"I marked little of anything, so much was I concerned as to your hurts, dear master," returned Timothy; "but in so far as I could see, her ladyship seemed to regard your uncle rather with annoyance than friendship, and to avoid his near presence as if she misliked his intrusion."
"And yet, if I mind aright, my mother hath ofttimes spoken of him as though she had known him passing well," observed Gilbert, as he half-raised himself upon his uninjured arm.
Timothy strode slowly towards the window and looked out into the park.
"She knew him ere yet she was wedded," he said in a quiet decisive tone, "so at least my father hath told me. But peradventure 'twas only idle gossip."
"Gossip?" repeated Gilbert reprovingly. "Gossip about my mother? Prithee, what said your father? Come, tell me, Tim."
"Nay, be not alarmed," said Timothy, turning for amoment from the window and looking his young master in the face. "'Twas only this, that when my lady was at Her Majesty's court in Richmond as one of Her Majesty's ladies-in-waiting, Jasper Oglander did woo her in the hope that she would wed him, and so cut out his brother, of whom, as thou knowest, he was bitterly jealous. My lady chose the better man to be her husband, and Master Jasper departed across the seas to forget his disappointment in foreign lands."
"Tut! There is naught in that," rejoined Gilbert with a light laugh. "'Tis in no wise surprising that Jasper Oglander or any other man should admire my mother. Doth not all England admire her? Have not a full score of our best poets penned sonnets in her praise? Out upon thee, Timothy, out upon thee!"
"Well, howsoever it be," said Timothy as he gave his head a careless toss and stood with his thumbs in his belt at the window; "howsoever it be, I like not the man myself. He is a braggart, of that I am sure, and there is a look in his eyes that doth betoken deceitfulness."
"Thy opinion in the matter of people's characters is seldom to be depended upon, Tim," remarked Gilbert, assuming the gravity of worldly wisdom. "Thou dost trust overmuch to instinct and too little to a knowledge of the world. 'Tis a brute dog's method."
Timothy strode to the bedside and sat down on the chair that Lady Betty had lately left. He crossed his legs and was silent for a few moments.