“Regicide!” exclaimed Hubert, holding up both hands in affected horror. “Do my ears deceive me? Is this the loyal and chivalrous Sir Norman Kingsley, ready to die for king and country—”
“Stuff and nonsense!” interrupted Sir Norman, impatiently. “I tell you any one, be he whom he may, that attempts to take Leoline from me, must reach her over my dead body!”
“Bravo! You ought to be a Frenchman, Sir Norman! And what if the lady herself, finding her dazzling suitor drop his barnyard feathers, and soar over her head in his own eagle plumes, may not give you your dismissal, and usurp the place of pretty Madame Stuart.”
“You cold-blooded young villain! if you insinuate such a thing again, I'll throttle you! Leoline loves me, and me alone!”
“Doubtless she thinks so; but she has yet to learn she has a king for a suitor!”
“Bah! You are nothing but a heartless cynic,” said Sir Norman, yet with an anxious and irritated flush on his face, too: “What do you know of love?”
“More than you think, as pretty Mariette yonder could depose, if put upon oath. But seriously, Sir Norman, I am afraid your case is of the most desperate; royal rivals are dangerous things!”
“Yet Charles has kind impulses, and has been known to do generous acts.”
“Has he? You expect him, beyond doubt, to do precisely as he said; and if Leoline, different from all the rest of her sex, prefers the knight to the king, he will yield her unresistingly to you.”
“I have nothing but his word for it!” said Sir Norman, in a distracted tone, “and, at present, can do nothing but bide my time.”