"So that is why the floor is cleared in the Great Chamber," I said.
She nodded at me. She looked more of a child than I had ever seen her.
"Will you dance with me, Dolly?" I asked.
"Yes," she said, "but my first is with my father."
I told them presently, though it was but a melancholy tale for Christmas Eve, of my Lord Stafford's trial, and all that I had seen there; and of the supper last night in Whitehall.
"My Lord is to be beheaded in five days," I said. "We must pray for his soul. He will die as bravely as he has lived; I make no doubt."
"And you have no doubt of his innocence?" asked Cousin Tom.
I stared on him.
"Why no," I said, "nor any man, except those paid to believe his guilt."
He pressed me to tell him more of what I had seen in London; and whether
I had seen the Duke of Monmouth again.