But all I could answer was, "I dare not!" "Are you afraid of these villains?" he continued, impatiently. "I tell you, we have them: it is they who have to fear!" But I still clung to my point. I would tell, but I would give no evidence; I dared not. "I am afraid, Mr. Price," he said at that, and with an air of some contempt, "that you are something of a coward!" I answered, grovelling before him, that it might be--it might be; but---- "But--who of us is not?" he answered, with a sudden gesture between scorn and self-reproof. "Do you mean that, man?" And he fixed his eyes on me. "Well, it is true. Who of us is not?" he repeated, slowly; and turning from me, he began to pace the room, his hands clasped behind him; so that before he had made a single turn it was easy to see that he had forgotten my presence. "Who of us is not afraid--if not of these scoundrels, still of the future, of the return, of Jacobus _iracundus et ingens_, of another 29th of May? To be safe now and to be safe then--who is not thinking of that and living for that, and planning for that?" [Illustration: AND TURNING FROM ME, HE BEGAN TO PACE THE ROOM, HIS HANDS CLASPED BEHIND HIM] He was silent a moment, then with something of anger in his voice, "My Lord Marlborough, dipped to the lips in '88, who shall say that for all that he has not made his peace? And has good reason to urge us to let sleeping dogs lie? And Godolphin, is it only at Newmarket he has hedged--that he says, the less we go into this the better? And Sunderland who trusts no one and whom no one trusts? And Leeds--all things for power? And Clarendon, once pardoned? And Russell, all temper? Who knows what pledges they have given, or may give? Devonshire--Devonshire only has to lose, and stands to lose with me. With me!" As he spoke thus he seemed to be so human, and through the robe of state and stateliness in which he lived the beating of the poor human heart was so plainly visible, that my heart went out to him, and with an eagerness and boldness that now surprise me, I spoke to him. "But, your Grace," I said, "while the King lives all goes well, and were anything to happen to him----" "Yes?" said he, staring at me, and no little astonished at the interruption. "There is the Princess Anne. She is here, she would succeed, and----" "And my Lord Marlborough!" said he, smiling. "Well, it may be. But who taught you politics, Mr. Price?" "Mr. Brome," said I, abashed. "What I know, your Grace." "Ha! I keep forgetting," he answered, gaily, "that I am talking to one of the makers of opinion--the formers of taste. But there, you shall be no evidence, I give you my word. So tell me all you know, and what befell you yesterday."