On arriving at the room upstairs, Captain Dave placed his hand on Cyril's shoulder and said:  
"How can I thank you, lad, for what you have done for us?"
 
"By saying nothing further about it, Captain Dave. I had hoped that the matter would never have come to your ears, and yet I rejoice, for her own sake, that Mistress Nellie has told you all. I thought that she would do so some day, for I, too, have seen how much she has been changed since then, and though it becomes me not to speak of one older than myself, I think that the experience has been for her good, and, above all, I am rejoiced to find that you have fully forgiven her, for indeed I am sure that she has been grievously punished."
 
"Well, well, lad, it shall be as you say, for indeed I am but a poor hand at talking, but believe me that I feel as grateful as if I could express myself rightly, and that the Earl of Wisbech cannot feel one whit more thankful to you for having saved the lives of his three children than I do for your having saved my Nellie from the consequences of her own folly. There is one thing that you must let me do—it is but a small thing, but at present I have no other way of showing what I feel: you must let me take upon myself, as if you had been my son, the expenses of this outfit of yours. I was talking of the matter, as you may have guessed by what I said to the Earl, when Nellie burst into tears; and if I contemplated this when I knew only you had saved me from ruin, how much more do I feel it now that you have done this greater thing? I trust that you will not refuse me and my wife this small opportunity of showing our gratitude. What say you, John Wilkes?"
 
"I say, Captain Dave, that it is well spoken, and I am sure Master Cyril will not refuse your offer."
 
"I will not, Captain Dave, providing that you let it be as a loan that I may perhaps some day be enabled to repay you. I feel that it would be churlish to refuse so kind an offer, and it will relieve me of the one difficulty that troubled me when the prospects in all other respects seemed so fair."
 
"That is right, lad, and you have taken a load off my mind. You have not acted quite fairly by us in one respect, Master Cyril!"
 
"How is that?" Cyril asked in surprise.
 
"In not telling us that you were Sir Cyril Shenstone, and in letting us put you up in an attic, and letting you go about as Nellie's escort, as if you had been but an apprentice."
 
Cyril laughed.
 
"I said that my father was Sir Aubrey Shenstone, though I own that I did not say so until I had been here some time; but the fact that he was a Baronet and not a Knight made little difference. It was a friendless lad whom you took in and gave shelter to, Captain Dave, and—it mattered not whether he was plain Cyril or Sir Cyril. I had certainly no thought of taking my title again until I entered a foreign army, and indeed it would have been a disservice to me here in London. I should have cut but a poor figure asking for work and calling myself Sir Cyril Shenstone. I should have had to enter into all sorts of explanations before anyone would have believed me, and I don't think that, even with you, I should have been so comfortable as I have been."
 
"Well, at any rate, no harm has been done," Captain Dave said; "but I think you might have told me."
 
"If I had, Captain Dave, you would assuredly have told your wife and Mistress Nellie; and it was much more pleasant for me that things should be as they were."
 
"Well, perhaps you were right, lad. And I own that I might not have let you work at my books, and worry over that robbery, had I known that you were of a station above me."
 
"That you could never have known," Cyril said warmly. "We have been poor ever since I can remember. I owed my education to the kindness of friends of my mother, and in no way has my station been equal to that of a London trader like yourself. As to the title, it was but a matter of birth, and went but ill with an empty purse and a shabby doublet. In the future it may be useful, but until now, it has been naught, and indeed worse than naught, to me."
 
The next morning when Cyril went into the parlour he found that Nellie was busy assisting the maid to lay the table. When the latter had left the room, the girl went up to Cyril and took his hand.
 
"I have never thanked you yet," she said. "I could not bring myself to speak of it, but now that I have told them I can do so. Ever since that dreadful night I have prayed for you, morning and evening, and thanked God for sending you to my rescue. What a wicked girl you must have thought me—and with reason! But you could not think of me worse than I thought of myself. Now that my father and mother have forgiven me I shall be different altogether. I had before made up my mind to tell them. Still, it did not seem to me that I should ever be happy again. But now that I have had the courage to speak out, and they have been so good to me, a great weight is lifted off my mind, and I mean to learn to be a good housewife like my mother, and to try to be worthy, some day, of an honest man's love."
 
"I am sure you will be," Cyril said warmly. "And so, Mistress Nellie, it has all turned out for the best, though it did not seem so at one time."
 
