She was alone with him, here on the empty moor, and had only a broken-winded horse to help her if need asked. Yet her disdain of him was so complete, her humiliation so bitter, that she had no fear. She spoke slowly, quietly; and Underwood reined his horse back a little, as if she had struck him with her riding-whip. “All this because I’ll not risk my head for a wild-cat plot to put a Stuart on the throne?” “Oh, not for that reason. Because you promised to risk your head; because, in time of peace, you persuaded loyal gentlemen that you were one of them; because, Mr. Underwood, you ran away before you had ever seen the enemy.” Nance’s one desire was to hurt this man, to get through his armour of good living and complacency; it was her way--the woman’s way--of digging a grave in which to hide the first love that was dead, unlovely, pitiful. “Well, we hunted yesterday,” said the other doggedly. “There were plenty of Lancashire gentlemen in my own case--our heads sounder than our hearts--and we had fine sport. And, coming home--you’ll forgive me--we laughed at Sir Jasper and his handful of enthusiasts. We like them--we shall miss them when they’re gibbeted in London--but we laughed at their old-fashioned view of honour. Honour trims pretty rosettes for a man to wear, but doesn’t save his head. Honour’s a woman’s pastime, Miss Demaine.” Nance looked at him with frank astonishment. This man knew that her own father was of Sir Jasper’s company, that she was troubled, like all stay-at-homes, lest ill news should come. And he chose this time to defend himself by confessing that he and others had laughed at better men. And he talked of Tower Hill. “When the gentlemen of Lancashire return--when the Prince has come to his own, and England is free again and happy--what then, Mr. Underwood? It will go ill, I think, with masqueraders.” They faced each other, the man insolent, ungroomed--true to his breed, as folk are apt to be in time of stress--Nance in that mood of hot fury and contempt which is cool and debonair. “What then?” he said, stroking his horse’s neck. “The Vicar of Bray was a very good man of the world, after all, and he prospered. We shall toast the Stuart openly; it will save all that clumsy ritual of passing the wine across the water.” Nance was healthy, eager, human. She shrank, with an odd, childish loathing, from this man who counted the world--the big, gallant world of faith, and strife, and loyalty--as a dining-table, no more, no less, where wise men took their ease. She gathered the reins into her hand, turned in saddle. “Keep the kerchief, sir,” she said gently. “As I told you, you will need it when”--her voice broke suddenly, against her will--“when our men come home from the crowning.”