Next morning his first visitor was the Lord Chamberlain, who expressed deep regret that the King was indisposed and could not see any emissary from the Scots that day. The high official spoke feelingly of the disappointment the monarch had been called upon to endure through the unmerited success of his rebellious subjects, and this statement seemed to the traveller only what was to have been expected. During the day Armstrong was privileged in securing one brief interview with Frances. The landlord had placed two rooms at her disposal, and in the scantily furnished parlour the young man had called upon her. The improvement she had affirmed the evening before was scarcely borne out by her appearance, for she was wan and dispirited, so much so that when Armstrong announced the disappearance of Captain Rudby, the tidings did not seem to depress her more than was already the case. However, the news clung to her mind; for, as he was telling her that the King could not see him that day, she suddenly said, in a tone which showed she had not been listening, that as Captain Rudby was not in Oxford, there was no reason why she should stay. She would go on at once to Banbury, and there await the coming of Armstrong. But the young man would not hear of such a course. It was impossible, he said, that an unprotected lady in the disturbed state of the country should travel alone between Oxford and Banbury. It was not likely that he would be held from the King more than another day, and then they would both set out together. Besides, she needed all the rest she could obtain before they turned north again. The girl was too deeply dejected even to argue the question, when he so strenuously opposed her desire. It seemed that a contrary fate was tightening the coils around her, and all struggle against it was fruitless. There were unshed tears in her eyes as she glanced timidly up at him, and she had the haunted look of one who was trapped. The unforeseen meeting with De Courcy, although Cromwell’s words should have prepared her for it, had completely unnerved her; that nightmare face of his confronting her whenever she closed her eyes. The past had come up before her in its most abhorrent guise. She remembered striking him fiercely with the jagged iron she happened to hold in her hand, and thought anything was justified that enabled her to escape his clutches, but that he would carry so fearful a disfiguration to his grave chilled her with fear of his vengeance; for if ever murder shone from a man’s eyes it glared in his when she caught his first glance the evening before. All during the night the terrifying vision drove sleep from her couch, and she pondered on some possible method of escape, but without result. How gladly she would have confided her peril to Armstrong, did she stand in honest relation to him, but she could not bring herself to ask help from a man whom she had just rejected and whom she would shortly rob.