fill his body with deadly rheums. Now what shall I do? ’twill
wake him to take him up and put him within the bed, and he sorely
needeth sleep.”
He looked about for extra covering, but finding none, doffed his
doublet and wrapped the lad in it, saying, “I am used to nipping
air and scant apparel, ’tis little I shall mind the cold!”–then
walked up and down the room, to keep his blood in motion,
soliloquising as before.
“His injured mind persuades him he is Prince of Wales; ’twill be
odd to have a Prince of Wales still with us, now that he that WAS
the prince is prince no more, but king–for this poor mind is set
upon the one fantasy, and will not reason out that now it should
cast by the prince and call itself the king. . . If my father
liveth still, after these seven years that I have heard nought
from home in my foreign dungeon, he will welcome the poor lad and
give him generous shelter for my sake; so will my good elder
brother, Arthur; my other brother, Hugh–but I will crack his
crown an HE interfere, the fox-hearted, ill-conditioned animal!
Yes, thither will we fare–and straightway, too.”
A servant entered with a smoking meal, disposed it upon a small
deal table, placed the chairs, and took his departure, leaving
such cheap lodgers as these to wait upon themselves. The door
slammed after him, and the noise woke the boy, who sprang to a
sitting posture, and shot a glad glance about him; then a grieved
look came into his face and he murmured to himself, with a deep
sigh, “Alack, it was but a dream, woe is me!” Next he noticed
Miles Hendon’s doublet–glanced from that to Hendon, comprehended
the sacrifice that had been made for him, and said, gently–
“Thou art good to me, yes, thou art very good to me. Take it and
put it on–I shall not need it more.”
Then he got up and walked to the washstand in the corner and stood
there, waiting. Hendon said in a cheery voice–
“We’ll have a right hearty sup and bite, now, for everything is
savoury and smoking hot, and that and thy nap together will make
thee a little man again, never fear!”
The boy made no answer, but bent a steady look, that was filled
with grave surprise, and also somewhat touched with impatience,
upon the tall knight of the sword. Hendon was puzzled, and said–
“What’s amiss?”
“Good sir, I would wash me.”
“Oh, is that all? Ask no permission of Miles Hendon for aught
thou cravest. Make thyself perfectly free here, and welcome, with
all that are his belongings.”
Still the boy stood, and moved not; more, he tapped the floor once
or twice with his small impatient foot. Hendon was wholly
perplexed. Said he–
“Bless us, what is it?”
“Prithee pour the water, and make not so many words!”
Hendon, suppressing a horse-laugh, and saying to himself, “By all
the saints, but this is admirable!” stepped briskly forward and
did the small insolent’s bidding; then stood by, in a sort of
stupefaction, until the command, “Come–the towel!” woke him
sharply up. He took up a towel, from under the boy’s nose, and
handed it to him without comment. He now proceeded to comfort his
own face with a wash, and while he was at it his adopted child
seated himself at the table and prepared to fall to. Hendon
despatched his ablutions with alacrity, then drew back the other
chair and was about to place himself at table, when the boy said,
indignantly–
“Forbear! Wouldst sit in the presence of the King?”
This blow staggered Hendon to his foundations. He muttered to
himself, “Lo, the poor thing’s madness is up with the time! It
hath changed with the great change that is come to the realm, and
now in fancy is he KING! Good lack, I must humour the conceit,
too–there is no other way–faith, he would order me to the Tower,
else!”
And pleased with this jest, he removed the chair from the table,
took his stand behind the King, and proceeded to wait upon him in