"As well go to a branch of a locust-tree blown by the May wind with
honey for all seeking noses, as to Chichely," said Parson Downs.
"And as for the burgesses, they are afraid of their own necks, and
some of us there be would rather have thee sit in stocks than lose
thy life, for we hold thy life dear, Harry, and some punishment it
must be for thee, for thou didst shoot a King's officer, though with
a damned poor aim, Harry."
Then I said again, with my heart like a drum in my ears, that I
wished it had been better, though naught I had against Robert
Waller, and as I learned afterward he had striven all he dared for
my release, but the militia, being under some suspicion themselves,
had to act with caution in those days.
Presently, while the parson was yet with me, my brother John came
in, and verily, for the first time, I realised that we were of one
blood. Down on his knees beside me he went.
"Oh, my God, Harry," he cried, "I have done all that I could for
thee, and vengeance I will have of some for this, and they shall
suffer for it, that I promise thee. To fix such a penalty as this
upon one of our blood!"
"John," I whispered, grasping his hand hard, "I pray thee--"
But he guessed my meaning. "Nay, Harry," he cried, "better this, for
if I went back to our mother and told her that thou wert dead, after
her long slight of thee and the long wrong we have all done thee, it
would be a sorer fate for her than the stocks for thee."
But I pleaded with him by the common blood in our veins to save me
from this ignominy, and my fever increased, and he knew not how to
quiet me. Then in came Catherine Cavendish, and what she said had
some weight with me.
"For shame!" she said, standing over me, with her face as white as
death, but with resolution in her eyes, "for shame, Harry Wingfield!
Full easy it is to be brave on the battlefield, but it takes a hero
to quail not when his vanity be assailed. Have not as good men as
thou, and better, sat in the stocks? And think you that it will make
any difference to us, except as we suffer with you? And 'tis harder
for my poor sister than for thee, but she makes no complaint, nor
sheds a tear, but goes about with her face like the dead, and such a
look in her eyes as never I saw there before. And she told me to say
to thee that she could not come to-day, but that she would make
amends, and that thou hadst no cause to overworry, and I know not
what she meant, but this much I do know, a brave man is a brave man
whether it be the scaffold or the stocks, and--and--thou
hast gotten thyself into a fever, Harry."