"I would rather talk to him in that old tapestried hall," thought Robin, "than in this narrow chamber. There I could have a run for my life; but here, Heaven help me! I am fairly in for it." "The room is passing close, the air is heavy," were the Protector's first words: "follow me to the palace-roof, where there can be no listeners, save the pale stars, and they prate not of man's doings." Robin followed Cromwell up a narrow flight of steps, so narrow that the Protector could hardly climb them. They were terminated by a trap-door leading to the roof; and there these two men, so different in station and in stature, stood together on a species of leaden platform, which by day commands a most beautiful and extensive view of the surrounding country;--at night there was nothing to be seen but the dim outline of the distant hills, and the dark woods that formed the foreground. Scarce a sound was heard, save of the breeze wailing among the many turrets of the proud palace, and now and then the tramp or challenge of the sentries at the different outposts, as they passed to and fro upon their ever-watchful guard. "I believe your real name is Robin Hays?" said the Protector. "Your Highness--it is so." "And you are the son of one Mary or Margery, proprietor of an hostelry, called the Gulls Nest?" "The son of Margery Hays, as your Highness has said, who, God be thanked! still lives in a quiet corner of the Isle of Shepey, and of her good husband Michael, who has now been dead many years." "I take it for granted that you know your own mother; but it is a wise son who knows his own father. Impurities are, praised be the Lord! fast fleeing from the land; but they were rife once, rife as blackberries that grow by the roadside. Yet this is nought; what business brought you here?" "Your Highness knows: I came with the Rabbi Ben Israel." "Parry not with me," exclaimed the readily-irritated Cromwell.--"I repeat, why came ye here?" "Your Highness is acquainted with the reason of my coming." "I _do_ know; but I also choose to know it from yourself. Why came ye here?" "Just then to seek out one who has fallen into your Highness's clutches; with favour, I would say, under your Highness's care," replied Robin, who felt himself not over comfortably situated. "His name sir--his name?" "Walter De Guerre." "And who advised you he was here?" "I found it out; I and another of his friends." "You mean Hugh Dalton?" "I do, please your Highness." "You have some secret communication for this Walter?" "Your Highness, I have not; yet, if he is here, I humbly entreat permission to see him; for, as it is your pleasure that we be detained, I am sure it would be a comfort to him to meet some one who has his interest firmly, humbly at heart." "Why came he to England?" "I believe, that is known only to Hugh Dalton." "Where got ye that Spanish dagger?" "Please your Highness, from a sailor at Greenwich, a pensioner."