Brilliana and the Cavaliers, stirred by the enthusiasm of Halfman’s stanza, caught up the cry commanded and sent it rolling through the hall.

“Vive le Roy! God bless the King!” they shouted, with the loyal tears in their eyes. Brilliana gave Halfman a grateful smile.

“Well sung, well done,” she approved. Halfman glowed. Sir Rufus frowned a little. Turning hurriedly to his companions, he said:

“Friends, I have another toast for you. I give you the King’s sweet warrior, Oxfordshire’s blithe viceroy, ‘The Lady of Loyalty House.’”

“Never a better toast in the world,” Halfman shouted. “Drink, gallants, drink.”

Brilliana crossed her fingers before her face. Through the living lattice her eyes peeped brightly.

“I protest you make too much of me,” she pleaded, while Halfman and the Cavaliers quickly filled their glasses again and lifted them high in air. A chorus of “The Lady of Loyalty House!” rang out, and again the toast was honored.

“I thank you with all my heart,” Brilliana panted, blushing and excited at the tumult and the praise. There was a moment’s silence. Everything worth saying seemed to have been said, everything worth doing to have been done. Suddenly, in that silence, Bardon caught sight of Evander where he stood apart, disdainful, between his guards, and the sight pricked his wits. Turning to his mates, he thumbed at the prisoner over his shoulder.

“Should we not make the crop-ear yonder pledge the Lady of Loyalty House?” he questioned. Radlett rubbed approving hands.

“Well thought. Let him honor his conqueror,” he began. The Lord Fawley tripped him up with a new proposal.

“Stop, stop; not so fast,” he protested. “The fellow has not pledged the King yet. Let him drink the King’s health first and be damned to him.”

The others applauded, but Ingrow, noting a certain sterner tightening of Evander’s mouth, interrupted.

“I’ll wager he will not drink,” he said, looking maliciously from the flushed faces of the Cavaliers to the pale face of the Puritan. Rufus’s temper blazed instantly.

“Will not drink, say you!” he cried. “This mewcant shall pledge at our pleasure or taste our displeasure.”

He strode to the table, filled a cup of wine, and set it down on the corner nearest to Evander.

“Come, you Roundpoll,” he continued—“come, you Geneva mumbler, here is a cup for you to wash down the dust of your dry thoughts. Drink, I give you ‘The King.’”

Evander gazed steadfastly at the irate gentleman and made no motion to take the wine. Brilliana, from where she stood, watching him curiously, wrestled with a reluctant admiration of his carriage. Ingrow commented, smoothly, maliciously:

“You see, the gentleman does not drink.”

Ingrow’s words fanned the Cavalier fire.

“Damn him for a disloyal rat!” Radlett shouted. Halfman elbowed his way past him and addressed Rufus.

“Sweet Sir Rufus,” he said, “I have lived in places where a little persuasion has often led folk to act much against their personal inclinations and desires. Out swords and force the toast.”

As he spoke he drew his sword with his best Mercutio manner, and the suggestion and the naked steel carried contagion. Every gentleman unsheathed his sword; all advanced upon Evander, a line of shining points.

“Bait him, bait him!” Bardon shouted.

Ingrow shrilled, “Tickle him, prick him, pink him till he drinks!”

Though Evander surveyed his enemies as composedly as if they had been children threatening him with pins, Brilliana knew that the spirit of mischief was alive and that the Cavaliers would not boggle at cruelty, six to one, for the sport of making a Parliament man honor the King against his will. She hated the man, but she would not have him so handled. Instantly she stepped between Evander and the Cavaliers, who fell back with lowered points before their hostess.

“Wait, sirs,” she ordered, “let me see if my entreaties will not make the bear more gracious.”

She took up the cup where Rufus had set it down, and, coming close to Evander, held the vessel to him with her sweetest smile, the smile which, she had been assured a thousand times, would tame a savage and shatter adamant. “Will you not pledge the best gentleman in England?” she asked, with a voice all honey.

Very courteously Evander took the proffered cup from her fingers and gave her back her smile. Brilliana’s heart thrilled with pleasure at this new proof of beauty’s victory.

“I will drink at your wish,” he said, looking at her with a quiet smile and speaking as if he and she were alone together in the great hall. “I will drink at your wish, but with my own wit.” Still looking into the gratified eyes of Brilliana, he lifted the cup.

“I drink,” he cried, loud and clear, “to the best man in England. I drink to Colonel Cromwell.”

He drained the glass and sent it crashing into the fireplace. Then he folded his arms and faced his antagonists.

