The Midnight Queen Part 18

"They call me Hubert--for want of a better name, I suppose," said the lad, easily. "And may I ask, Sir Norman, if you are shod with seven-leagued boots, or if your errand is one of life and death, that you stride along at such a terrific rate?"

"And what is that to you?" asked Sir Norman, indignant at his free-and-easy impudence.

"Nothing; only I should like to keep up with you, if my legs were long enough; and as they're not, and as company is not easily to be had in these forlorn streets, I should feel obliged to you if you would just slacken your pace a trifle, and take me in tow."

The boy's face in the moonlight, in everything but expression, was exactly that of Leoline, to which softening circ.u.mstance may be attributed Sir Norman's yielding to the request, and allowing the page to keep along side.

"I've met you once before to-night?" inquired Sir Norman, after a prolonged and wondering stare at him.

"Yes; I have a faint recollection of seeing you and Mr. Ormiston on London Bridge, a few hours ago, and, by the way, perhaps I may mention I am now in search of that same Mr. Ormiston."

"You are! And what may you want of him, pray?"

"Just a little information of a private character--perhaps you can direct me to his whereabouts."

"Should be happy to oblige you, my dear boy, but, unfortunately, I cannot. I want to see him myself, if I could find any one good enough to direct me to him. Is your business pressing?"

"Very--there is a lady in the case; and such business, you are aware, is always pressing. Probably you have heard of her--a youthful angel, in virgin white, who took a notion to jump into the Thames, not a great while ago."

"Ah!" said Sir Norman, with a start that did not escape the quick eyes of the boy. "And what do you want of her?"

The page glanced at him.

"Perhaps you know her yourself, sir Norman? If so, you will answer quite as well as your friend, as I only want to know where she lives."

"I have been out of town to-night," said Sir Norman, evasively, "and there may have been more ladies than one jumped into the Thames during my absence. Pray, describe your angel in white."

"I did not notice her particularly myself," said the boy, with easy indifference, "as I am not in the habit of paying much attention to young ladies who run wild about the streets at night and jump promiscuously into rivers. However, this one was rather remarkable, for being dressed as a bride, having long black hair, and a great quant.i.ty of jewelry about her, and looking very much like me. Having said she looks like me, I need not add she is handsome."

"Vanity of vanities, all in vanity!" murmured Sir Norman, meditatively.

"Perhaps she is a relative of yours, Master Hubert, since you take such an interest in her, and she looks so much like you."

"Not that I know of," said Hubert, in his careless way. "I believe I was born minus those common domestic afflictions, relatives; and I don't take the slightest interest in her, either; don't think it!"

"Then why are you in search of her?"

"For a very good reason--because I've been ordered to do so."

"By whom--your master?"

"My Lord Rochester," said that n.o.bleman's page, waving off the insinuation by a motion of his hand and a little displeased frown; "he picked her up adrift, and being composed of highly inflammable materials, took a hot and vehement fancy for her, which fact he did not discover until your friend, Mr. Ormiston, had carried her off."

Sir Norman scowled.

"And so he sent you in search of her, has he?"

"Exactly so; and now you perceive the reason why it is quite important that I find Mr. Ormiston. We do not know where he has taken her to, but fancy it must be somewhere near the river."

"You do? I tell you what it is, my boy," exclaimed Sir Norman, suddenly and in an elevated key, "the best thing you can do is, to go home and go to bed, and never mind young ladies. You'll catch the plague before you'll catch this particular young lady--I can tell you that!"

"Monsieur is excited," lisped the lad raising his hat and running his taper fingers through his glossy, dark curls. "Is she as handsome as they say she is, I wonder?"

"Handsome!" cried Sir Norman, lighting up with quite a new sensation at the recollection. "I tell you handsome doesn't begin to describe her!

She is beautiful, lovely, angelic, divine--" Here Sir Norman's litany of adjectives beginning to give out, he came to a sudden halt, with a face as radiant as the sky at sunrise.

"Ah! I did not believe them, when they told me she was so much like me; but if she is as near perfection as you describe, I shall begin to credit it. Strange, is it not, that nature should make a duplicate of her greatest earthly chef d'oeuvre?"

"You conceited young jackanapes!" growled Sir Norman, in deep displeasure. "It is far stranger how such a bundle of vanity can contrive to live in this work-a-day world. You are a foreigner, I perceive?"

"Yes, Sir Norman, I am happy to say I am."

"You don't like England, then?"

"I'd be sorry to like it; a dirty, beggarly, sickly place as I ever saw!"

Sir Norman eyed the slender specimen of foreign manhood, uttering this sentiment in the sincerest of tones, and let his hand fall heavily on his shoulder.

"My good youth, be careful! I happen to be a native, and not altogether used to this sort of talk. How long have you been here? Not long, I know myself--at least, not in the Earl of Rochester's service, or I would have seen you."

"Right! I have not been here a month; but that month has seemed longer than a year elsewhere. Do you know, I imagine when the world was created, this island of yours must have been made late on Sat.u.r.day night, and then merely thrown in from the refuse to fill up a dent in the ocean."

Sir Norman paused in his walk, and contemplated the speaker a moment in severest silence. But Master Hubert only lifted up his saucy face and laughing black eyes, in dauntless sang froid.

"Master Hubert," began Master Hubert's companion, in his deepest and sternest ba.s.s, "I don't know your other name, and it would be of no consequence if I did--just listen to me a moment. If you don't want to get run through (you perceive I carry a sword), and have an untimely end put to your career, just keep a civil tongue in your head, and don't slander England. Now come on!"

Hubert laughed and shrugged his shoulders:

"Thought is free, however, so I can have my own opinion in spite of everything. Will you tell me, monsieur, where I can find the lady?"

"You will have it, will you?" exclaimed Sir Norman, half drawing his sword. "Don't ask questions, but answer them. Are you French?"

"Monsieur has guessed it."

"How long have you been with your present master?"

"Monsieur, I object to that term," said Hubert, with calm dignity.

"Master is a vulgarism that I dislike; so, in alluding to his lords.h.i.+p, take the trouble to say, patron."

Sir Norman laughed.

"With all my heart! How long, then, have you been with your present patron?"

"Not quite two weeks."

"I do not like to be impertinently inquisitive in addressing so dignified a gentleman, but perhaps you would not consider it too great a liberty, if I inquired how you became his page?"

"Monsieur shall ask as many questions as he pleases, and it shall not be considered the slightest liberty," said the young gentleman, politely.

"I had been roaming at large about the city and the palace of his majesty--whom may Heaven preserve, and grant a little more wisdom!--in search of a situation; and among that of all n.o.bles of the court, the Earl of Rochester's livery struck me as being the most becoming, and so I concluded to patronize him."