was out of sight.
“We’re all ready,” he said tersely, as he entered.
“Then everything is ready,” the Speaker replied from his desk, where, with his clerk standing by his side, he was signing documents with great flourishes of a quill. “And it’s only just in time.”
“Only just in time?”
The Speaker dismissed the clerk and turned to Jeremy. “Only just in time,” he repeated, with an expression of gravity. “They have moved much quicker than I expected. They held up a train last week as soon as their messengers got back, and they’ve been bringing up troops in it nearly as far as Hitchin. Luckily it broke down before they had quite finished, and so the line is blocked. But the advance-guard I sent out met some of their patrols just outside St. Albans this morning.”
“Then the fighting has begun?” Jeremy asked, with a little excitement.
“Yes—begun.” The Speaker’s face was dark and sullen. “A hundred of our men were driven through the town by a score or so of theirs. They are moving on London already, but now they are coming more slowly than they have been. I intend to set out to-night and we shall meet them to-morrow somewhere on the other side of Barnet. They will come by the Great North Road.”
Jeremy was silent, and the Speaker came to him and took his arm. “Yes, Jeremy,” he said, with almost tenderness in his voice, “by this time to-morrow it ought to be all over.”