“Leave me, Cynthia,” he groaned in despair. “Go, child. I am grievously wounded. I have the fever, girl. Go; let me sleep.” “But tell me, father, what passed.” “Unnatural child,” whined Gregory feebly, “will you plague a sick man with questions? Would you keep him from the sleep that may mean recovery to him?” “Father, dear,” she murmured softly, “if I thought it was as you say, I would leave you. But you know that you are but attempting to conceal something from me something that I should know, that I must know. Bethink you that it is of my lover that you have spoken.” By a stupendous effort Gregory shaped a story that to him seemed likely. “Well, then, since know you must,” he answered, “this is what befell: we had all drunk over-deep to our shame do I confess it--and growing tenderhearted for you, and bethinking me of your professed distaste to Kenneth's suit, I told him that for all the results that were likely to attend his sojourn at Castle Marleigh, he might as well bear Crispin company in his departure. He flared up at that, and demanded of me that I should read him my riddle. Faith, I did by telling him that we were like to have snow on midsummer's day ere he 'became your husband. That speech of mine so angered him, being as he was all addled with wine and ripe for any madness, that he sprang up and drew on me there and then. The others sought to get between us, but he was over-quick, and before I could do more than rise from the table his sword was through my shoulder and into the wainscot at my back. After that it was clear he could not remain here, and I demanded that he should leave upon the instant. Himself he was nothing loath, for he realized his folly, and he misliked the gleam of Joseph's eye--which can be wondrous wicked upon occasion. Indeed, but for my intercession Joseph had laid him stark.” That both her uncle and her father had lied to her--the one cunningly, the other stupidly--she had never a doubt, and vaguely uneasy was Cynthia to learn the truth. Later that day the castle was busy with the bustle of Joseph's departure, and this again was a matter that puzzled her. “Whither do you journey, uncle?” she asked of him as he was in the act of stepping out to enter the waiting carriage. “To London, sweet cousin,” was his brisk reply. “I am, it seems, becoming a very vagrant in my old age. Have you commands for me?” “What is it you look to do in London?” “There, child, let that be for the present. I will tell you perhaps when I return. The door, Stephen.”