At that instant Eleanor Roe, thrusting aside the curtains, showed her beautiful face, now distraught with fear, and cried aloud for help.
“Be not alarmed, fair one,” said one of her new escort, scarcely veiling his bold stare of admiration by an assumption of good manners. “We have saved you from some roistering knaves, and shall give you a pleasant refuge until the trouble be quelled.”
“Where are my father’s serving-men?” demanded another voice, and Anna looked forth, though anger rather than fear marked her expression.
“Prone in the dust, miladi,” answered the cavalier.
Both girls saw that they were being taken towards Gondomar’s house.
“I pray you convey us to Temple Bar,” cried Anna, an alarmed look now sending shadows across her dark eyes. “’Tis but a step, and there our names shall warrant us bearers in plenty.”
“You are much too pretty to trust to such varlets,” said the spokesman of the party, and, before another word of protest could be uttered, the litter was hustled within the gates, which were closed at once.
Now, both Mowbray and his huge companion were assured that the whole business was a trick. The only sufferers from the riot were the unfortunate litter-bearers and the nobleman who was pitched over the wall. All the rest was make-believe, save the unpleasing fact that two young and beautiful girls were left helpless in the hands of a number of unprincipled libertines such as followed the lead set by Carr, the Scottish page, and maintained, in later years, by “Steenie” and “Baby Charles” in a lewd and dissolute court.
But Mowbray was a comparative stranger in London, and Sainton had never before set eyes on the capital. Common prudence suggested that they should not raise a clamor at the gates of Gondomar, whose great influence with the erratic King was widely known and justly dreaded.