A few years later, in the course of his wanderings, Jack accidentally came across Robert and Peregrine Bertie at Siena in Italy. There they lay recovering from severe wounds received in an affair that reflected greatly to their honor. After that meeting it is doubtful if the paths of these early friends again crossed in life, but the young sons of the famous Lord Willoughby played such important parts in our hero’s career that the reader will surely be interested in knowing something of their fate. In 1601 Robert succeeded to the title and estates of his father on the death of the latter. As the twelfth Baron Willoughby he upheld the military prestige of the family and added fresh laurels to those gathered by a long line of soldier ancestors. He was created Earl Lindsay in the reign of James the First and during the civil war that terminated in the execution of Charles the First, he held the post of commander-in-chief of the royal forces and was mortally wounded at the battle of Edgehill. Peregrine became a barrister--a truly strange occupation for a Bertie in those days--and practised law with some distinction until his death in 1640. We left our young hero on the road to Paris. His condition was very different from that in which he left Willoughby for London, but he had set out upon that journey with a light heart and abundant hope. Now he was plodding towards the capital of France in a gloomy state of mind. The idea of abandoning his venture and returning to the plow or, worse yet, the dingy counting house of Master Sendall, was utterly distasteful to him and his pride was touched by the thought of so lame a conclusion to the boastful display of independence he had made to his guardian. Having taken Robert Bertie’s money on the understanding that he would use it to return to England he felt bound to do so, but he began to wish that he had declined the gift and had gone on his way as poor in purse but as free in action as when he turned his back on his native village. Indeed, before he had finished his supper at the inn where he stopped at nightfall, Jack had almost decided to retrace his steps on the morrow, hand Robert his purse untouched and regain his freedom. But one of those chance circumstances that lead to the most important results in the lives of all of us, decided the matter in another way.