Master Mervale slipped from his embrace and waded to dry land. "My lord,—" he began, demurely.
"My lady wife,—" said his lordship of Falmouth, with a tremulous smile. He paused, and passed his hand over his brow. "And yet I do not understand," he said. "Y'are dead; y'are buried. It was a frightened boy I struck." He spread out his strong arms. "O world! O sun! O stars!" he cried; "she is come back to me from the grave. O little world! small shining planet! I think that I could crush you in my hands!"
"Meanwhile," Master Mervale suggested, after an interval, "it is I that you are crushing." He sighed,—though not very deeply,—and continued, with a hiatus: "They would have wedded me to Lucius Rossmore, and I could not—I could not—"
"That skinflint! that palsied goat!" the marquis growled.
"He was wealthy," said Master Mervale. Then he sighed once more. "There seemed only you,—only you in all the world. A man might come to you in those far-off countries: a woman might not. I fled by night, my lord, by the aid of a waiting-woman; became a man by the aid of a tailor; and set out to find you by the aid of such impudence as I might muster. But luck did not travel with me. I followed you through Flanders, Italy, Spain,—always just too late; always finding the bird flown, the nest yet warm. Presently I heard you were become Marquis of Falmouth; then I gave up the quest."
"I would suggest," said the marquis, "that my name is Stephen;—but why, in the devil's name, should you give up a quest so laudable?"
"Stephen Allonby, my lord," said Master Mervale, sadly, "was not Marquis of Falmouth; as Marquis of Falmouth, you might look to mate with any woman short of the Queen."
"To tell you a secret," the marquis whispered, "I look to mate with one beside whom the Queen—not to speak treason—is but a lean-faced, yellow piece of affectation. I aim higher than royalty, heart's dearest,—aspiring to one beside whom empresses are but common hussies."
"And Ursula?" asked Master Mervale, gently.
"Holy Gregory!" cried the marquis, "I had forgot! Poor wench, poor wench! I must withdraw my suit warily,—firmly, of course, yet very kindlily, you understand, so as to grieve her no more than must be. Poor wench!—well, after all," he hopefully suggested, "there is yet Pevensey."