"One question is best answered at a time. Martin Thorne, her father, was my oldest friend. When James mounted the throne of England he, like your father and myself, was one of those honest adherents of the Stuarts who could not abide the practices James put in motion. He himself had been in exile with Charles and James while Cromwell lived, and he, again like your father, went into exile when James became a Papist."
"My father never returned from abroad," Bevill remarked.
"I know--I know. But Thorne returned only to go abroad again. Your father was, however, well to do. Thorne was not so. When a young exile during Cromwell's rule he had been in Liége, in a great merchant's house, since it was necessary he should find the means whereby to live. When he returned to Liége twenty-six years afterwards he had some means, and he became on this second occasion a merchant himself."
"I begin to understand."
"He thrived exceedingly. 'Tis true England was almost always at war with France, but war is good for commerce. Thorne profited by this state of affairs, and so grew rich. Sylvia is rich now, but the French hold Liége. She would escape from that city."
"Will they not let her go? She is a woman. What harm can she do either by going or staying?"
"They will let none go now who are strangers. Ere long this war, which the claims of Louis to the Spanish succession on behalf of his grandson have aroused, will have two principal seats--Flanders and Spain. There are such things as hostages; there are such things as rich people buying their liberty dearly. And Sylvia is rich, and they know it. Much of her wealth is placed in England, 'tis true, but much also is there, in Liége. Short of one chance, the chance that, in the course of this campaign Liége should fall into the hands of one of our allies, she may have to remain there until peace is made--and that will not be yet. Not for months--perhaps years."
"But if she should escape--what of her wealth then?"
"She will be free, and still she will be rich; while if, as I say, Liége falls into the allies' hands she will not even lose her property there. But, at the moment, she desires only one thing; and that desire, being a rich woman, she is anxious to gratify. She is anxious to return to England."
"And I--I am to be the man to help her to do so--to aid her to escape from Liége. I'll do it if 'tis to be done."