Cromwell stood at the window, looking down on the dark street below, dotted with moving lights. His broad back was toward his visitor, and he did not turn round even when he addressed her. On a chair rested his polished breast-plate and steel cap, otherwise he was accoutred as he had been when she saw him on the road. His voice was hoarse. “Who are you, wench, and what are you to this man, that you range the land brazenly together under a pass written for neither of you?” With some difficulty the girl found her voice after two or three ineffectual attempts to speak, and said: “I am Frances Wentworth, sister to Lieutenant Wentworth of General Cromwell’s army.” The General’s ponderous head turned slowly, and he bent his sullen eyes upon her. She wondered Armstrong had not seen the brutal power of that countenance even by candle-light. “Why is your brother not in your place?” “My brother was sorely wounded the morning he set out, and now lies between life and death in our home.” “How came he wounded?” “He met Lord Rudby, who attacked him. My brother would not defend himself, and so was thrust through the body. Armstrong brought him to our house, and the doctor says he cannot be moved for a month at least.” “Why was I not informed of this?” “I did not know where to find you.” “You, wench, surely did not know where to find me; but your brother knew that a message to his nearest superior would find me.” “My brother, I have told you, was dangerously wounded, and had but one thing in his mind.” “What was that? Lord Rudby’s daughter, most like.” The rich colour mounted in the cheeks of Frances, but she answered slowly: “It was to have done with the task you had set upon him.” “He committed it to your hands then?” “He did.” “What was the task I set him?” “It was to steal from Armstrong the King’s commission, and to deliver the result of that theft to General Cromwell, the receiver.” “Wench, your tongue is over-sharp; a grievous fault. I pray you amend it.” “Not until I have told you I am no wench, but a lady.” “We have had too much of lady’s meddling in England, and will have less of it in days to come. A wench, if she be honest, is better than a lady, who is seldom honest. Your meddling in this matter has come near to causing a serious disarrangement of great affairs. How was I to know who you were or why you travelled? Has that foolish head of yours so little understanding that, though you stopped at York, at Newark, at Grantham, you gave no officer of mine a clue to your vagabondage?” “A woman can fulfil her duty without so much babbling of it. My foolish head never thought a great general wished his designs published from one end of England to the other.”