"Good-morrow!" said Aunt Tabitha's treble tones, which allowed no one else's voice to be heard at the same time. "Give you good-morrow, Father, and the like to thee, Christie. Well, Roger, I trust you're in a forgiving mood this morrow? You'll have to hammer at it a while, I reckon, afore you can make out that Edward Benden's an innocent cherub. I'd as lief wring that man's neck as eat my dinner!—and I mean to tell him so, too, afore I do it."

Aunt Tabitha left her sentence grammatically ambiguous, but practically lucid enough to convey a decided impression that a rod for Mr Benden was lying in tolerably sharp pickle.

"Daughter," said old Mr Hall, "methinks you have but a strange notion of forgiveness, if you count that it lieth in a man's persuading himself that the offender hath done him no wrong. To forgive as God forgiveth, is to feel and know the wrong to the full, and yet, notwithstanding the same, to pardon the offender."

"And in no wise to visit his wrong upon him? Nay, Father; that'd not a-pay me, I warrant you."

"That a man should escape the natural and temporal consequences of his evil doing, daughter, is not the way that God forgives. He rarely remits that penalty: more often he visits it to the full. But he loveth the offender through all, and seeks to purge away his iniquity and cleanse his soul."

"Well-a-day! I can fashion to love Edward Benden that way," said Tabitha, perversely misinterpreting her father-in-law's words. "I'll mix him a potion 'll help to cleanse his disorder, you'll see. Bitters be good for sick folks; and he's grievous sick. I met Mall a-coming; she saith he snapped her head right off yester-even."

"Oh dear!" said literal Christie. "Did she get it put on again, Aunt Tabitha, before you saw her?"

"It was there, same as common," replied Tabitha grimly.

"He's not a happy man, or I mistake greatly," remarked Roger Hall.

"He'll not be long, if I can win at him," announced Tabitha, more grimly still. "Good lack! there he is, this minute, crossing the Second Acre Close—see you him not? Nell, my pattens—quick! I'll have at him while I may!"

And Tabitha flew.

Christabel, who had lifted her head to watch the meeting, laid it down again upon her cushions with a sigh. "Aunt Tabitha wearies me, Father," she said, answering Roger's look of sympathetic concern, "She's like a blowy wind, that takes such a deal out of you. I wish she'd come at me a bit quieter. Father, don't you think the angels are very quiet folks? I couldn't think they'd come at me like Aunt Tabby."

"The angels obey the Lord, my Christie, and the Lord is very gentle. He 'knoweth our frame,' and 'remembereth that we are but dust.'"

"I don't feel much like dust," said Christie meditatively. "I feel more like strings that somebody had pulled tight till it hurt. But I do wish Aunt Tabitha would obey the Lord too, Father. I can't think she knows our frame, unless hers is vastly unlike mine."

"I rather count it is, Christie," said Roger.

Mr Benden had come out for his airing in an unhappy frame of mind, and his interview with Tabitha sent him home in a worse. Could he by an effort of will have obliterated the whole of his recent performances, he would gladly have done it; but as this was impossible, he refused to confess himself in the wrong. He was not going to humble himself, he said gruffly—though there was nobody to hear him—to that spiteful cat Tabitha. As to Alice, he was at once very angry with her, and very much put out by her absence. It was all her fault, he said again. Why could she not behave herself at first, and come to church like a reasonable woman, and as everybody else did? If she had stood out for a new dress, or a velvet hood, he could have understood it; but these new-fangled nonsensical fancies nobody could understand. Who could by any possibility expect a sensible man to give in to such rubbish?

So Mr Benden reasoned himself into the belief that he was an ill-used martyr, Alice a most unreasonable woman, and Tabitha a wicked fury. Having no principles himself, that any one else should have them was both unnecessary and absurd in his eyes. He simply could not imagine the possibility of a woman caring so much for the precepts or the glory of God, that she was ready for their sakes to brave imprisonment, torture, or death.

