John Enderby | Page 9

man of sin
conferred upon you, to your undoing."
"Your Highness," replied Enderby, "I have but one desire, and that is
peace. I have been outlawed from England so long, and my miseries
have been so great, that I accept gladly what the justice of your
Highness gives thus freely. But I must tell your Highness that I was no
enemy of King Charles, and am no foe to his memory. The wrong was
done by him to me, and not returned by me to him, and the issue is

between our Maker and ourselves. But it is the pride of all Englishmen
that England be well governed, and strong and important in the eyes of
the nations; and all these things has your Highness achieved. I will
serve my country honourably abroad, or rest peacefully here on my
own estate, lifting no hand against your Highness, though I hold to the
succession in the monarchy."
Cromwell looked at him steadily and frowningly for a minute, then
presently, his face clearing, he said: "Your words, detached from your
character, sir, would be traitorous; but as we stand, two gentlemen of
England face to face, they seem to me like the words of an honest man,
and I love honesty before all other, things. Get to your home, sir. You
must not budge from it until I send for you. Then, as proof of your
fidelity to the ruler of your country, you shall go on whatever mission I
send you."
"Your Highness, I will do what seems my duty in the hour of your
summons."
"You shall do the will of the Lord," answered the Protector, and,
bowing a farewell, turned upon his heel. Enderby looked after him a
moment, then moved towards the door, and as he went out to mount his
horse he muttered to himself:
"The will of the Lord as ordained by Oliver Cromwell--humph!"
Then he rode away up through Trafalgar Square and into the Tottenham
Court Road, and so on out into the Shires until he came to Enderby
House.
Outside all was as he had left it seven years before, though the hedges
were not so well kept and the grass was longer before the house. An air
of loneliness pervaded all the place. No one met him at the door. He
rode round into the court-yard and called. A man-servant came out.
From him he learned that four of Cromwell's soldiers were quartered in
the house, that all the old servants, save two, were gone, and that his
son had been expelled the place by Cromwell's order two days before.
Inside the house there was less change. Boon companion of the
boisterous cavaliers as his son had been, the young man's gay hours had
been spent more away from Enderby House than in it.
When young Enderby was driven from his father's house by Cromwell,
he determined to join the Scotch army which was expected soon to
welcome Charles the Second from France. There he would be in

contact with Lord Rippingdale and his Majesty. When Cromwell was
driven from his place, great honours might await him. Hearing in
London, however, that his father had returned, and was gone on to the
estate, he turned his horse about and rode back again, travelling by
night chiefly, and reached Enderby House four days after his father's
arrival there.
He found his father seated alone at the dinner-table. Swinging wide
open the door of the dining-room he strode in aggressively.
The old man stood up in his place at the table and his eyes brightened
expectantly when he saw his son, for his brain was quickened by the
thought that perhaps, after all his wrong-doing, the boy had come back
to stand by him, a repentant prodigal. He was a man of warm and firm
spirit, and now his breast heaved with his emotions. This boy had been
the apple of his eye. Since the day of his birth he had looked for great
things from him, and had seen in him the refined perpetuation of the
sturdy race of the Enderbys. He counted himself but a rough sort of
country gentleman, and the courtly face of his son had suggested the
country gentleman cast in a finer mould. He was about to speak kindly
as of old, but the young man, with clattering spurs, came up to the other
end of the table, and with a dry insolence said:
"By whose invitation do you come here?"
The blood fled from the old man's heart. For a moment he felt sick, and
his face turned white. He dropped his head a little and looked at his son
steadily and mournfully.
"Shall a man need an invitation to his own house, my son?" he said at
last.
The