But the marquis struck his hands together with pleasure, and cried,

’There, my boy!  There is a king to serve!  Sir Rowland Scudamore!  There is for thee!  And thy wife will be my lady!  Think on that!’

Rowland did think on it, but bitterly.  He summoned strength to thank his majesty, but failed to find anything courtier-like to add to the bare thanks.  When his visitors left him, he sighed sorely and said to himself,

’Honour without desert!  But for the roundhead’s taunts, I might have run to Rupert and saved the day.’

The next morning the marquis went again to see him.

‘How fares sir Rowland?’ he said.

‘My lord,’ returned Scudamore, in beseeching tone, ’break not my heart with honour unmerited.’

‘How!  Darest thou, boy, set thy judgment against the king’s?’ cried the marquis.  ’Sir Rowland thou art, and sir Rowland will the archangel cry when he calls thee from thy last sleep.’

‘To my endless disgrace,’ added Scudamore.

‘What! hast not done thy duty?’

‘I tried, but I failed, my lord.’

‘The best as often fail as the worst,’ rejoined his lordship.

’I mean not merely that I failed of the end.  That, alas!  I did.  But I mean that it was by my own fault that I failed,’ said Rowland.

Then he told the marquis all the story of his encounter with Richard, ending with the words,

‘And now, my lord, I care no more for life.’

‘Stuff and nonsense!’ exclaimed the marquis.  ’Thinkest though the roundhead would have let thee run to Rupert?  It was not to that end he spared thy life.  Thy only chance was to fight him.’

‘Does your lordship think so indeed?’ asked Rowland, with a glimmer of eagerness.

’On my soul I do.  Thou art weak-headed from thy sickness and weariness.’

‘You comfort me, my lord—­a little.  But the stolen mare, my lord?—­’

’Ah! there indeed I can say nothing.  That was not well done, and evil came thereof.  But comfort thyself that the evil is come and gone; and think not that such chances are left to determine great events.  Naseby fight had been lost, spite of a hundred messages to Rupert.  Not care for life, boy!  Leave that to old men like me.  Thou must care for it, for thou hast many years before thee.’

‘But nothing to fill them with, my lord.’

’What meanest thou there, Rowland?  The king’s cause will yet prosper, and—­’

’Pardon me, my lord; I spoke not of the king’s majesty or his affairs.  Hardly do I care even for them.  It is a nameless weight, or rather emptiness, that oppresseth me.  Wherefore is there such a world?  I ask, and why are men born thereinto?  Why should I live on and labour on therein?  Is it not all vanity and vexation of spirit?  I would the roundhead had but struck a little deeper, and reached my heart.’

’I admire at thee, Rowland.  Truly my gout causeth me so great grief that I have much ado to keep my unruly member within bounds, but I never yet was aweary of my life, and scarce know what I should say to thee.’