"Now, were I an English knight, with golden spurs," said the stripling, "I would challenge to mortal combat that recreant Tudor, and force him to raise fair Elizabeth to her fitting elevation: woe the while, all England's good knights are slain, and the noble Lincoln, the last and best of all, has perished!"
"You speak unwisely and unknowingly, of things you wot not of," said Madeline, alarmed at the meaning glance of Frion; "good nephew Perkin, your eyes see not even the English white cliffs, much less can your mind understand its dangerous policy."
"Nay, dear mother," remarked her little daughter, "you have told me that the noble earl and the good Lord Lovel had been kind guardians to my cousin Peterkin: you chid him not when he wept their death, and you may suffer him to reproach their foe."
"I know nothing of these lords," said Frion, "whose names are a stumbling-block to a Frenchman's tongue. But methinks it is well for us that they aim at each other's hearts, and make booty of their own provender, no longer desolating the gay fields of France with their iron hoofs."
And now, since that he had found him whom he sought, Frion talked again of other matters, and, as before, his smooth and gay discourse gained him pleased auditors. At length, the peaceful cottagers retired to rest, and Frion sunk to sleep under their hospitable roof, after he had thought of various plans by which he might possess himself of the prince's person;—the readiest and safest way was to entice him to accompany him alone some little space, no matter how short: he trusted to his own skill to draw him still further and further on, till he should be put on board the boat that would ferry him to his own revolted England.
CHAPTER IX
THE DECOY
Gilderoy was a bonnie boy,
Had roses tull his shoone;
His stockings were of silken soy,
With garters hanging doon.
OLD BALLAD.
It was a simple scheme, yet with the simple simplicity succeeds best. A new face and talk of distant lands had excited York beyond his wont. He could not rest during the long night, while the image of his disastrous fortunes haunted him like a ghost. "Were I the son of a falconer or hind," he thought, "I could don my breastplate, seize my good cross-bow, and away to the fight. Mewed up here with women, the very heart of a Plantagenet will fail, and I shall play the girl at the sight of blood. Wherefore tarries Sir Edmund, our gentle coz? If he be a true man, he shall lead me to danger and glory, and England, ere she own her king, shall be proud of her outcast child."