The Heart

"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."