At this moment Captain Dave came in. "I am glad to see you two talking together as of old," he said. "We had thought that there must be some quarrel between you, for you had given up rating him, Nellie. Give her a kiss, Cyril; she is a good lass, though she has been a foolish one. Nay, Nellie, do not offer him your cheek—it is the fashion to do that to every idle acquaintance. Kiss him heartily, as if you loved him. That is right, lass. Now let us to breakfast. Where is your mother? She is late."
 
"I told her that I would see after the breakfast in future, father, and I have begun this morning—partly because it is my duty to take the work off her hands, and partly because I wanted a private talk with Sir Cyril."
 
"I won't be called Sir Cyril under this roof," the lad said, laughing. "And I warn you that if anyone calls me so I will not answer. I have always been Cyril with you all, and I intend to remain so to the end, and you must remember that it is but a few months that I have had the right to the title, and was never addressed by it until by Prince Rupert. I was for the moment well nigh as much surprised as you were last night."
 
An hour later Cyril again donned his best suit, and started to pay his visit to the Earl. Had he not seen him over-night, he would have felt very uncomfortable at the thought of the visit; but he had found him so pleasant and friendly, and so entirely free from any air of pride or condescension, that it seemed as if he were going to meet a friend. He was particularly struck with the manner in which he had placed Captain Dave and his family at their ease, and got them to talk as freely and naturally with him as if he had been an acquaintance of long standing. It seemed strange to him to give his name as Sir Cyril Shenstone to the lackeys at the door, and he almost expected to see an expression of amusement on their faces. They had, however, evidently received instructions respecting him, for he was without question at once ushered into the room in which the Earl of Wisbech and his daughters were sitting.
 
The Earl shook him warmly by the hand, and then, turning to his daughters, said,—
 
"This is the gentleman to whom you owe your lives, girls. Sir Cyril, these are my daughters—Lady Dorothy, Lady Bertha, and Lady Beatrice. It seems somewhat strange to have to introduce you, who have saved their lives, to them; but you have the advantage of them, for you have seen them before, but they have not until now seen your face."
 
Each of the girls as she was named made a deep curtsey, and then presented her cheek to be kissed, as was the custom of the times.
 
"They are somewhat tongue-tied," the Earl said, smiling, as the eldest of the three cast an appealing glance to him, "and have begged me to thank you in their names, which I do with all my heart, and beg you to believe that their gratitude is none the less deep because they have no words to express it. They generally have plenty to say, I can assure you, and will find their tongues when you are a little better acquainted."
 
"I am most happy to have been of service to you, ladies," Cyril said, bowing deeply to them. "I can hardly say that I have the advantage your father speaks of, for in truth the smoke was so thick, and my eyes smarted so with it, that I could scarce see your faces."
 
"Their attire, too, in no way helped you," the Earl said, with a laugh, "for, as I hear, their costume was of the slightest. I believe that Dorothy's chief concern is that she did not have time to attire herself in a more becoming toilette before the smoke overpowered her."
 
"Now, father," the girl protested, with a pretty colour in her cheeks, "you know I have never said anything of the sort, though I did say that I wished I had thrown a cloak round me. It is not pleasant, whatever you may think, to know that one was handed down a ladder in one's nightdress."
 
"I don't care about that a bit," Beatrice said; "but you did not say, father, that it was a young gentleman, no older than Sydney, who found us and carried us out. I had expected to see a great big man."
 
"I don't think I said anything about his age, Beatrice, but simply told you that I had found out that it was Sir Cyril Shenstone that had saved you."
 
"Is the nurse recovering, my Lord?"
 
"She is still in bed, and the doctor says she will be some time before she quite recovers from the fright and shock. They were all sleeping in the storey above. It was Dorothy who first woke, and, after waking her sisters, ran into the nurse's room, which was next door, and roused her. The silly woman was so frightened that she could do nothing but stand at the window and scream until the girls almost dragged her away, and forced her to come downstairs. The smoke, however, was so thick that they could get no farther than the next floor; then, guided by the screams of the other servants, they opened a door and ran in, but, as you know, it was not the room into which the women had gone. The nurse fell down in a faint as soon as she got in. The girls, as it seems, dragged her as far as they could towards the window, but she was too heavy for them; and as they had not shut the door, the smoke poured in and overpowered them, and they fell beside her. The rest you know. She is a silly woman, and she has quite lost my confidence by her folly and cowardice, but she has been a good servant, and the girls, all of whom she nursed, were fond of her. Still, it is evident that she is not to be trusted in an emergency, and it was only because the girls' governess is away on a visit to her mother that she happened to be left in charge of them. Now, young ladies, you can leave us, as I have other matters to talk over with Sir Cyril."
 
