To the old man's confusion, however, when they entered the room, a fire was blazing in the grate. He took up the tongs to hide his confusion, muttering, "It is burning clear now, but it smoked woundily in the morning!"
Next Frank ordered Andrew to procure him two stout fellows of the neighbourhood on whom he could rely, who would back the new proprietor, in case of Rashleigh attempting any attack during Frank's stay in the home of his fathers.
Andrew soon returned with a couple of his friends--or, as he described them, "sober, decent men, weel founded in doctrinal points, and, above all, as bold as lions."
Syddall, however, shook his head at sight of them.
"I maybe cannot expect that your Honour should put confidence in what I say, but it is Heaven's truth for all that. Ambrose Wingfield is as honest a man as lives, but if there be a false knave in all the country, it is his brother Lancie. The whole country knows him to be a spy for Clerk Jobson on the poor gentlemen that have been in trouble. But he's a dissenter, and I suppose that's enough nowadays."
The evening darkened down, and trimming the wood fire in the old library Frank sat on, dreaming dreams in which a certain lady occupied a great place. He chanced to lift his eyes at a sound which seemed like a sigh, and lo! Diana Vernon stood before him. She was resting on the arm of a figure so like the portrait on the wall that involuntarily Frank raised his eyes to the frame to see whether it was not indeed empty.
But the figures were neither painted canvas nor yet such stuff as dreams are made of. Diana Vernon and her father--for it was they--stood before the young man in actual flesh and blood. Frank was so astonished that for a while he could not speak, and it was Sir Frederick who first broke the silence.
"We are your suppliants, Mr. Osbaldistone," he said; "we claim the refuge and protection of your roof, till we can pursue a journey where dungeons and death gape for me at every step!"
"Surely you cannot suppose--" Frank found words with great difficulty--"Miss Vernon cannot suppose that I am so ungrateful--that I could betray any one--much less you!"
"I know it," said Sir Frederick, "though I am conferring on you a confidence which I would have been glad to have imposed on any one else. But my fate, which has chased me through a life of perils, is now pressing me hard, and, indeed, leaving me no alternative."