The Midnight Queen by May Agnes Fleming (best books under 200 pages txt) 📖

of sang frond, and were then permitted to kiss the hand of the queen--a privilege worth any amount of swearing--and retire.

"Let any one who has any reports to make, make them immediately," again commanded her majesty.

A number of gentlemen of high rank, presented themselves at this summons, and began relating, as a certain sect of Christians do in church, their experience! Many of these consisted, to the deep disapproval of Sir Norman, of accounts of daring highway robberies, one of them perpetrated on the king himself, which distinguished personage the duplicate of Leoline styled "our brother Charles," and of the sums thereby attained. The treasurer of state was then ordered to show himself, and give an account of the said moneys, which he promptly did; and after him came a number of petitioners, praying for one thing and another, some of which the queen promised to grant, and some she didn't. These little affairs of state being over, Miranda turned to the little gentleman beside her, with the observation,

"I believe, your highness, it a on this night the Earl of Gloucester is to be tried on a charge of high treason, in it not?"

His highness growled a respectful assent.

"Then let him be brought before us," said the queen. "Go, guards, and fetch him."

Two of the soldiers bowed low, and backed from the royal presence, amid dead and ominous silence. At this interesting stage of the proceedings, as Sir Norman was leaning forward, breathless and excited, a footstep sounded on the flagged floor beside him, and some one suddenly grasped his shoulder with no gentle hand.


CHAPTER IX. LEOLINE.

In one instant Sir Norman was on his feet and his hand on his sword. In the tarry darkness, neither the face nor figure of the intruder could be made out, but he merely saw a darker shadow beside him standing in the sea of darkness. Perhaps he might have thought it a ghost, but that the hand which grasped his shoulder was unmistakably of flesh, and blood, and muscle, and the breathing of its owner was distinctly audible by his ads.

"Who are you?" demanded Sir Norman, drawing out his sword, and wrenching himself free from his unseen companion.

"Ah! it is you, is it? I thought so," said a not unknown voice. "I have been calling you till I am hoarse, and at last gave it up, and started after you in despair. What are you doing here?"

"You, Ormiston!" exclaimed Sir Norman, in the last degree astonished. "How--when--what are you doing here?"

"What are you doing here? that's more to the purpose. Down flat on your face, with your head stuck through that hole. What is below there, anyway?"

"Never mind," said Sir Norman, hastily, who, for some reason quite unaccountable to himself, did not wish Ormiston to see. "There's nothing therein particular, but a lower range of vaults. Do you intend telling me what has brought you here?"

"Certainly; the very fleetest horse I could find in the city."

"Pshaw! You don't say so?" exclaimed Sir Norman, incredulously. "But I presume you had some object in taking such a gallop? May I ask what? Your anxious solicitude on my account, very likely?"

"Not precisely. But, I say, Kingsley, what light is that shining through there? I mean to see."

"No, you won't," said Sir Norman, rapidly and noiselessly replacing the flag. "It's nothing, I tell you, but a number of will-o-'wisps having a ball. Finally, and for the last time, Mr. Ormiston, will you have the goodness to tell me what has sent you here?"

"Come out to the air, then. I have no fancy for talking in this place; it smells like a tomb."

"There is nothing wrong, I hope?" inquired Sir Norman, following his friend, and threading his way gingerly through the piles of rubbish in the profound darkness.

"Nothing wrong, but everything extremely right. Confound this place! It would be easier walking on live eels than through these winding and lumbered passages. Thank the fates, we are through them, at last! for there is the daylight, or, rather the nightlight, and we have escaped without any bones broken."

They had reached the mouldering and crumbling doorway, shown by a square of lighter darkness, and exchanged the damp, chill atmosphere of the vaults for the stagnant, sultry open air. Sir Norman, with a notion in his head that his dwarfish highness might have placed sentinels around his royal residence, endeavored to pierce the gloom in search of them. Though he could discover none, he still thought discretion the better part of valor, and stepped out into the road.

"Now, then, where are you going?" inquired Ormiston for, following him.

"I don't wish to talk here; there is no telling who may be listening. Come along."

Ormiston glanced back at the gloomy rain looming up like a black spectre in the blackness.

"Well, they most have a strong fancy for eavesdropping, I must say, who world go to that haunted heap to listen. What have you seen there, and where have you left your horse?"

"I told you before," said Sir Norman, rather impatiently, "I that I have seen nothing--at least, nothing you would care about; and my horse is waiting me at the Golden Crown."

"Very well, we have no time to lose; so get there as fast as you can, and mount him and ride as if the demon were after you back to London."

"Back to London? Is the man crazy? I shall do no such thing, let me tell you, to-night."

