e letters have already been
once taken from me; and I have little hope that I can now deliver them
as they are addressed. I place them, therefore, in your royal hands,
certain that they will evince the innocence of the writer."

The King shook his head as he took the packet reluctantly. "It is no
safe office you have undertaken, young man. A messenger has sometimes
his throat cut for the sake of his despatches--But give them to me; and,
Chiffinch, give me wax and a taper." He employed himself in folding the
Countess's packet in another envelope. "Buckingham," he said, "you are
evidence that I do not read them till the Council shall see them."

Buckingham approached, and offered his services in folding the parcel,
but Charles rejected his assistance; and having finished his task, he
sealed the packet with his own signet-ring. The Duke bit his lip and
retired.

"And now, young man," said the King, "your errand is sped, so far as it
can at present be forwarded."

Julian bowed deeply, as to take leave at these words, which he rightly
interpreted as a signal for his departure. Alice Bridgenorth still
clung to his arm, and motioned to withdraw along with him. The King and
Buckingham looked at each other in conscious astonishment, and yet not
without a desire to smile, so strange did it seem to them that a prize,
for which, an instant before, they had been mutually contending, should
thus glide out of their grasp, or rather be borne off by a third and
very inferior competitor.

"Mistress Chiffinch," said the King, with a hesitation which he could
not disguise, "I hope your fair charge is not about to leave you?"

"Certainly not, your Majesty," answered Chiffinch. "Alice, my love--you
mistake--that opposite door leads to your apartments."

"Pardon me, madam," answered Alice; "I have indeed mistaken my road, but
it was when I came hither."

"The errant damosel," said Buckingham, looking at Charles with as much
intelligence as etiquette permitted him to throw into his eye, and
then turning it towards Alice, as she still held by Julian's arm,
"is resolved not to mistake her road a second time. She has chosen a
sufficient guide."

"And yet stories tell that such guides have led maidens astray," said
the King.

Alice blushed deeply, but instantly recovered her composure so soon
as she saw that her liberty was likely to depend upon the immediate
exercise of resolution. She quitted, from a sense of insulted delicacy,
the