"Seems hard," mused the boy, seating himself in one of the crenellations of the rampart, and thinking deeply, "that he should get letters with news from London, and poor mother not have a line. That was a letter on the table, though he pretended it was not, for I could see it began like one. I didn't want to read it. Perhaps he was ashamed of being always writing letters. Don't matter to me. Afraid, perhaps, that he'll be told that he ought to attend more to teaching me. Wish he'd be always writing letters. I can learn twice as much reading with mother." It was very beautiful in that sunny niche in the mouldering stones close to the tower farthest away from that occupied by the secretary, and a spot much favoured by the boy, for from there he could look right over the square gate-way with its flanking towers, and the drawbridge which was never drawn, and the portcullis which was never lowered. "Can't hear him playing here," thought Roy that day; and he congratulated himself upon the fact, without pausing to think that the distance was so short that the notes should have been audible. Roy had been successful in getting off his reading with the tutor, but he was very undecided what to do next, for there were so many things to tempt him, and his mind kept on running in different directions. One minute he was dwelling on his mother's troubles and the want of news from his father, and from this it was a natural transition to thinking of how grand it would be if he could prevail upon her to let him go up to that far-away mysterious city, which it took days to reach on horseback, and then he could take her letter and find where his father was lying with his regiment, and see the army,--maybe see the king and queen, and perhaps his father might let him stay there,--at all events for a time. Then he was off to thinking about the great moat, for twice over a splash rose to his ears, and he could see the rings of water which spread out and made the lily-leaves rise and fall. "That was the big tench," he said to himself. "Must catch that fellow some day. He must weigh six or seven pounds. It ought to be a good time now. Want a strong line, though, and a big hook, for he'd run in and out among the lily-stems and break mine. Now, if I knew where father was, I could write and ask him to buy me one and send it down by his next letter. No: he wouldn't want to be bothered to buy me fishing-lines when he's with his regiment. I know," he said to himself, after a pause; "old Ben has got the one he caught the big eel with. I'll make him lend me that. Poor old Ben! who'd ever have thought that he could cry. For it was crying just as a little boy would. Seems funny, because he has been a brave soldier, and saved father's life once. Shouldn't have thought a man like that could cry."