When the door closed behind Mr. Chiffinch I felt more alone than ever. I regarded the King's dark face, turned down upon his paper; his dusky ringed hand with the lace turned back; the blue-gemmed quill that he used, his great plumed hat. I looked now and again, discreetly, round the room, at the gorgeous carvings, the tall presses, the innumerable clocks, the brightly polished windows with the river flowing beneath. I felt very little and lonely. Then, in a flash, the memory came back that not fifty yards away was Dolly's little parlour, and Dolly herself; and my determination surged up once more.
Suddenly His Majesty threw down his pen.
"Mr. Mallock," he said very sternly, "there is only one excuse for you—that you were drunk last night. Do you plead that?"
He was looking straight at me with savage melancholy eyes. I dropped my own.
"No, Sir."
"You dare to say you were not drunk?"
"Yes, Sir."
His Majesty caught up an ivory knife and sat drawing it through his fingers, still looking at me, I perceived; though I kept my eyes down. I could see that he was violently impatient.
"Mr. Mallock," said he, "this is intolerable. You come back from France where you have done me good service—I will never deny that—and you win my gratitude; and then you fling it all away by a piece of unpardonable behaviour. Are you aware of the penalties for such behaviour as yours?—brawling in the Palace itself, knocking my men down, forcing your way into the lodgings of Her Majesty's Ladies? Have you anything to say as to why you should not go before the Green Cloth?"
A great surge of contradiction and defiance rose within me; but I choked it down again. It was there if I should need it. The effort held me steady and balanced.