The three girls curtsied deeply, first to their father, and then to Cyril, who held the door for them to pass out.
 
"Now, Sir Cyril," the Earl said, as the door closed behind them, "we must have a talk together. You may well believe that, after what has happened, I look upon you almost as part of my family, and that I consider you have given me the right to look after your welfare as if you were a near relation of my own; and glad I am to have learned yesterday evening that you are, in all respects, one whom I might be proud indeed to call a kinsman. Had you been a cousin of mine, with parents but indifferently off in worldly goods, it would have been my duty, of course, to push you forward and to aid you in every way to make a proper figure on this expedition. I think that, after what has happened, I have equally the right to do so, and what would have been my duty, had you been a relation, is no less a duty, and will certainly be a great gratification to me to do now. You understand me, do you not? I wish to take upon myself all the charges connected with your outfit, and to make you an allowance, similar to that which I shall give to my son, for your expenses on board ship. All this is of course but a slight thing, but, believe me, that when the expedition is over it will be my pleasure to help you forward to advancement in any course which you may choose."
 
"I thank you most heartily, my Lord," Cyril said, "and would not hesitate to accept your help in the present matter, did I need it. However, I have saved some little money during the past two years, and Captain Dowsett has most generously offered me any sum I may require for my expenses, and has consented to allow me to take it as a loan to be repaid at some future time, should it be in my power to do so. Your offer, however, to aid me in my career afterwards, I most thankfully accept. My idea has always been to take service under some foreign prince, and Prince Rupert has most kindly promised to aid me in that respect; but after serving for a time at sea I shall be better enabled to judge than at present as to whether that course is indeed the best, and I shall be most thankful for your counsel in this and all other matters, and feel myself fortunate indeed to have obtained your good will and patronage."
 
"Well, if it must be so, it must," the Earl said. "Your friend Captain Dowsett seems to me a very worthy man. You have placed him under an obligation as heavy as my own, and he has the first claim to do you service. In this matter, then, I must be content to stand aside, but on your return from sea it will be my turn, and I shall be hurt and grieved indeed if you do not allow me an opportunity of proving my gratitude to you. As to the career you speak of, it is a precarious one. There are indeed many English and Scotch officers who have risen to high rank and honour in foreign service; but to every one that so succeeds, how many fall unnoticed, and lie in unmarked graves, in well-nigh every country in Europe? Were you like so many of your age, bent merely on adventure and pleasure, the case would be different, but it is evident that you have a clear head for business, that you are steady and persevering, and such being the case, there are many offices under the Crown in which you might distinguish yourself and do far better than the vast majority of those who sell their swords to foreign princes, and become mere soldiers of fortune, fighting for a cause in which they have no interest, and risking their lives in quarrels that are neither their own nor their country's.
 
"However, all this we can talk over when you come back after having, as I hope, aided in destroying the Dutch Fleet. I expect my son up to-morrow, and trust that you will accompany him to the King's levée, next Monday. Prince Rupert tells me that he has already presented you to the King, and that you were well received by him, as indeed you had a right to be, as the son of a gentleman who had suffered and sacrificed much in the Royal cause. But I will take the opportunity of introducing you to several other gentlemen who will sail with you. On the following day I shall be going down into Kent, and shall remain there until it is time for Sydney to embark. If you can get your preparations finished by that time, I trust that you will give us the pleasure of your company, and will stay with me until you embark with Sydney. In this way you will come to know us better, and to feel, as I wish you to feel, as one of the family."
 
Cyril gratefully accepted the invitation, and then took his leave.
 
Captain Dave was delighted when he heard the issue of his visit to the Earl.
 
"I should never have forgiven you, lad, if you had accepted the Earl's offer to help you in the matter of this expedition. It is no great thing, and comes well within my compass, and I should have been sorely hurt had you let him come between us; but in the future I can do little, and he much. I have spoken to several friends who are better acquainted with public affairs than I am, and they all speak highly of him. He holds, for the most part, aloof from Court, which is to his credit seeing how matters go on there; but he is spoken of as a very worthy gentleman and one of merit, who might take a prominent part in affairs were he so minded. He has broad estates in Kent and Norfolk, and spends the greater part of his life at one or other of his country seats. Doubtless, he will be able to assist you greatly in the future."
 
"I did not like to refuse his offer to go down with him to Kent," Cyril said, "though I would far rather have remained here with you until we sail."
 
"You did perfectly right, lad. It will cut short your stay here but a week, and it would be madness to refuse the opportunity of getting to know him and his family better. The Countess died three years ago, I hear, and he has shown no disposition to take anoth............