Meanwhile Alice and her fellow-prisoner, Rachel Potkin, were engaged in trying their scheme of living on next to nothing. We must not forget that even poor people, at that time, lived much better than now, so far as eating is concerned. The Spanish noblemen who came over with Queen Mary's husband were greatly astonished to find the English peasants, as they said, "living in hovels, and faring like princes." The poorest then never contented themselves with plain fare, such as we think tea and bread, which are now nearly all that many poor people see from one year's end to another. Meat, eggs, butter, and much else were too cheap to make it necessary.

So Alice and Rachel arranged their provisions thus: every two days they sent for two pounds of mutton, which cost some days a farthing, and some a halfpenny; twelve little loaves of bread, at 2 pence; a pint and a half of claret, or a quart of ale, cost 2 pence more. The halfpenny, which was at times to spare, they spent on four eggs, a few rashers of bacon, or a roll of butter, the price of which was fourpence-halfpenny the gallon. Sometimes it went for salt, an expensive article at that time. Now and then they varied their diet from mutton to beef; but of this they could get only half the quantity for their halfpenny. On fish-days, then rigidly observed, of course they bought fish instead of meat. For a fortnight they kept up this practice, which to them seemed far more of a hardship than it would to us; they were accustomed to a number of elaborate dishes, with rich sauces, in most of which wine was used; and mere bread and meat, or even bread and butter, seemed very poor, rough eating. Perhaps, if our ancestors had been content with simpler cookery, their children in the present day would have had less trouble with doctors' bills.

Roger Hall visited his sister, as he had said, on Saint Edmund's Day, the sixteenth of November. He found her calm, and even cheerful, very much pleased with her father's message and gift, and concerned that Mary should follow her directions to make Mr Benden comfortable. That she forgave him she never said in words, but all her actions said it strongly. Roger had to curb his own feelings as he promised to take the message to this effect which Alice sent to Mary. But Alice could pretty well see through his face into his heart, and into Mary's too; and she looked up with a smile as she added a few words:—

"Tell Mall," she said, "that if she love me, and would have me yet again at home, methinks this were her wisest plan."

Roger nodded, and said no more.



CHAPTER ELEVEN.

TABITHA'S BASKET.

Of all the persons concerned in our story at this juncture, the least unhappy was Alice Benden in Canterbury Gaol, and the most miserable was Edward Benden at Briton's Mead. His repentance was longer this time in coming, but his suffering and restlessness certainly were not so. He tried all sorts of ways to dispel them in vain. First, he attempted to lose himself in his library, for he was the rich possessor of twenty-six volumes, eight of which were romances of chivalry, wherein valiant knights did all kinds of impossibilities at the behest of fair damsels, rescued enchanted princesses, slew two-headed giants, or wandered for months over land and sea in quest of the Holy Grail, which few of them were sufficiently good even to see, and none to bring back to Arthur's Court. But Mr Benden found that the adventures of Sir Isumbras, or the woes of the Lady Blanchefleur, were quite incapable of making him forget the very disagreeable present. Then he tried rebuilding and newly furnishing a part of his house; but that proved even less potent to divert his thoughts than the books. Next he went into company, laughed and joked with empty-headed people, played games, sang, and amused himself in sundry ways, and came home at night, to feel more solitary and miserable than before. Then, in desperation, he sent for the barber to bleed him, for our forefathers had a curious idea that unless they were bled once or twice a year, especially in spring, they would never keep in good health. We perhaps owe some of our frequent poverty of blood to that fancy. The only result of this process was to make Mr Benden feel languid and weak, which was not likely to improve his spirits. Lastly, he went to church, and was shriven—namely, confessed his sins, and was absolved by the priest. He certainly ought to have been happy after that, but somehow the happiness would not come. He did not know what to do next.

