"I was wrong, mother," Aline said, penitently. "I was very cross and ill-behaved, but it came suddenly upon me, and it seemed to me hard that Albert and Edgar should both seem delighted at what pained me so much. Forgive me, Albert."
"There is nothing to forgive, dear. Of course I understand your feeling that it will be hard for us to part, when we have been so much together. I shall be very sorry to leave you, but I am sure you will agree with me that it is less hard to do so now than it would have been if I had been going to be shut up in a convent to prepare for entering the Church, as we once thought would be the case."
"I should think so," the girl said. "This will be nothing to it. Then you would have been going out of our lives; now we shall have an interest in all you do, and you will often be coming back to us; there will be that to look forward to. Well, you won't hear me say another word of grumbling until you have gone. And when are you to go?"
"To-morrow or next day," her father said. "Mynheer Van Voorden says, 'I am about to start,' which may mean three days or six. It will need a whole day for your mother and the maids to see to Albert's clothes, and that all is decent and in order. To-day is Monday, and I think that if we say that Albert will arrive there on Thursday by noon it will do very well. Will you be ready by that time, Edgar?"
"Easily enough, Sir Ralph; for, indeed, as we have no maid, my clothes need but little preparation. I wear them until they are worn out, and then get new ones; and I doubt not that I shall be able to replenish my wardrobe to-morrow at Dartford."
Well pleased to find that Albert was to accompany him, Edgar rode home. As he passed in at the gates, Hal Carter ran up to him. "Master tells me that you are going away, Master Edgar. Are you going to take me with you?"
"Not this time, Hal. I am going to Flanders as a guest of a Flemish gentleman, and I could not therefore take a man-at-arms with me; besides, as you know naught of the language, you would be altogether useless there. But do not think that I shall not fulfil my promise. This is but a short absence, and when I return I shall enter the train of some warlike knight or other, and then you shall go with me, never fear."