“Patience, and shuffle the cards! I may yet go to Rome, and come back Saint Peter.”
Richard lifted his mournful eyes to his brother’s face.
“Ned!” he said in a low voice, “it were better to abide a forest hind, methinks, than to come back Jude the Iscariot.”
“What meanest, Dickon?”
“Take no heed what I meant, so it come not true.”
“So what come not true?” Edward’s voice, at any rate, expressed surprise and perplexity.
“If thou wist not, Ned, I am thereof, fain.”
“Save thee All Hallows, Dickon! I can no more arede thy speech than the man in the moon.”
“So better, brother mine.”
They rode on for a little while without further words. Just before they came within earshot of the porters, Richard added quietly—