‘There will be no danger to life, and little to limb,’ said his lordship.  ’The torrent will cease flowing the moment they are swept from the bridge.  But they shall be both bruised and shamed; and,’ added his lordship, with an oath such as seldom crossed his lips, ’in such times as these, they will well deserve what shall befall them.  Intruding hounds!—­But you must take heed, cousin Dorothy, that you forget not that you have yourself done.  Should you have occasion to go on the bridge after setting your vermin-trap, you must not omit to place your feet precisely where Caspar will show you, else you will have to ride a watery horse half-way, mayhap to the marble one—­except indeed he throw you from his back against the chapel-door.’

When her husband talked in long sentences, as he was not unfrequently given to do, lady Margaret, even when their sequences were not very clear, seldom interrupted him:  she had learned that she gained more by letting him talk on; for however circuitous the route he might take, he never forgot where he was going.  He might obscure his object, but there it always was.  He was now again walking up and down the room, and, perceiving that he had not yet arranged all to his satisfaction, she watched him with merriment in her Irish eyes, and waited.

‘I have it!’ he cried again.  ’It shall be so, and my father shall thus have immediate notice.  The nights are weekly growing warmer, and he will not therein be tempted to his hurt.  Our trusty and well-beloved cousin Dorothy, we herewith, in presence of our liege and lovely lady, appoint thee our deputy during our absence.  No one but thyself hath a right to cross the bridge after dark, save Caspar and the governor, whom with my father I shall inform and warn concerning what is to be done.  But I will myself adjust the escape, so that the torrent shall not fall too powerful; Caspar must connect it with the drawbridge, whose fall will then open it.  And pray remind him to see first that all the hinges and joints concerned be well greased, that it may fall instantly.’

So saying, he left the room, and sought out Caspar, with whom he contrived the ringing of a bell in the marquis’s chamber by the drawbridge in its fall, the arrangement for which Caspar was to carry out that same evening after dark.  He next sought his father, and told him and his brother Charles the whole story; nor did he find himself wrong in his expectation that the prospect of so good a jest would go far to console the marquis for the annoyance of finding that his household was not quite such a pattern one as he had supposed.  That there was anything of conspiracy or treachery involved, he did not for a moment believe.

After dinner, while the horses were brought out, lord Herbert went again to his wife’s room.  There was little Molly waiting to bid him good-bye, and she sat upon his knee until it was time for him to go.  The child’s looks made his heart sad, and his wife could not restrain her tears when she saw him gaze upon her so mournfully.  It was with a heavy heart that, when the moment of departure came, he rose, gave her into her mother’s arms, clasped them both in one embrace, and hurried from the room.  He ought to be a noble king for whom such men and women make such sacrifices.