“You are a great man, now, I suppose,” she said presently, “too great to see to the pigs any longer.  We have no such rooms as this at Hare Street.”

They were indeed fine; and we went through them together.  They were all furnished from roof to floor; there were some good tapestries and pictures; and the windows, as the officer had said, looked out for the most part upon the trees beneath which so long ago I had watched ladies walking.  But I told her that I loved my panelled chamber at Hare Street, and the little parlour, with the poor Knights of the Grail, who rode there for ever and never attained their quest, more than all Whitehall.  Then I kissed her again, for perhaps the thirtieth time; and, as I was doing so Cousin Tom came in.

“Ah!” said he, “I have caught you then!” But he said it without much merriment.

If Dolly was no older, her father was.  There were grey hairs in his eyebrows, for that was all that I could see of his hair, since he wore a periwig; and his face appeared a little blotchy.

I met him however with cordiality, and congratulated him on his looks.  He sat down, and presently, to my astonishment, he too opened out upon my prospects, though in a very different manner from Dolly.

“You are a great man now,” he said, “in these fine lodgings.  I wonder His Majesty hath not made you at least a knight.”

I was a little angry at his manner.  He said it not pleasantly at all; but as if he found fault.  I determined I would not meet his ambitions at all.

“My dear Cousin,” said I, “indeed I am not a knight; and have no hope of being so.  His Majesty hath a thousand men more competent than I.”

“Then why hath he given you these lodgings?” said he, with a sharp look.

I shrugged my shoulders.

“I am of some convenience to His Majesty; and the more so if I am near him.  I suppose that these lodgings fell vacant in the nick of time.”

He looked at me very earnestly.  He had, of course, no idea of in what matters I was engaged:  I might have been a mere valet for all he knew.

“That is so?” he said.

“I have no reason to think otherwise,” I answered him.

* * * * *

Well; it was growing late; and I had not supped, as Dolly presently remembered; it was near eight o’clock, and after that time there would be formalities at the gate as they went out.  So they took their leave at last; and I kissed Dolly for the thirty-first time, and went downstairs with them, and watched them down the gallery; they having promised to come again next day.

* * * * *

I had scarcely done supper and looked about me a little, when Mr. Chiffinch’s name was brought to me; and I went to see him in the little parlour and bring him through to what would be my private closet—­so great was I become!  He looked older; and I told him so.