"And Mistress Beatrix?" asked the young man, softly.
"Ah, who can say?" responded the broken baronet. "At one time I feared that he was appearing as a hero to her. But I do not know. He played his game cleverly at first, but now he is losing patience. I would to God that he would lose it altogether. Then the compact would be broken. But no, he is cautious. He knows that, at a word from the girl, my sword would be out. Then things would go hard with him, even though he should kill me, for my men hate him."
"Why not pick a quarrel with him?" asked the headstrong Kingswell.
"You do not understand—you cannot understand—how delicate a thing to keep is the word of honour of a man who is branded as being without honour," replied the other, sadly.
"And should Mistress Beatrix flout him," said Kingswell, "he would find his revenge in reporting your whereabouts to the garrison at St. John's."
"He is well watched," said Sir Ralph, "and this is not an easy place to escape from, even in summer. We are hidden, up here, and not so much as a fishing-ship has sighted us in the two years."
"I'll wager that he'd find a way past your vigilance if he set his mind to it," retorted Kingswell. "Gad, but it maddens me to think of being billeted under the roof of such an aspiring rogue! Rip me, but it's a monstrous sin that a lady should be plagued, and a whole body of Englishmen menaced, by a buccaneering adventurer."
"My boy," replied Sir Ralph, wearily, "you must curb your indignation, even as the rest of us do. Discretion is the card to play just now. I have been holding the game with it for over two years. Who knows but that Time may shuffle the pack before long?"
Just then Mistress Beatrix joined them. She wore one of the gay gowns—in truth somewhat enlarged and remodelled—by which her girlish beauty had been abetted and set off in England. There seemed a brightness and shimmer all about her. The coils of her dark hair were bright. The changing eyes were bright. The lips, the round neck and dainty throat, the buckled shoes, and even the material of bodice and skirt were radiant in the gloom and firelight of that rough chamber. To all appearances, her mood was as bright as her beauty. Sir Ralph watched her with adoring eyes, realizing her bravery. Kingswell joined in her gay chatter, and found it easy to be merry. Ouenwa, silent on the corner of the bench by the hearth, gazed at this vision of loveliness with wide eyes. He could realize, without effort, that Sir Ralph and D'Antons and even his glorious Kingswell were men, even as Tom Bent, and the Triggets, and Black Feather were, but that Mistress Beatrix was a woman—a woman, as were William Trigget's wife and daughter, and Black Feather's squaw—no, he could not believe it! He was even surprised to note a resemblance to other females in the number of her hands and feet. She had, most assuredly, two hands and two feet. Also she had one head. But how different in quality, though similar in number, were the members of this flashing young divinity.
"I left Montaw's lodge to behold the wonders of the world," mused the dazzled child of the wilderness, "and already, without crossing the great salt water, I have found the surpassing wonder. Can it be that any more such beings exist? Has even Master Kingswell ever before looked upon such beauty and such raiment?"