"Ay, I have heard all. Not that the news hath long come to me, for I have only but lately arrived from France, where I have been at the behest of James of York. Had I known earlier I would have been to see you before, but I never dreamed that you would have been such a fool."
My heart grew cold at these words, for my father spoke, as I thought, strangely.
"I went away with a light heart," he went on, "for I believed that you had wit enough to make good use of whatever you should find out. I left you enough money for all needs, and I believed that when I came back I should find you in high favour with the king. Instead, I find that you have espoused the cause of the daughter of a regicide, that you have refused to obey the king's commands, and that you have acted like a fool in relation to the discovery which you made."
"What would you have had me do?" I asked.
"Do!" he replied. "Did I not tell you from your earliest childhood that no man would do aught for you, except that which would help forward his own plans? And did I not trust you to make a wise use of your knowledge? That is why I laid down no plan of action for you when we met at Dover. I said 'the boy hath all his wits, and will be able to act wisely when the right time comes,' Why, having once obtained the ear of the king, thou shouldst have gone to him after what thou didst find out, and thou shouldst have appeared before him as one anxious to serve him. He would then, in his own interests, have rewarded thee with some fair demesne and a wealthy dame's hand. Instead, what dost thou do? Thou dost become the aider and abettor of this daughter of John Leslie, and when obedience to the king would have found his favour, thou didst like a fool refuse to do his bidding. Ay, and what happened then? The king, being desirous of keeping his marriage with Lucy Walters a secret, and knowing that thou wert a dangerous fool, clapped thee into prison."
"And you, father," I said, "what have you done?"
"I have done what I meant to do," he replied. "If the son is a fool there is no reason why the father should be. I have so managed the king, through His Grace of York that I have got my old lands back, so that in spite of thine own foolishness thou wilt no longer be a landless Rashcliffe. The king's marriage with Lucy Walters was not the only card I had to play, so when my time came I played it, and I took the trick too."
At this I was silent, for somehow I felt my father to be a different man.
"If ever a man had his chances you had," my father went on. "I had known for years that Katharine Harcomb had been trying to find out through Lucy Walters' mother where the old madman Walters was, and I knew that when she found out she would come and tell me."
"How did you know?" I asked.