The Noble Rogue

Papa Legros was here with Rose Marie. So much was true; that was no longer in the domain of dreams. They had been brought here to add their testimony to the lies spoken by the i...

The older man nodded, and Stowmaries gazed long and searchingly upon his cousin, vaguely wondering if Sir John's astuteness had pointed in the right direction, if indeed this we...

And do you ask what game she plays? With me 'tis lost or won; With thee it is playing still; with him It is not well begun; But 'tis a game she plays with all Beneath the sway o...

What whisperest thou? Nay, why Name the dead hours? I mind them well: Their ghosts in many darkened doorways dwell With desolate eyes to know them by. --DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI.

No one--not even her parents--knew what the proposed journey cost the girl in bitter sense of shame. She had, in order to consent to this pilgrimage of humiliation, to put aside...

A pause. Mistress Julia Peyton, you understand, was waxing impatient. Can you wonder? She was not accustomed to moodiness on the part of her courtiers; to a certain becoming dif...

What be her cards you ask? Even these:-- The heart, that doth but crave More, having fed; the diamond, Skilled to make base seem brave; The club, for smiting in the dark The spa...

After half an hour's continuous walking--for the roads out of London were over-bad after the heavy rains during the past week--the Huguenot clerk, closely followed by Master Leg...

M. Legros, tailor-in-chief to His Majesty Louis XIV and to the Court of Paris and Versailles, bowed himself out of the room; with back bent nearly double, and knees trembling in...

He entered very composedly. Having been formally announced by the servant, he waited with easy patience that the man should close the doors and leave him alone with his fair cou...

"Will you, good my lord, and all of you gallant gentlemen grant me five minutes wherein to place before you the situation as it at present stands? Here is my lord of Stowmaries...

Thus it was that this day, after maman had cleared the debris of dinner, and papa went downstairs to set the 'prentices to their afternoon's work, that no sooner had Rose Marie...

It was Lord Rochester who spoke. He, together with Lord Stowmaries and Sir John Ayloffe, was standing on the top of the steps beneath the ancient stone portcullis which surmount...

The workshop of Master Legros, tailor-in-chief to His Majesty the King of France, had been transformed into a vast assembly-room. The big central tables whereon usually sat cros...

Her game in thy tongue is called Life As ebbs thy daily breath; When she shall speak, thou'lt learn her tongue And know she calls it death. --DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI.

Comparatively only, because strive as he might he could not altogether banish from his mind the last picture he had of his cousin, standing all alone in the gloomy withdrawing r...

Papa Legros at first had been too dazed to protest. Truly his loving heart had been for hours on the rack at thought of the awful task which lay before him--the opening of his c...

The old, majestic Church of St. Gervais had been made quite gay with flowers. Good M. Legros was passing rich, thank God! He could gratify his only child's every whim--however t...

How! Old thief thy wits are lame; To clip such it is no shame; I rede you in the devil's name, Ye come not here to make men game. --SWINBURNE.

They said that love would die when Hope was gone And Love mourned long, and sorrowed after Hope; At last she sought out Memory and they trod The same old paths where Love had wa...

You all know that funny little inn at St. Denis, on what was then the main road between Paris and Havre; it stands sheltered against north and east winds by a towering bouquet o...

Michael in the meanwhile was running through the deserted streets like a man possessed. Cloakless and hatless he ran, bending his head to the gusts of wind which tore down the n...

Master Daniel Pye had certainly thought it wiser--after that precipitous exit from the master tailor's house--to watch and to await events. He had been wholly taken by surprise...

So many worlds, so much to do, So little done, such things to be, How know I what had need of thee, For thou wert strong as thou wert true? --TENNYSON.

The light of the one candle fell full upon the unromantic figure of the good tailor, on his pallid face whereon beads of perspiration told their mute tale of anxiety and of fuls...

Oh, yes! she was quite, quite sure that she was very happy, and that it was because of this great happiness which filled her heart to bursting, that she felt so very much inclin...

For Michael Kestyon was a man with a grievance. A just grievance enough since many held that he and not his cousin Rupert should have been the present Earl of Stowmaries.

It was situate in the Strand until that time, close to its junction with Fleet Street and within a pebble's throw from St. Clements. A tall narrow building, raftered and gabled,...

She did not see his gesture of menace, nor would it have perturbed her much if she had. Her spite against the man had been cruel and petty; she knew that well enough, yet did no...

He had been so excited, so full of Sir John's proposals and their more than probable success that like Michael Kestyon he had no desire for rest. He had soon wearied of the crow...

M. Blond was much perturbed. He was not accustomed to foreigners at any time and he held the English theoretically in abhorrence, and now here were four of these milors actually...

In the silence of the night, How we shiver with affright At the melancholy menace of their tone! For every sound that floats From the rust within their throats Is a groan. --EDG...

Gorgeously-clad gentlemen of high degree, ladies in silks and brocades, elbowed and pushed one another, climbing on their chairs, in order to have a clear view of the small grou...

My lord of Stowmaries had not only been arrested but he had confessed to his guilt; a matter which at first had greatly surprised Master Pye, who had been at great pains to conc...

With a quick glance thrown on each of the four faces, shrewd Sir John had quickly appraised the mood of this small clique. Stowmaries in sullen rage against the whole world beca...

Her eyes were deeper than the depth Of waters still at even: She had three lilies in her hand, And the stars in her hair were seven. --DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI.

And a bird overhead sang "Follow"! And a bird to the right sang "Here"; And the arch of the leaves was hollow And the meaning of May was clear. --SWINBURNE.

His snowdrop was gazing straight at him from out great, wide eyes, her lips were parted as if she meant to speak, and her hand lay on the arm of her father, good Papa Legros, dr...

Then she went to the little _secrétaire_ which stood in an angle of the room, drew forth a sheet of paper, took a heavy quill pen in her hand, and feverishly--though very labori...

The news that Michael Kestyon--the hero of one of the most exciting adventures in the history of gallantry, the man who less than twenty-four hours ago had by the king's mandate...

Obediently she had left her Kentish village, her miserable cottage, and ungrateful garden, to come to London when first he bade her so to do. She had exchanged her rough worsted...

"My cabbage," said Maman Legros in that decisive tone, which she only assumed on great occasions, and which then no one dreamed of contradicting, "what thou dost ask is entirely...

At first when Sir John Ayloffe threw open the door of the public room, Stowmaries was only conscious of an almost Satanic din; he certainly could see nothing through the dense c...

And it was in consequence of Monseigneur the Archbishop's advice, and of maman's desire that this advice be acted upon, that anon we see Master Legros, tailor-in-chief to His Ma...

But there was one more card which Ayloffe, the gambler, desired to play ere he lost sight momentarily of the man who was to be his tool in the carving of their respective fortunes.

I think that we shall have to accept Sir Anthony Wykeham's account of how the proceedings finally terminated. He avers that by the time the church clock of St. Clement's had str...

And in the narrow bed built within the wall in the tiny room, wherein a tallow candle placed on a central table threw only very feeble rays, the girl Rose Marie lay dreaming.

"I wish, my jewel, that you had not interfered," he said reproachfully, "when first I desired to kick those rascals out of doors. My first instinct was right, you see."

That same afternoon, and at about the same time as Rupert Kestyon's coach swung out of the gates of the Bell yard, Sir John Ayloffe presented himself at his kinswoman's house in...

And it was in the little room of the Rue de l'Ancienne Comédie that Michael once more beheld his snowdrop. It was December now and the room was filled with Christmas roses. Outs...