attachment to Mr. Hampden had not been thoroughly understood. Urrey insinuated that the Carewes were but half-hearted in the national cause. The young man’s mother was rather too fond of her daughter-in-law, who, to his knowledge, was in constant correspondence with the Court; and, as for the young man, he did nothing more than follow the lead of the Hampdens and Knightleys, when, as every patriot knew, it was high time that those gentry should be made to move a little faster. This tone did not generally succeed. Two or three hotheaded men were for rebellion at the very moment that the King had given way on the great point of a permanent parliament; but of the rest, all but the few who wished to sit still and do nothing under any circumstances, fully agreed with Harry—that their duty was to keep watch on public affairs, and be ready to act, either by sustaining their members in parliament, or, if the dreary need should arise, by preparing to oppose by force any violent use of his prerogative by the King.
“Harry,” said his wife when he came home that evening, “when are you going to London again?”
“I do not know, my love. It depends on events there.”
“I wish you would let me go with you. There is room for me in my father’s lodging.”
“O yes; but I dread the agitation for you. Your health is not your own just now; and you can have no idea what London is like at this time.”
“I could bear it better there than here. And, to say the truth, Harry, I do not like Mr. Urrey.”
“Nor do I.”
“He has always been respectful in his words and manner; but I cannot imagine how Lady Carlisle can make a friend of him as she does. I had much rather see her than have letters through anybody’s hands; and particularly this gentleman’s.”
“Why will you not go to Hampden, and rest there with my mother? There you can conduct your correspondence in your own way. Mr. Urrey will not vex you there; and my mother will see that your letters go and come freely, without any desire to know what is in them.”
No: Henrietta had set her heart on going to London: and there she was, accordingly, before many days.
It did not conduce to her tranquillity to meet her friend. Lord Strafford was dead, and Lady Carlisle was not broken-hearted. The time was out of joint, and it perplexed Henrietta greatly.
Her father had made an hour of leisure to receive her; and Mr. Pym spent a few minutes with them the first evening. The two friends lodged in the same house, and usually dined together: and Mr. Pym now told Henrietta that Lady Carlisle was so impatient to see her that she would spend with her two or three hours that day.—Yes, why not? Lady Carlisle was an old friend of Mr. Pym’s. He was always sure of a welcome at her abode; but it was more convenient that she should visit her friends in London than that they should visit her, while she was in actual and frequent attendance on the Queen. Lady Carlisle was therefore not a rare visitor in Gray’s Inn Lane; and she was coming that day.
“Father, what does this mean?” Henrietta asked, when Mr. Hampden and she were alone for a few moments.
“In times like these,” he said, “men’s minds, and yet more, women’s minds are unsettled. Some have hopes that the strife may be accommodated; and, since the yielding of the King in the matter of the permanence of the parliament, I will not answer for it that patriotic men, as well as loyal women, may not have believed that Lord Strafford was the sacrifice which might be accepted as a peace-offering.”
“Is there hope—?” she stopped; and her father answered her unspoken thought.
“Whatever is, or may be, said of Mr. Pym being covertly on the King’s side is untrue. He is, like myself, bound to the cause of parliamentary government. If you had seen his face, and marked the trembling of his hands among his papers at one moment when the great prisoner was at the bar of the house, you would fully comprehend Mr. Pym’s mind.”
“What moment was that?”
“It was a moment when Lord Strafford cast a glance that way. When their eyes met, it was not only the searching strength of the man’s gaze that moved Mr. Pym. It was that it came from a countenance so wasted and so wistful, and from a friend of past years, who said in that glance, ‘Will you slay me, as one unfit to live?’”
“And what then?” asked the weeping Henrietta.
“In a moment the weakness passed away from both. The wrong-doer was unfit to live in a time like this. The accuser proved, as his duty bade him, that it was so; and the wrong-doer did not dispute our right to judge him, but bent his mind to his fate. The accuser who has carried through that great trial may well be trusted, if any man may, with the conduct of the cause of which that great trial was the opening.”
Henrietta’s heart sank at the thought of a further unrolling of a history so dreary; and Lady Carlisle’s conversation, interesting to the last degree, perplexed far more than it reassured her.
“After my letter, my child, you almost wonder that I am alive? You thought I should die of grief?”
“No,” said Henrietta, “I expected something better from you. Loyal hearts must not break at such a time, but be strong.”
“That is the noble view. My little Puritan always sees the heroic side: and I am sure we all have need of it.”
“If the loyal are right,” said Henrietta, “God will not give the most strength to the Puritans.”
“How true that is!” exclaimed Lady Carlisle. “How events show it! But a few weeks ago, how little could I (and others who are greater than I) have conceived that we could endure the death of such a friend in such a way! that we could resign ourselves to it as a necessary thing, and almost forgive those who did it?”
“Do you mean that the King so takes the death of Lord Strafford?” asked Henrietta,
