Being by that smile much emboldened, I answered: "Then I am more generous than William, Prince of Orange. For life," I said, lifting from the floor the broken point of the sword, "is less than honor. Yet, like His Highness, I keep the point that kills." CHAPTER XVI When I try to write that part of my story that should here immediately ensue, I find the attempt at first more destructive of the feather than the nib of my pen. If I close my eyes and seek to live again in memory the hour that followed upon what I have last related, the result is always the same: I find myself awaking, as it were, from a kind of inner dream to the outward consciousness of heavily pouring rain, the rhythmic jingle of bridles, and the discordant squeaking of wet saddle under wetter boots. For Ned and I are out in the foulest night of that foul November, and Roan Charley beneath me makes brave use of his tired limbs to come the sooner at his own stable. And then the sound of Ned's voice speaking to his horse in some manner brings back to me a few incidents of our passing from my Lady Mary's withdrawing-room to this wet and pitiless night; things which at this time of writing I do not clearly nor directly recall, but merely remember that I did then recollect; how His Highness had turned his back upon us, and departed in company of Mr. Bentinck and Count Schomberg; how Ned had sworn he would not leave his own house, saying they should hang him in the morning if they would; how M. de Rondiniacque and I had between us well-nigh forced him from the house; and how, with the Frenchman's help, I had gotten the two of us to horse; and how this good friend had, ere we left, said many things; but not one word of his could I recall. So, having gathered out of my stupor the remnants of the nearer past, I was already again in my mind busily at work with divers plots and plannings to bring out of this dismal present a glorious and golden future. This change had been indeed brought to pass; nor was Dame Fate's change of front tedious of accomplishment; but I feel it is due to any that reads me to confess at once that the passage from evil fortune to good was the work rather of the hand of God and the goodness of men, than brought about by any skill or wit of the poor maid that would gladly have foregone all merriment here and hereafter to see once more a smile on the lips of the man she loved.