She did not mention Hamilton's name, but I knew whom she meant and answered:--
A long pause followed, during which I was unable to read the expression on her face, but presently she spoke, her voice trembling with anger or emotion, I knew not which:--
"I hate him! If he were to touch my hand, I believe I should want to cut it off! I hate him--that is, I try to hate him."
Her words and manner caused me uneasiness in two respects: first, it led me to fear that she loved Hamilton; and second, in view of the rumors I had heard connecting his name with Roger Wentworth's death, it flashed upon me that possibly he was the man she had recognized by the light of Noah's lanthorn. Either of these surmises, if true, was enough to mar my peace of mind, but together they brought me trouble indeed.
I had come to look for a speedy accomplishment of my cousin's good fortune, and also to regard Hamilton as my dearest friend among men. Still I was helpless to remedy these evils if they really existed. What I did at the time was to insist, first, that Frances regain her senses as soon as possible, and second, that she say nothing of her intention to leave Whitehall for at least ten days. To my first request she replied that she had never been so completely in possession of her senses as at that present moment, and my second, she positively refused to consider.
The best of women want their way, at least in part, so I said, "I abandon my first request as unreasonable."
She looked up to me, hardly knowing whether to laugh or to frown, but she chose the former, and I continued, "And as to my second suggestion, I amend it to, say, five or six days."
"Three!" she insisted. So we let it stand at that, each with a sense of triumph.
We returned to the palace, and soon I had an opportunity to ask the king for a word privately. He graciously consented, and led me to his closet, overlooking the River Thames. From this closet, on the second floor, a privy stairs led down to a door which opened on a small covered porch at the head of a flight of stone steps falling to the king's private barge landing at the water's edge. When I noticed the narrow stairway, I had no thought of the part it would one day play in the fortunes and misfortunes of Frances, Hamilton, and myself.