CHAPTER XXXI
AT LORD CAVERSHAM'S TABLE
As soon as Merrylips had passed beyond the carved screen, she was sorry for her rash promise. She did not wish to tell Rupert's story, then and there. For she found herself in a great vaulted room, where serving-men moved softly to and fro, and at a long table, in the middle of the room, was seated what seemed to her a great company.
Lady Caversham was there, and Allison, and Dick Fowell, and a young man so like him that he must be a brother, and Munn, and a gentleman in a chaplain's dress, and two other gentlemen, who seemed rebel officers. But though Merrylips was startled by the sight of all these people, she forgot them in a second, when she looked at the head of the table, for there sat the man who she knew must be Lord Caversham.
His Lordship, the Roundhead governor of Ryeborough, was not at all the lank, close-cropped churl that Merrylips' friends at Monksfield would have made her believe. He was a burly, broad-shouldered gentleman, with iron-gray hair, which he wore as long as any Cavalier, and warlike mustachios. His doublet was of murry-colored velvet, and his linen of the finest. Indeed, he looked like any great English gentleman, as he sat at his ample table, with his family and his friends about him.
While Merrylips noted all this and dared to hope that his Lordship might indeed prove kind, Betteris spoke aloud:—
"An't like you, sir, here is a young gentleman who is much at your service."
It was she that was spoken of, Merrylips knew. She saw that all were looking at her. She did not think it proper to courtesy, while she wore those clothes, so she stood up straight and saluted, as she had done at Monksfield.
She saw the men at table smile, and heard Lady Caversham murmur, "Dear heart!"
She saw, too, that Munn was watching her with a warning look to make sure that she bore herself as became a little sister of his. So she remembered to be neither too bold nor too timid, but like a little gentleman went to Lord Caversham, when he called her, and let him draw her to his side.
"Indeed thou art a little one!" said the Roundhead lord. "And thou hast walked that weary distance from Monksfield unto this town?"
"Ay, my lord," she said.
She was a little startled to find that all sat silent and listened to her.
"But indeed," she hastened to add, "'twas Rupert planned all for us both, and was right brave, and kind unto me."
"So! 'Twas Rupert, eh?" His Lordship smiled upon her. "And this is Rupert, I take it. Come here, lad!"
Rupert came as he was bidden, but he came unwillingly. He halted at Merrylips' elbow, and kept his eyes cast down, while he plucked at the hem of his worn doublet. Merrylips knew that he waited for her to speak, and with Munn looking on, she wondered if she dared.
"You're yourself but a young one," said Lord Caversham, in a kindly, careless voice. "A son to one of the troopers in the Monksfield garrison, they tell me."
Rupert looked up.
"No, my lord," he said.
Then he dared say no more, but with his eyes asked help of Merrylips. And she gave it. Even if twenty Munns had sat there, she would have given help in answer to such a look.
"Please you, my lord," she spoke out bravely, and took Rupert's hand in hers, "he is no common trooper's lad. His true name is called Robert Lucas, and he is son to an English gentleman, one Captain Edward Lucas that died long since in camp in High Germany."
She had to stop then to draw breath, and she heard Munn cry sharply:—
"Merrylips! Good faith, where got you that crack-brained story?"
Then Munn added, more calmly:—
"Believe me, my lord Caversham, that boy yonder is a son or nephew or the like to one of mine own troopers, a Saxon fellow named Hinkel, and known as such to all the Monksfield garrison."
"Oh, but indeed thou art mistaken, Munn," pleaded Merrylips.
She could not keep her voice from shaking. For all those faces that had looked so kindly on her had now grown doubtful and impatient, and she was half afraid. But still she went on:—
"Rupert is truly son to Captain Lucas and to Lady Venetia that was my godmother's sister, and he hath a ring—"
"So you say, boy, those were your parents' names?" Lord Caversham asked sternly.
Rupert now was facing him steadily enough.
"My lord—" he began.
Then for a moment he hesitated. Indeed he would have been glad to claim the kindred that Merrylips had said was surely his! But he had to speak the truth, and he did it bravely.
"I know not the name of my father nor my mother," he said. "But my nurse said my father's name was Lucas, and he was a captain, and the rest—Merrylips knew the rest and told it unto me."
"Why, this is rare!" cried Dick Fowell, and he seemed angrier even than Munn himself. "Here's a complete trickster for so young a lad! So, you, sirrah, you've drained that little girl dry, and from her prattle have patched up this story of your great kin with which to cozen us."
The chaplain said that Rupert were best confess at once that he was telling a false story. Dick Fowell's brother swore that such a young liar deserved a whipping. Munn Venner, who was as loud as any, vowed that such a tale, of a lost child of Lady Venetia's, was too strange for belief. And all the time Merrylips and Rupert held each other fast by the hand and wondered what they should say next.
But in the midst of this clamor, Lord Caversham himself spoke out.
"When you lads are older," said he,—and even in her distress, Merrylips wondered to hear Dick Fowell and her brother Munn called "lads,"—"you'll know that the stranger a story sound, the likelier it is to be the truth."
While Lord Caversham spoke, he put his arm about Rupert and drew him down to sit upon his knee. At this treatment Rupert stiffened and grew red, for he was not pleased at being handled like a little boy.
"Put back the shirt from your shoulder," my lord bade.
There was something in his tone that made Rupert obey in haste. He put back his shirt, with shaking fingers. Merrylips stood near enough to see that on his bared chest was a red mark like a fresh cut. And yet she knew that Rupert had not recently been hurt.
On his bared chest was a red mark like a fresh cut.
On his bared chest was a red mark like a fresh cut.
On his bared chest was a red mark like a fresh cut.
"Enough!" said Lord Caversham. "And you can sit quiet, my boy, for I've held you in my arms before this day, my godson, Robert Lucas."