in my opinion fully explained George's presence on the St. Albans road,
but she declared that it was a flimsy excuse, and said she did not want
to talk further on the subject.

Knowing that I could not convince her at that time, I bore away from the
topic and called her attention to the impropriety of taking dinner
unescorted at a public house.

"I know all about it, cousin," she returned, "but a good character is
of no value in Whitehall. It is an incumbrance. As to my conscience,
you need have no fear. When I first came to court, I supposed I should
encounter dangers. I was mistaken. I am as safe here as I should be in my
father's house. All the pitfalls and snares are to be seen by any one who
wishes to see them. It is the sleeping spider that catches the fly, not
your bold, brazen hunter, clumsily alert."

I did not want to be preaching constantly to Frances, so we talked on
other subjects till we reached my uncle's house, where I remained,
singing, dancing, and very merry with Frances, Sarah, and Churchill, till
we heard the night watch call, "One o'clock and raining!"

Churchill and I slept at Sir Richard's and returned to Whitehall the next
morning.

During the following week I went to see Betty frequently under the
pretence of wishing to see Hamilton, but she told me (honestly, I
believed) that he had left the Old Swan and that she did not know where
he was. So I repeated my visits every day, each visit growing longer and
I growing fonder. Betty, too, seemed to be looking for my visits with a
degree of pleasure that both pleased and grieved me, for with all my
longing for the girl, I never lost sight of the fact that if I were the
right sort of man, I should not wish to gain her love to an extent that
would mean sorrow to her.

If I were the right sort of man? The question has always set me
wondering. The man who never doubts that he is the right sort of man may
be put down as all bad, though the right sort of man is not necessarily
all good.

CHAPTER VII

THE EYE OF THE DRAGON

One morning, a week or more after my visit to my uncle's house, with
Frances, she came to my closet in the Wardrobe greatly excited, and told
me that a sheriff had come to take her to one of the London courts of
law.

"Here is the paper he gave me," she said, handing me a document which
proved to be a subpoena. "I have committed no crime, and I can't imagine
what it all means."

After examining the subpoena, I expl