"Oh, just as you please," said Ormiston, with a great deal of indifference, considering the urgent nature of his former request. "You can do as you like, you know, and so can I--which translated, means, I will go and tell her you have declined to come."

"Tell her? Tell whom? What are you talking about? Hang it, man!" exclaimed Sir Norman, getting somewhat excited and profane, "what are you driving at? Can't you speak out and tell me at once?"

"I have told you!" said Ormiston, testily: "and I tell you again, she sent me in search of you, and if you don't choose to come, that's your own affair, and not mine."

This was a little too mach for Sir Norman's overwrought feelings, and in the last degree of exasperation, he laid violent hands on the collar of Ormiston's doublet, and shook him as if he would have shaken the name out with a jerk.

"I tell you what it is, Ormiston, you had better not aggravate me! I can stand a good deal, but I'm not exactly Moses or Job, and you had better mind what you're at. If you don't come to the point at once, and tell me who I she is, I'll throttle you where you stand; and so give you warning."

Half-indignant, and wholly laughing, Ormiston stepped back out of the way of his excited friend.

"I cry you mercy! In one word, then, I have been dispatched by a lady in search of you, and that lady is--Leoline."

It has always been one of the inscrutable mysteries in natural philosophy that I never could fathom, why men do not faint. Certain it is, I never yet heard of a man swooning from excess of surprise or joy, and perhaps that may account for Sir Norman's not doing so on the present occasion. But he came to an abrupt stand-still in their rapid career; and if it had not been quite so excessively dark, his friend would have beheld a countenance wonderful to look on, in its mixture of utter astonishment and sublime consternation.

"Leoline!" he faintly gasped. "Just atop a moment, Ormiston, and say that again--will you?"

"No," said Ormiston, hurrying unconcernedly on; "I shall do no such thing, for there is no time to lose, and if there were I have no fancy for standing in this dismal road. Come on, man, and I'll tell you as we go."

Thus abjured, and seeing there was no help for it, Sir Norman, in a dazed and bewildered state, complied; and Ormiston promptly and briskly relaxed into business.

"You see, my dear fellow, to begin at the beginning, after you left, I stood at ease at La Masque's door, awaiting that lady's return, and was presently rewarded by seeing her come up with an old woman called Prudence. Do you recollect the woman who rushed screaming out of the home of the dead bride?"

"Yes, yes!"

"Well, that was Prudence. She and La Masque were talking so earnestly they did not perceive me, and I--well, the fast is, Kingsley, I stayed and listened. Not a very handsome thing, perhaps, but I couldn't resist it. They were talking of some one they called Leoline, and I, in a moment, knew that it was your flame, and that neither of them knew any more of her whereabouts than we did."

"And yet La Masque told me to come here in search of her," interrupted Sir Norman.

"Very true! That was odd--wasn't it? This Prudence, it appears, was Leoline's nurse, and La Masque, too, seemed to have a certain authority over her; and between them, I learned she was to have been married this very night, and died--or, at least, Prudence thought so--an hour or two before the time."

"Then she was not married?" cried Sir Norman, in an ecstasy of delight.

"Not a bit of it; and what is more, didn't want to be; and judging from the remarks of Prudence, I should say, of the two, rather preferred the plague."

"Then why was she going to do it? You don't mean to say she was forced?"

"Ah, but I do, though! Prudence owned it with the most charming candor in the world."

"Did you hear the name of the person she was to have married?" asked Sir Norman, with kindling eyes.

"I think not; they called him the count, if my memory serves me, and Prudence intimated that he knew nothing of the melancholy fate of Mistress Leoline. Moat likely it was the person in the cloak and slouched hat we caw talking to the watchman."

Sir Norman said nothing, but he thought a good deal, and the burden of his thoughts was an ardent and heartfelt wish that the Court L'Estrange was once more under the swords of the three robbers, and waiting for him to ride to the rescue--that was all!

"La Masque urged Prudence to go back," continued Ormiston; "but Prudence respectfully declined, and went her way bemoaning the fate of her darling. When she was gone, I stepped up to Madame Masque, and that lady's first words of greeting were an earnest hope that I had been edified and improved by what I had overheard."

"She saw you, then?" said Sir Norman.

"See me? I believe you! She has more eyes than ever Argus had, and each one is as sharp as a cambric needle. Of course I apologized, and so on, and she forgave me handsomely, and then we fell to discoursing--need I tell you on what subject?"

"Love, of course," said Sir Norman.

"Yes, mingled with entreaties to take off her mask that would have moved a heart of atone. It moved what was better--the heart of La Masque; and, Kingsley, she has consented to do it; and she says that if, after seeing her face, I still love her, she will be my wife."

"Is it possible? My dear Ormiston, I congratulate you with all my heart!"

"Thank you! After that she left