"Am I late Hubert?" said his hurried questioner, as he drew the lad's
arm within his own, and led him off out of hearing.
"I think not. The count," said Hubert, with laughing emphasis, "has
not been visible since he entered yonder doorway, and there has been no
message that I have heard of. Doubtless, now that George has arrived,
the message will soon be here, for the royal procession starts within
half an hour."
"Are you sure there is no trick, Hubert? Even now he may be with
Leoline!"
Hubert shrugged his shoulders.
"He maybe; we must take our chance for that; but we have his royal word
to the contrary. Not that I have much faith in that!" said Hubert.
"If he were king of the world instead of only England," cried Sir
Norman, with flashing eyes, "he shall not have Leoline while I wear a
sword to defend her!"
"Regicide!" exclaimed Hubert, holding up both hands in affected horror.
"Do my ears deceive me Is this the loyal and chivalrous Sir Norman
Kingsley, ready to die for king and country--"
"Stuff and nonsense!" interrupted Sir Norman, impatiently. "I tell you
any one, be he whom he may, that attempts to take Leoline from me, must
reach her over my dead body!"
"Bravo! You ought to be a Frenchman, Sir Norman! And what if the lady
herself, finding her dazzling suitor drop his barnyard feathers, and
soar over her head in his own eagle plumes, may not give you your
dismissal, and usurp the place of pretty Madame Stuart."
"You cold-blooded young villain! if you insinuate such a thing again,
I'll throttle you! Leoline loves me, and me alone!"
"Doubtless she thinks so; but she has yet to learn she has a king for a
suitor!"
"Bah! You are nothing but a heartless cynic," said Sir Norman, yet with
an anxious and irritated flush on his face, too: "What do you know of
love?"
"More than you think, as pretty Mariette yonder could depose, if put
upon oath. But seriously, Sir Norman, I am afraid your case is of the
most desperate; royal rivals are dangerous things!"
"Yet Charles has kind impulses, and has been known to do generous acts."
"Has he? You expect him, beyond doubt, to do precisely as he said; and
if Leoline, different from all the rest of her sex, prefers the knight
to the king, he will yield her unresistingly to you."
"I have nothing but his word for it!" said Sir Norman, in a distracted
tone, "and, at present, can do nothing but bide my time."
"I have been thinking of that, too! I promised, you know, when I left
her, last night, that we would return before day-dawn, and rescue her.
The unhappy little beauty will doubtless think I have fallen into the
tiger's jaws myself, and has half wept her bright eyes out by this
time!"