The King's Achievement Part 12

Ralph went away that day more engrossed than ever. He began to ask himself where his interest in her would end; and wondered at its intensity.

As he questioned himself about it, it seemed that to him it was to a great extent her appearance of detached self-possession that attracted him. It was the quality that he most desired for himself, and one which he had in measure attained; but he was aware that in the presence of Cromwell at least it deserted him. He knew well that he had found his master there, and that he himself was nothing more than a hero-worshipper before a shrine; but it provoked him to feel that there was no one who seemed to occupy the place of a similar divinity with regard to this girl. Obviously she admired and loved Sir Thomas More--Ralph soon found out how deeply in the course of his visits--but she was not in the least afraid of her friend. She serenely contradicted him when she disagreed with what he said, would fail to keep her appointments at his house with the same equanimity, and in spite of Sir Thomas's personality never appeared to give him more than a friendly and affectionate homage. With regard to Ralph himself, it was the same. She was not in the least awed by him, or apparently impressed by his reputation which at this time was growing rapidly as that of a capable and daring agent of Cromwell's; and even once or twice when he condescended to hint at the vastness of the affairs on which he was engaged, in a desperate endeavour to rouse her admiration, she only looked at him steadily a moment with very penetrating eyes, and began to speak of something else. He began to feel discouraged.

The first hint that Ralph had that he had been making a mistake in his estimate of her, came from Margaret Roper, who was still living at Chelsea with her husband Will.

Ralph had walked up to the house one bleak afternoon in early spring along the river-bank from Westminster, and had found Margaret alone in the dining-hall, seated by the window with her embroidery in her hand, and a Terence propped open on the sill to catch the last gleams of light from the darkening afternoon. She greeted Ralph warmly, for he was a very familiar figure to them all by now, and soon began to talk, when he had taken a seat by the wide open fireplace whence the flames flickered out, casting shadows and lights round the high room, across the high-hung tapestries and in the gloomy corners.

"Beatrice is here," she said presently, "upstairs with father. I think she is doing some copying for him."

"She is a great deal with him," observed Ralph.

"Why, yes; father thinks so much of her. He says that none can write so well as she, or has such a quick brain. And then she does not talk, he says, nor ask foolish woman-questions like the rest of us." And Margaret glanced up a moment, smiling.

"I suppose I must not go up," said Ralph, a little peevishly; for he was tired with his long day.

"Why, no, you must not," said Margaret, "but she will be down soon, Mr.

Torridon."

There was silence for a moment or two; and then Margaret spoke again.

"Mr. Torridon," she said, "may I say something?" Ralph made a little sound of a.s.sent. The warmth of the fire was making him sleepy.

"Well, it is this," said Margaret slowly, "I think you believe that Beatrice does not like you. That is not true. She is very fond of you; she thinks a great deal of you," she added, rather hastily.

Ralph sat up; his drowsiness was gone.

"How do you know that, Mrs. Roper?" he asked. His voice sounded perfectly natural, and Margaret was rea.s.sured at the tone of it. She could not see Ralph well; it was getting dark now.

"I know it well," she said. "Of course we talk of you when you are gone."

"And does Mrs. Beatrice talk of me?"

"Not so much," said Margaret, "but she listens very closely; and asks us questions sometimes." The girl's heart was beating with excitement as she spoke; but she had made up her mind to seek this opportunity. It seemed a pity, she thought, that two friends of hers should so misunderstood one another.

"And what kind of questions?" asked Ralph again.

"She wonders--what you really think--" went on Margaret slowly, bending down over her embroidery, and punctuating her words with st.i.tches--"about--about affairs--and--and she said one day that--"

"Well?" said Ralph in the same tone.

"That she thought you were not so severe as you seemed," ended Margaret, her voice a little tremulous with amus.e.m.e.nt.

Ralph sat perfectly still, staring at the great fire-plate on which a smoky Phoebus in relief drove the chariot of the sun behind the tall wavering flames that rose from the burning logs. He knew very well why Margaret had spoken, and that she would not speak without reason; but the fact revealed was so bewilderingly new to him that he could not take it in. Margaret looked at him once or twice a little uneasily; and at last sighed.

"It is too dark," she said, "I must fetch candles."

She slipped out of the side-door that led to the servants' quarters, and Ralph was left alone. All his weariness was gone now; the whirl of images and schemes with which his brain had been seething as he walked up the river-bank half-an-hour before, had receded into obscurity; and one dominating thought filled their place: What if Margaret were right?

And what did he mean to do himself? Surely he was not--

The door from the entrance pa.s.sage opened, and a tall slender figure stood there, now in light, now in shadow, as the flames rose and fell.

"Meg," said a voice.

Ralph sat still a moment longer.

"Meg," said Beatrice again, "how dark you are."

Ralph stood up.

"Mrs Roper has just gone," he said, "you must put up with me, Mrs.

Beatrice."

"Who is it?" said the girl advancing. "Mr. Torridon?"

She had a paper in her hand as she came across the floor, and Ralph drew out a chair for her on the other side of the hearth.

"Yes," he said. "Mrs. Roper has gone for lights. She will be back immediately."

Beatrice sat down.

"It is a troublesome word," she said. "Master More cannot read it himself, and has sent me to ask Meg. He says that every dutiful daughter should be able to read her father's hand."

And Ralph could see a faint amused smile in her black eyes, as the firelight shone on them.

"Master More always has an escape ready," he said, as he too sat down.

The girl's hand holding the paper suddenly dropped on to her knee, and the man saw she was looking at him oddly.

"Yes?" he said interrogatively; and then--

"Why do you look at me like that, Mrs. Beatrice?"

"It is what you said. Do you really think that, Mr. Torridon?"

Ralph was bewildered for a moment.

"I do not understand," he said.

"Do you truly think he always has an escape ready?" repeated the girl.

Then Ralph understood.

"You mean he is in danger," he said steadily. "Well, of course he is.

There is no great man that is not. But I do not see why he should not escape as he has always done."

"You think that, Mr. Torridon?"