CHAPTER XIX

THE LAST OF THE SECRETARY Amid a crowd of notables and fashionables, where the wits of the coffee-houses rubbed elbows with the beaus of the Mall, Francis pressed to hear the last scene in the drama which had been played athwart his own life. The Lord President had gained him admission, and so this morning he stood in the great hushed Westminster chamber, watching the lords in their robes, the frowning bench of judges, and at the bar the huddled figure of the old lord with his two piercing eyes still mocking at the…