"The dark line of them is like a serpent creeping from the tunal," said Henry Sedley. "Last night I dreamed a strange thing.... It concerned my sister Damaris. She came up from the sea, straight from the water like blown spray, and she was dressed in white. She looked down through the sea and her tears fell, and falling, they made music like the mermaiden's singing that we heard. '_Lie still_,' she said. '_Thou under the sea and I under the sod. Lie still: dream well: all's over_.' To whom did she speak?" "If I were a dead man and she called my name, I would answer," said Ferne. "She under the sod and I under the sea.... So be it! But first one couch, one cup, one garland, the sounded depths of love--" "I dreamed of home," quoth Baldry, "and of my mother's calling me, a little lad, when at twilight work was done. '_Robert, Robert_!' she called." "I had no dreams," said Sir Mortimer. "Now sounds John Nevil's trumpets--our guests have made entry." "Why, señors," answered Mexia, flattered and flown with wine, "I learned to speak your tongue from a man of your country, who also gave me that knowledge of English affairs which you are pleased to compliment. I make my boast that I am no traveller--I have not been home to Seville these twenty years--yet, as you see, I have some trifling acquaintance--" "Your learning is of so shining a quality," quoth Sir Mortimer, with courteous emphasis, "that here and there a flaw cannot mar its curious worth. Smerwick Fort lies in Ireland, señor, not in England. Though verily the best thing I know of Edmund Campion is the courageousness of his end; yet indeed he died not with a halo about his head, nor were miracles wrought with his blood. Her Gracious Majesty the Queen of England hath no such distemperature as that you name, and keepeth no sort of familiar fiend. The Queen of Scots, if a most fair and most unfortunate, is yet a most wicked lady, who, alas! hath trained many a gallant man to a bloody and disastrous end." "Who is that Englishman, your teacher?" came from the head of the board the Admiral's grave voice. "He is dead," said De Guardiola at his right hand. "Of his fate, valiant señors," began the fuddled Mexia, "you alone may be precisely aware--" "He is dead," again stated with deliberation Don Luiz. "I know, señors, the pool where these fish were caught and the wood where alone grows this purple fruit. So you set at liberty those three slaves, the caciques?... Well, I had reason to believe that they had hidden gold." "Where is Master Francis Sark?" demanded Nevil, of Ferne. "I did command his attendance here to-night." "He plead a tertian fever--would not mar our warmth with his shivering," said the other. "I sent the chirurgeon to his cell--for indeed the man shook like a reed."