s like to have done me; and all to think that it was for
love of poor Frank." For this Prince had known the Lord Francis well,
and had shown him many favours.

"And now, good Master Governor," the King continued, but with quite
another expression on his countenance, "we will see your Man Captive, if
it shall so please you." And the two went upstairs.

This is all I am permitted to tell in this place of what passed between
King Charles the Second and the Prisoner in the upper chamber:--

"You know me!" the King said, sitting over against him at the table, and
scanning his face with dark earnestness.

"You are Charles Stuart, second of the name on the throne of England."

"You know I am in the possession of your secret--of the King's Secret;
for of those dead it was known but to Oliver, as of those living it is
now only known to yourself and to me."

"And the young Man, Richard?"

"He never knew it. His father never trusted him so far. He had doubts
and suspicions, that was all."

"Thank God!" said the prisoner.

"What was Oliver's enmity towards you, that he should immure you here
all these years?"

"I had served him too well. He feared lest the Shedder of Blood should
become the Avenger of Blood."

"Are you sorry?"

"Sorry!" cried the Prisoner, with a kind of scream. "Had he a thousand
lives, had I a thousand hands, I would do the same deed to-morrow." And
he struck the right hand that was covered with the velvet glove with
cruel violence on to the oaken table.

FOOTNOTES:

[I] A woman of very mean belongings, whose parents lived, I have heard,
somewhere about the Maypole in the Strand, and who was promoted to high
station, being Monk's Duchess, but to her death of a coarse and brutish
carriage, and shamefully given to the drinking of strong waters.--J. D.

[J] A very glorious rag nevertheless.--ED.

CHAPTER THE SEVENTH.

I AM BRED UP IN VERY BAD COMPANY, AND (TO MY SHAME) HELP TO KILL THE
KING'S DEER.

I LAY all that night in a little Hole by the side of a Bank, just as
though I had been a Fox-cub. I was not in much better case than that
Vermin, and I only marvel that my Schoolmaster did not come out next day
to Hunt me with horses and hounds. Hounds!--the Black Fever to him!--he
had used me like a Hound any time for Six Months past; and often had I
given tongue under his Double Thonging. Happily the weather was warm,
and I got no hurt by sleeping in the Hole. 'Tis strange, too, what
Har