ech withal!"

When the illustrious maidens were gone, Tom turned wearily to his keepers
and said--

"May it please your lordships to grant me leave to go into some corner
and rest me?"

Lord Hertford said--

"So please your highness, it is for you to command, it is for us to obey.
That thou should'st rest is indeed a needful thing, since thou must
journey to the city presently."

He touched a bell, and a page appeared, who was ordered to desire the
presence of Sir William Herbert. This gentleman came straightway, and
conducted Tom to an inner apartment. Tom's first movement there was to
reach for a cup of water; but a silk-and-velvet servitor seized it,
dropped upon one knee, and offered it to him on a golden salver.

Next the tired captive sat down and was going to take off his buskins,
timidly asking leave with his eye, but another silk-and-velvet
discomforter went down upon his knees and took the office from him. He
made two or three further efforts to help himself, but being promptly
forestalled each time, he finally gave up, with a sigh of resignation and
a murmured "Beshrew me, but I marvel they do not require to breathe for
me also!" Slippered, and wrapped in a sumptuous robe, he laid himself
down at last to rest, but not to sleep, for his head was too full of
thoughts and the room too full of people. He could not dismiss the
former, so they stayed; he did not know enough to dismiss the latter, so
they stayed also, to his vast regret--and theirs.

Tom's departure had left his two noble guardians alone. They mused a
while, with much head-shaking and walking the floor, then Lord St. John
said--

"Plainly, what dost thou think?"

"Plainly, then, this. The King is near his end; my nephew is mad--mad
will mount the throne, and mad remain. God protect England, since she
will need it!"

"Verily it promiseth so, indeed. But . . . have you no misgivings as to
. . . as to . . ."

The speaker hesitated, and finally stopped. He evidently felt that he
was upon delicate ground. Lord Hertford stopped before him, looked into
his face with a clear, frank eye, and said--

"Speak on--there is none to hear but me. Misgivings as to what?"

"I am full loth to word the thing that is in my mind, and thou so near to
him in blood, my lord. But craving pardon if I do offend, seemeth it not
strange that madness could so change his port and manner?--not but that
his port and speech are princely still, but that