“This tallies with what Alice hinted,” said Everard; “but how could she know it? didst thou give her any hint of such a thing?”
“I!” replied the cavalier, “I, who never saw Mistress Alice in my life till to-night, and then only for an instant—zooks, man, how is that possible?”
“True,” replied Everard, and seemed lost in thought. At length he spoke—“I should call Cromwell to account for his bad opinion of me; for, even though not seriously expressed, but, as I am convinced it was, with the sole view of proving you, and perhaps myself, it was, nevertheless, a misconstruction to be resented.”
“I’ll carry a cartel for you, with all my heart and soul,” said Wildrake; “and turn out with his godliness’s second, with as good will as I ever drank a glass of sack.”
“Pshaw,” replied Everard, “those in his high place fight no single combats. But tell me, Roger Wildrake, didst thou thyself think me capable of the falsehood and treachery implied in such a message?”
“I!” exclaimed Wildrake. “Markham Everard, you have been my early friend, my constant benefactor. When Colchester was reduced, you saved me from the gallows, and since that thou hast twenty times saved me from starving. But, by Heaven, if I thought you capable of such villany as your General recommended,—by yonder blue sky, and all the works of creation which it bends over, I would stab you with my own hand!”
“Death,” replied Everard, “I should indeed deserve, but not from you, perhaps; but fortunately, I cannot, if I would, be guilty of the treachery you would punish. Know that I had this day secret notice, and from Cromwell himself, that the young Man has escaped by sea from Bristol.”
“Now, God Almighty be blessed, who protected him through so many dangers!” exclaimed Wildrake. “Huzza!—Up hearts, cavaliers!—Hey for cavaliers!—God bless King Charles!—Moon and stars, catch my hat!”—and he threw it up as high as he could into the air. The celestial bodies which he invoked did not receive the present dispatched to them; but, as in the case of Sir Henry Lee’s scabbard, an old gnarled oak became a second time the receptacle of a waif and stray of loyal enthusiasm. Wildrake looked rather foolish at the circumstance, and his friend took the opportunity of admonishing him.
“Art thou not ashamed to bear thee so like a schoolboy?”
“Why,” said Wildrake, “I have but sent a Puritan’s hat upon a loyal errand. I laugh to think how many of the schoolboys thou talk’st of will be cheated into climbing the pollard next year, expecting to find the nest of some unknown bird in yonder unmeasured margin of felt.”