Dorothy stood in dismay, a mere vessel containing a tumult of emotions.  The king re-entered his chamber, and closed the door.  The same instant a light appeared at the further end of the gallery—­a long way off, and Dr. Bayly came, like a Will o’ the wisp, gliding from afar; till, softly walking up, he stopped within a yard or two of the king’s door, and there stood, with his candle in his hand.  His round face was pale that should have been red, and his small keen eyes shone in the candle light with mingled importance and anxiety.  He saw Dorothy, but the only notice he took of her presence was to turn from her with his face towards the king’s door, so that his shadow might shroud the recess where she stood.

A minute or so passed, and the king’s door re-opened.  He came out, said a few words in a whisper to his guide, and walked with him down the gallery, whispering as he went.

Dorothy hastened to her chamber, threw herself on the bed, and wept.  The king was cast from the throne of her conscience, but taken into the hospital of her heart.

What followed between the king and the marquis belongs not to my tale.  When, after a long talk, the chaplain had conducted the king to his chamber and returned to lord Worcester, he found him in the dark upon his knees.

CHAPTER XLVI.

Gifts of healing.

Soon after the king’s departure, the marquis received from him a letter containing another addressed ’To our Attorney or Solicitor-General for the time being,’ in which he commanded the preparation of a bill for his majesty’s signature, creating the marquis of Worcester duke of Somerset.  The enclosing letter required, however, that it should—­’be kept private, until I shall esteem the time convenient.’  In the next year we have causes enough for the fact that the king’s pleasure never reached any attorney or solicitor-general for the time being.

About a month after the battle of Naseby, and while yet the king was going and coming as regards Raglan, the wounded Rowland, long before he was fit to be moved from the farm-house where his servant had found him shelter, was brought home to the castle.  Shafto, faithful as hare-brained, had come upon him almost accidentally, after long search, and just in time to save his life.  Mistress Watson received him with tears, and had him carried to the same turret-chamber whence Richard had escaped, in order that she might be nigh him.  The poor fellow was but a shadow of his former self, and looked more likely to vanish than to die in the ordinary way.  Hence he required constant attention—­which was so far from lacking that the danger, both physical and spiritual, seemed rather to lie in over-service.  Hitherto, of the family, it had been the marquis chiefly that spoiled him; but now that he was so sorely wounded for the king, and lay at death’s door, all the ladies of the castle were admiring, pitiful, tender,