St. George's Cross; Or, England Above All

by H. G. Keene

The two women leaned against each other, even more embarrassed than, for a moment, was their visitor. They seemed to remember the voice, yet could not speak to much purpose for the beating of their scared pulses. But it is not easy for female self-love to be deceived. The boy had not changed so much in turning into man but that the face of an old love could resume its familiarity.

"'Tis Mr. Elliot," presently said Marguerite, addressing her sister in English. "Mr. Chevalier, the Centenier, told you of his return but yesterday when we went to the market at S. Helier. I admire to see him here so soon."

Rose advanced, with the restored self-possession of a lady on her own hearth, and gave the visitor her hand. "Welcome back to Jersey, Mr. Elliot. Time hath dealt kindly with you: you are almost grown to man's estate."

The young Scot flushed, somewhat angrily, at this equivocal compliment. "What Time hath done with me I cannot tell," said he, with less than his wonted ease, "save that nothing Time can do can avail to quench old feelings. This is the first liberty that I have had since we landed. I have used it to lay myself at your feet."

The ladies resumed their seats, motioning Tom to the place between them, just vacated by Le Gallais: and the talk soon ran into easier grooves.

"I have that to say," continued the page, "that may shake your spirits, fair ladies. What I have listened to this day it may cost me my ears to have heard. But," with an air of important resolution, "cost what it may, I will not nor cannot keep it from you."

"A groat for your tidings," replied Rose, "we poor women hear none in this remote corner. But is it a secret? Women may keep one," she added, looking at the panel that had closed on Le Gallais, "but walls have ears: and so have you, as yet such as they are, which I would not have you sacrifice in our cause. If therefore your news be dangerous, think not of our curiosity, and give the matter no vent."

Elliot was a scamp, no doubt, yet he could not but be moved by this thoughtful speech of a woman who could decline a secret. But he had come too far, laden with a burden that he would fain lay down. So long as he kept to himself what he had heard in the King's chamber he might be doing his duty to Charles. But Charles had insulted him and his nation. Marguerite de St. Martin was his first love, the welfare of herself and her sister was at stake; he had trudged, four miles and more through the mire of steep and devious lanes to tell them; was he to leave them unwarned? Love and Duty fought their old battle, and with the old result—Love conquered and the secret was told. He had not, it is true, heard the full purport of the Secretary's grave words or of Charles' light replies: but what he had caught, tallying with the Chaplain's disclosures of an earlier hour, had led him to conclude that there was a villainous plot on foot, of which the King did not seem to approve, and which therefore might be made known to those interested without real breach of faith. What he knew he told, and eked it out with what he could but conjecture.

The conference lasted long. While it was confined to the designs of the French, on which the short gusts of the Lieutenant-Governor's stormy impatience had thrown a transient gleam of lurid light, the ladies were all attention. When the page began to talk of the King's loyal resolves and of what great things he would do, they gave less heed. It seemed to them that Charles Stuart was all too young, too much bound to his mother, to be trusted in an affair wherein her favourite took an interest. Tom pleaded his master's cause with the zeal of one who felt himself to have done that master some wrong; but he pleaded in vain. Little did the Jersey ladies care who might bear rule in the British islands; their chief care was for what would affect Jersey, and—above all men and things of Jersey—their dear Michael, now in exile.

It had long grown dusk, and Tom knew that he was absent without leave. His visit must be cut short. If he glanced significantly at Marguerite as he bent over Rose's hand, if he hoped that Marguerite would follow him to the door and allow an integration of former toys, he was only building on a precocious knowledge of the sex. "I will but lock the door after Mr. Elliot," said she to Rose, in patois, "be tranquil, my sister, he is but an infant."