"The servants, Pan—" she warned him.
"You'll take me up, Bet, you'll let me see the old lad?" the Viscount pleaded. "I've been scheming out ways and means of getting him first to my place in Sussex and then over seas——"
"Phoh!" exclaimed my lady. "And yourself and him dungeoned in the Tower within the week. How should you know he was hereabouts—'twas that Major d'Arcy, I'll vow!"
"True, he mentioned the matter and moreover——"
"Ha!" cried my lady stamping her foot, "so he must be talking already!"
"Aye—to me, Bet, why not i' faith! And—though a Whig——"
"A flapdragon!" exclaimed my lady.
"I say though a Whig he is as ready to aid Charles into safety as you or I. Nay, he hath even proffered to harbour him in his own house."
"Mm!" said my lady, smiling down at her roses, "I wonder why a Whiggish soldier should run such risk for Charles, a stranger?"
"Because the Major chances to be the best, the bravest, the most unselfish gentleman I have the honour to know!" replied the Viscount.