a fitter time to ask an
interview."

He would have hurried away, but the mask still detained him.

"Those who talk to your lordship of what your own honour demands have a
right over your time, whatever occupations you may lay aside in order to
indulge them."

"How! my honour? Who dare impeach it?" said Leicester.

"Your own conduct alone can furnish grounds for accusing it, my lord,
and it is that topic on which I would speak with you."

"You are insolent," said Leicester, "and abuse the hospitable license
of the time, which prevents me from having you punished. I demand your
name!"

"Edmund Tressilian of Cornwall," answered the mask. "My tongue has been
bound by a promise for four-and-twenty hours. The space is passed,--I
now speak, and do your lordship the justice to address myself first to
you."

The thrill of astonishment which had penetrated to Leicester's very
heart at hearing that name pronounced by the voice of the man he most
detested, and by whom he conceived himself so deeply injured, at first
rendered him immovable, but instantly gave way to such a thirst for
revenge as the pilgrim in the desert feels for the water-brooks. He had
but sense and self-government enough left to prevent his stabbing to
the heart the audacious villain, who, after the ruin he had brought
upon him, dared, with such unmoved assurance, thus to practise upon
him further. Determined to suppress for the moment every symptom of
agitation, in order to perceive the full scope of Tressilian's purpose,
as well as to secure his own vengeance, he answered in a tone so altered
by restrained passion as scarce to be intelligible, "And what does
Master Edmund Tressilian require at my hand?"

"Justice, my lord," answered Tressilian, calmly but firmly.

"Justice," said Leicester, "all men are entitled to. YOU, Master
Tressilian, are peculiarly so, and be assured you shall have it."

"I expect nothing less from your nobleness," answered Tressilian; "but
time presses, and I must speak with you to-night. May I wait on you in
your chamber?"

"No," answered Leicester sternly, "not under a roof, and that roof mine
own. We will meet under the free cope of heaven."

"You are discomposed or displeased, my lord," replied Tressilian; "yet
there is no occasion for distemperature. The place is equal to me, so
you allow me one half-hour of your time uninterrupted."

"A shorter time will, I trust, suffice," answered Leicester. "Meet me in
the Plea