there was no other house so near, and you were sorely hurt. Richard
Jennifer and my black boy made a litter of the saddle-cloths, and with
Sir Francis and Mr. Tybee to help--"

I think she must have seen that this thrust was sharper than that of the
German long-sword, for she stopped in mid-sentence and looked away from
me. And, surely, I thought it was the very irony of fate that I should
thus be brought half dead to the house that was my father's, with my
enemy and his second to share the burden of me.

"But your father?" I queried, when the silence had grown over-long.

"My father is away at Queensborough, so you must e'en trust yourself to
my tender mercies, Captain Ireton. Are you strong enough to have your
wound dressed?"

She asked, but waited for no answer of mine. Summoning a black boy to
hold the basin of water, she fell to upon the wound-dressing with as
little ado as if she had been a surgeon's apprentice on a battle-field,
and I a bloodless ancient too old to thrill at the touch of a woman's
hands.

"Dear heart! 'tis a monstrous ugly hurt," she declared, replacing the
wrappings with deft fingers. "How came you to go about picking a quarrel
with Sir Francis?"

"'Twas not of my seeking," I returned, and then I could have cursed my
foolish tongue.

"Is that generous, Captain Ireton? We hear something of the talk of the