Chapter 51
"Yes," he cried, "if you'll stand by me like a man."
"What do you mean?"
"Escape with me. Get out of the window as soon as it is dark, and make a dash for it. Let them fire; they would not hit us in the dark, and we could soon reach the friends and be safe."
"Run away and join your friends?" said Frank quietly.
"Yes! We should be placed in the army at once, as soon as they knew who we were. Come, you repent of what you said, and you will be faithful to the cause?"
"Won't you shake hands without that?"
"No, I cannot. I am ready to forgive everything you said or did to me; but I cannot forgive such an act as desertion in the hour of England's great need. Shake hands."
"Can't," said Frank sadly; and he thrust his hands into his pockets, walked to the window, and stood looking out into the courtyard.
No word was spoken for some time, and no sound broke the stillness that seemed to have fallen upon the place, save an occasional weary yawn from the soldier stationed outside the door and the tramp of the nearest sentry, while Andrew very silently still imitated the action of a newly caged wild animal. At last he stopped suddenly.
"Have you thought that over?" he said.
"No," replied Frank. "Doesn't want thinking over. My mind was made up before."
"And you will take the consequences?"
"Hang the consequences!" cried Frank angrily. "What is your rightful monarch, or your pretender, or whatever he is, to me? I don't understand your politics, and I don't want to. I've only one thing to think about. My father told me that, as far as I could, I was to stand by and watch over my mother in his absence, and I wouldn't forsake my post for all the kings and queens in the world; so there!"
"Then I suppose if I try to escape you will give the alarm and betray me?"
"I don't care what you suppose. But I shouldn't be such a sneak. I wish you would go, and not bother me. You've no business here, and it would be better if you were away; but I don't suppose you will do much good if you do go."
"Oh!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Andrew, as if letting off so much indignant steam; "and this is friends.h.i.+p!"
"I don't care what you say now. Your ideas are wider and bigger than mine, I suppose. I'm a more common sort of fellow, with only room in my head to think about what I've been taught and told to do. Perhaps you're right, but I don't see it."
"I can't give you up without one more try," said Andrew, standing before him with his brow all in lines. "You say your father told you to stay and watch over your mother?"
"Yes; and I will."
"But since then he has changed his opinions; he is on our side now, and I cannot but think that he
Andrew turned away in bitter contempt and rage, for strong in his determination not to be stung into a fresh quarrel, the boy he addressed, as soon as he heard his companion begin to reiterate his a.s.sertion that Sir Robert Gowan had gone over to the Pretender's side, turned slowly away, and, with his elbows once more resting on the window-sill, thrust a finger into each ear, and stopped them tight. So effectually was this done, that he started round angrily on feeling a hand laid upon his shoulder.
"It's of no use, Drew, I won't--Oh, it's you, Captain Murray!"
"Yes, my lad. Has he been saying things you don't like?"
Frank nodded.
"Well, that's one way of showing you don't want to listen. Your mother wishes to see you, and you can go to her."
"Ah!" cried the boy eagerly.
"Give me your word as a gentleman that you will go to her and return at once, and I will let you cross to Lady Gowan's apartments without an escort."
"Escort, sir?" said Frank wonderingly.
"Well, without a corporal and a file of men as guard."
"Oh, of course I'll come back," said the boy, smiling. "I'm not going to run away."
"Go, then, at once."
Captain Murray walked with him to the door, made a sign to the sentry, who drew back to stand at attention, and the boy began to descend.
"How long may I stay, sir?" he asked.
"As long as Lady Gowan wishes; but be back before dark."
"Poor old Drew!" thought Frank, as he hurried across to the courtyard upon which his mother's apartments opened; "it's a deal worse for him than it is for me. But he's half mad with his rightful-king ideas, and ready to say or do anything to help them on. But to say such a thing as that about my father! Oh!"
He was ushered at once into his mother's presence, but she did not hear the door open or close; and as she lay on a couch, with her head turned so that her face was buried in her hands, he thought she was asleep.
"Mother," he said softly, as he bent over her.
Lady Gowan sprang up at once; but instead of holding out her arms to him as he was about to drop on his knees before her, her wet eyes flashed angrily, and she spoke in a voice full of bitter reproach.
"I have just heard from the Princess that my son, whom I trusted in these troublous times to be my stay and help, has been brawling disgracefully during his duties at the court."
"Brawling disgracefully" made the boy wince, and a curious, stubborn look began to cloud his face.
"Her Royal Highness tells me that you actually so far forgot yourself as to draw upon young Forbes, that you were half mad with pa.s.sion, and that some terrible mischief would have happened if the Prince, who heard the clas.h.i.+ng from his room of audience, had not rushed in, and at great risk to himself beaten down the swords. That is what I have been told, and that you are both placed under arrest. Is it all true?"
"Yes, mother," said the lad bluntly; and he set his teeth for the encounter that was to come.
"Is this the conduct I ought to expect from my son, after all my care and teaching--to let his lowest pa.s.sions get the better of him, so that, but for the interference of the Prince, he might have stained his sword with the blood of the youth he calls his friend?"
"It might have been the other way, mother," said the boy bluntly.
"Yes; and had you so little love, so little respect for your mother's feelings, that you could risk such a thing? I have been prostrated enough by what has happened. Suppose, instead, the news had been brought to me that in a senseless brawl my son had been badly wounded-- or slain?"
"Senseless brawl" made the boy wince again.
"It would have been very horrible, mother," he said, in a low voice.
"It would have killed me. Why was it? What was the cause?"
"Oh, it was an affair of honour, mother," said Frank evasively.
"An affair of honour!" cried Lady Gowan scornfully; "a boy like you daring to speak to me like that! Honour, sir! Where is the honour? It comes of boys like you two, little better than children, being allowed to carry weapons. Do you not know that it is an honour to a gentleman to wear a sword, because it is supposed that he would be the last to draw it, save in some terrible emergency for his defence or to preserve another's life, and not at the first hasty word spoken? Had you no consideration for me? Could you not see how painful my position is at the court, that you must give me this fresh trouble to bear?"