Brilliana’s heart seemed for a second to stand still. So beauty had not triumphed, after all. Dimly, as one in a dream, she could hear the fury of the Cavaliers find words.

“You black Jack, I will clip your ears,” Rufus promised.

“Blood him. Blood him,” bawled Fawley.

“Slit his nose,” Radlett suggested.

“Duck him in the horse-pond,” suggested Bardon.

“Set him in the stocks,” Ingrow advised.

Halfman, seeing how Brilliana leaned against the table, her face pale as her smock, raged at her daring denier. He stretched out his sword as if to marshal and restrain the passions of the Cavaliers.

“Would it not be properer sport, sirs,” he asked, “to tie him in a chair, like Guido Fawkes on November day, and take him through the village that loyal lads may pelt a traitor?”

Once again Halfman’s pleasant invention pleased the fancy of his allies.

“Well said,” assented Rufus. “Fetch a rope, some one.”

Brilliana, hearing, moved a little forward. She had failed and felt shamed. Yet this thing must not happen. She could not leave her enemy thus to the mercy of his enemies. But what she would have said was stayed by a sudden diversion.

Interest in all the events that had so swiftly passed before them had gravely relaxed the vigilance of Evander’s guardians. Garlinge and Clupp—a strong Gyas and a strong Cloanthes—open-eyed and open-mouthed, were open-handed also and clawed no clutch upon their prisoner’s shoulder. Thoroughgood, confused between jealous thoughts of Tiffany and envious admiration of the manner in which Halfman handled the gentry, was as heedless as his inferiors, and was therefore taken too much by surprise to offer the slightest resistance when Evander, suddenly springing from between his guards, snatched from his supine arms the captured sword that had been intrusted to his keeping. Before he or any other of the astonished spectators could take any action Evander had leaped lightly into the alcove of the window, and, dragging by main force the heavy table in front of him, so as to blockade his corner, showed himself snugly intrenched behind a rampart which his single sword might well hope to hold at least for some time against the swords of half a dozen assailants.

“You will find me a spoil sport,” he cried, cheerily, as he stood on guard behind the massive bulk of oak. “Dogs, here is a hart at bay; beware his antlers.”

“Bravely done, rebel,” Brilliana cried, aloud, as if in spite of herself, as she beheld the reckless deed, and “Bravely done, rebel,” Halfman echoed, in his reluctant turn, as he heard his lady’s words and saw the light of praise on his lady’s face. Though he hated the Puritan as cordially as if he had been a King’s man all his days, he could not deny his courage, and his scene of effective action made him wish himself in Evander’s place, taking the stage so skilfully and dominating the situation. But above all this, if Brilliana applauded the rebel’s act, then the rebel’s life was of some value, and until he received his lady’s orders the rebel’s life should be sacred to Halfman. So he struck up with his sword the pikes that Garlinge and Clupp levelled, clumsily enough, and were preparing to thrust at Evander over the interposing barrier. At the same moment Rufus, for a very different reason, restrained the action of his comrade Cavaliers, who were making ready for a combined rush, sword in hand, upon their enemy. Rufus saw instantly how well intrenched their enemy lay; it would be hard for any sword to reach him across that width of oak, and even push of pike, when delivered by such loutish fingers as now governed those weapons, might easily be parried by a swordsman so skilful as he guessed Evander to be. But there was no generosity towards a brave adversary in Rufus’s action. In his hot ferocity he merely wished to make sure of his quarry as quickly as possible.

“You shall be no hart-royal,” he answered, fiercely, taking up the hunter’s challenge. “You shall not escape. We shall sound the mort of the deer in a moment. Give me your gun, fellow.”

This last command was addressed to Thoroughgood, who had brought his musketoon to the ready and was waiting irresolute for command. Sir Rufus snatched the weapon from him and was about to aim at Evander when, to his rage, Brilliana stepped between him and his mark.

“Stay your hand, Sir Rufus,” she commanded, with a frown on the fair face to which the color had now returned. “It is for me, and for me only, to give orders here. This is my prisoner, and were he ten times a Roundpoll he should have honest handling.”

Sir Rufus would fain have protested, would fain have carried his point, but he saw that in the face of her whom it was his heart’s desire to please which reduced him to sullen obedience. He shrugged his shoulders. “As you please,” he muttered, as he returned the gun to Thoroughgood and, turning on his heel to hide his vexation, joined his comrades, who seemed all to share, discomfited, in his rebuke, and to deprecate the anger of Brilliana. Brilliana went up to the table, and, poising herself against it by pressing the palms of her hands on its surface, looked with gracious entreaty into the grave eyes of Evander, who lowered his sword in respectful greeting.