The Pigeon Pie | Page 5

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"For who better may The right sceptre sway Than he whose right it is to reign; Then look for no peace, For the war will never cease Till the King enjoys his own again."
As he came to the last line, Rose returning exclaimed, "Oh, hush, Lucy. Pray don't, Walter!"
"Ha! Rose turned Roundhead?" cried Walter. "You don't deserve to hear the good news from Worcester."
"O, what?" cried the girls, eagerly.
"When it comes," said Walter, delighted to have taken in Rose herself; but Rose, going up to him gently, implored him to be quiet, and listen to her.
"All this noisy rejoicing grieves our mother," said she. "If you could but have seen her yesterday evening, when she heard your loyal songs. She sighed, and said, 'Poor fellow, how high his hopes are!' and then she talked of our father and that evening before the fight at Naseby."
Walter looked grave and said, "I remember! My father lifted me on the table to drink King Charles's health, and Prince Rupert--I remember his scarlet mantle and white plume--patted my head, and called me his little cavalier."
"We sat apart with mother," said Rose, "and heard the loud cheers and songs till we were half frightened at the noise."
"I can't recollect all that," said Lucy.
"At least you ought not to forget how our dear father came in with Edmund, and kissed us, and bade mother keep up a good heart. Don't you remember that, Lucy?"
"I do," said Walter; "it was the last time we ever saw him."
And Walter sat on the table, resting one foot on the bench, while the other dangled down, and leaning his elbow on his knee and his head on his hand; Rose sat on the bench close by him, with Charlie on her lap, and the two little girls pressing close against her, all earnest to hear from her the story of the great fight of Naseby, where they had all been in a farmhouse about a mile from the field of battle.
"I don't forget how the cannon roared all day," said Lucy.
"Ah! that dismal day!" said Rose. "Then by came our troopers, blood- stained and disorderly, riding so fast that scarcely one waited to tell my mother that the day was lost and she had better fly. But not a step did she stir from the gate, where she stood with you, Charlie, in her arms; she only asked of each as he passed if he had seen my father or Edmund, and ever her cheek grew whiter and whiter. At last came a Parliament officer on horseback--it was Mr. Enderby, who had been a college mate of my father's, and he told us that my dear father was wounded, and had sent him to fetch her."
"But I never knew where Edmund was then," said Eleanor. "No one ever told me."
"Edmund lifted up my father when he fell," said Walter, "and was trying to bind his wound; but when Colonel Enderby's troop was close upon them, my father charged him upon his duty to fly, saying that he should fall into the hands of an old friend, and it was Edmund's duty to save himself to fight for the King another time."
"So Edmund followed Prince Rupert?" said Eleanor.
"Yes," said Lucy; "you know my father once saved Prince Rupert's life in the skirmish where his horse was killed, so for his sake the Prince made Edmund his page, and has had him with him in all his voyages and wanderings. But go on about our father, Rose. Did we go to see him?"
"No; Mr. Enderby said he was too far off, so he left a trooper to guard us, and my mother only took her little babe with her. Don't you remember, Walter, how Eleanor screamed after her, as she rode away on the colonel's horse; and how we could not comfort the little ones, till they had cried themselves to sleep, poor little things? And in the morning she came back, and told us our dear father was dead! O Walter, how can we look back to that day, and rejoice in a new war? How can you wonder her heart should sink at sounds of joy which have so often ended in tears?"
Walter twisted about and muttered, but he could not resist his sister's earnest face and tearful eyes, and said something about not making so much noise in the house.
"There's my own dear brother," said Rose. "And you won't tease Deborah?"
"That is too much, Rose. It is all the sport I have, to see the faces she makes when I plague her about Diggory. Besides, it serves her right for having such a temper."
"She has not a good temper, poor thing!" said Rose; "but if you would only think how true and honest she is, how hard she toils,