“And pray for Lady Castlemain’s unbaptized children, your Majesty?” asked George, whereupon the king shrugged his shoulders and turned away.  Lady Castlemain and Charles were—­well, there had been talk about them, to say the least.

The court ladies laughed when George declined to drink himself drunk or refused to help his former companions fleece a stranger.  Nell Gwynn told him that even his language had grown too polite for polite society, and, lacking emphasis, was flat as stale wine.  In truth, it may well be said that George had set out to mend his ways under adverse conditions.  But he had set out to do it, and that in itself was a great deal, for there is a likable sort of virtue in every good intent.  He had reached the first of the three great R’s in the act of repentance, Recognition; Regret and Recession being the second and third—­all necessary to regeneration.  I had faith in his good intentions, but doubted his ability.

Hamilton and I had become fast friends, and by his help my suit of his sister Mary had prospered to the extent of a partial engagement of marriage.  That is to say, Mary’s mother, an old worldling of the hardest type, had thought it well to secure me and to keep me dangling, to be landed in case no better fish took the hook.  I was aware of the mother’s selfish purposes, but did not believe that Mary shared them, though I knew her to be an obedient child.  This peculiar condition of affairs somewhat nettled me, though I do not remember that I was at all unhappy because of it.

But to come back to George.  One day, a fortnight before Frances’s arrival in London, while he and I were watching the royal brothers, King Charles and the Duke of York, playing pall-mall, I expressed my doubts and fears of his ultimate success in reformation so long as he remained in any way associated with Crofts, Berkeley, Wentworth, and others of the vicious clique.

“Yes, I know it is an uphill journey,” returned George, laughing with a touch of bitterness, “but think of my reward if I succeed!”

“Do you mean my cousin?” I asked.

“Yes, but I have little hope,” he replied, though perhaps he had more hope than he expressed.

I had told him of her intention to come to London, hoping that he would leave before her arrival, as he did, though neither he nor I knew when she was coming.  So I asked:—­

“Don’t you know that she will be carried off by some rich lord before you are half good enough for her?”

“I suppose so,” he answered, with a sigh.

“You must know that she is coming for that purpose,” I returned, wishing to take all hope out of him.

He winced perceptibly and answered after a long pause, nodding his head in the direction of the king:  “There is the only man I fear—­the king.  But rather than see her the victim of any man, by God, I’ll kill him, though it cost me my life the next moment!”

I was touched by the new light in which I saw him and took his arm in friendliness as I said, “I judged you wrongfully at Sundridge.”