I sat still, leaning my head upon my hand, and tried to wait as patiently as I could. Would that dog never cease howling? What was that approaching on the river? A boat? It must be, for now the soft beating of oars upon the water was plainly to be heard.
Oh, why did not Sir Hubert, or at least Sir William, return? There were men in the boat—four men, two were rowing. Why, at a gesture from the one sitting in the stern of the boat, did the oarsmen stop rowing? Now they were approaching the bank where I sat. They must have seen me, and indeed my figure, silhouetted against the sky, must have been conspicuous.
They were getting out now—at least two of the men were—and coming towards me.
But what was this? Oh joy! The men whom I now saw more clearly were none other than my two good knights, returning to me in all haste.
Sir Hubert seized my trembling hands.
'You have been left too long, my love!' he said. 'But indeed we could not help it. What do you think? The men we ran after were no foes, after all. Far from it, they were friends. When we had knocked them down, and they found out who we were, mostly from Sir William, whom they had seen before, they informed us that they belonged to a small party of men that the Duke of Suffolk had sent out here to look for me. They had come down to Kingston by boat, and were hoping to meet with me and take me to London City by water.'
'Then that was why they stared so hard at us, and followed us about?' I said inquiringly.
'Exactly. They were not sure that it was I, until Sir William and I had knocked a little sense into them!'
'Shall you go with them?' I asked. 'And I, what shall I do?'
'Well, you mast come too. You want to be with Lady Jane. I think that I had better take you to her father, whom the queen has pardoned and set free. He will know best how to get you into the Tower, and to his daughter.'