All these performances had taken some time. Christmas came and passed— Christmas, with its morning mass and evening carols, its nightly waits, its mummers or masked itinerant actors, its music and dancing, its games and sports, its plum-porridge, mince-pies, and wassail-bowl. There were none of these things for Alice Benden in her prison, save a mince-pie, to which she treated herself and Rachel: and there might as well have been none for her husband, for he was unable to enjoy one of them. The frosts and snows of January nipped the blossoms, and hardened the roads, and made it difficult work for Roger Hall to get from Staplehurst to Canterbury: yet every holy-day his pleasant face appeared at the window of the gaol, and he held a short sympathising chat with Alice. The gaoler and the Bishop's officers came to know him well. It is a wonder, humanly speaking, that he was never arrested during these frequent visits: but God kept him.

"Good den, Alice," he said as he took leave of her on the evening of Saint Agnes' Day, the twenty-first of January. "I shall scarce, methinks, win hither again this month; but when our Lady Day next cometh, I will essay to see thee. Keep a good heart, my sister, and God be with thee."

"I do so, Roger," replied Alice cheerily. "Mistress Potkin here is a rare comfort unto me; and God is in Canterbury Gaol no less than at Staplehurst. I would fain, 'tis true, have been able to come and comfort Christie; but the Lord can send her a better help than mine. Give my loving commendations to the sweet heart, and may God reward thee for the brave comfort thou hast been to me all this winter! Farewell."

The next day, another and a less expected visitor presented himself. A tired bay horse drooped its weary head at the door of the Bishop's Palace, and a short, thick-set, black-haired man, with bushy eyebrows, inquired if he might be allowed to speak with his Lordship. The Bishop ordered him to be admitted.

"Well, and what would you, my son?" he asked condescendingly of the applicant.

"An't like your Lordship, my name is Edward Benden, of Staplehurst, and I do full reverently seek the release of my wife, that is in your gaol for heresy."

The Bishop shook his head. He had before now held more than one interview with Alice, and had found that neither promises nor threats had much weight with her. Very sternly he answered—"She is an obstinate heretic, and will not be reformed. I cannot deliver her."

"My Lord," responded Mr Benden, "she has a brother, Roger Hall, that resorteth unto her. If your Lordship could keep him from her, she would turn; for he comforteth her, giveth her money, and persuadeth her not to return."

"Well!" said the Bishop. "Go home, good son, and I will see what I can do." [This conversation is historical.]

If Mr Benden had not been in a brown study as he went into the Chequers to "sup his four-hours"—in modern phrase, to have his tea—and to give his horse a rest and feed before returning home, he would certainly have recognised two people who were seated in a dark corner of the inn kitchen, and had come there for the same purpose. The man kept his hat drawn over his face, and slunk close into the corner as though he were anxious not to be seen. The woman sat bolt upright, an enormous, full basket on the table at her right hand, and did not appear to care in the least whether she were seen or not.

"Is yon maid ever a-coming with the victuals?" she inquired in a rather harsh treble voice.

"Do hush, Tabby!" said the man in the most cautious of whispers. "Didst not see him a moment since?"

"Who? Dick o' Dover?"

"Tabitha!" was the answer in a voice of absolute agony. "Do, for mercy's sake!—Edward."

The last word was barely audible a yard away.

Mrs Hall turned round in the coolest manner, and gazed about till she caught sight of her brother-in-law, who happened to have his back to the corner in which they were seated, and was watching two men play at dominoes while he waited for his cakes and ale.

"Humph!" she said, turning back again. "Thomas Hall, I marvel if there be this even an hare in any turnip-field in Kent more 'feared of the hounds than you.—Well, Joan, thou hast ta'en thy time o'er these cakes."

The last remark was addressed to the waitress, who replied with an amused smile—

"An't like you, Mistress, my name's Kate."

"Well said, so thou bringest us some dainty cates [delicacies].—Now, Tom, help yourself, and pass that tankard."

"Tabitha, he'll hear!"

"Let him hear. I care not an almond if he hear every word I say. He'll hear o' t'other side his ears if he give us any trouble."

Mr Benden had heard the harsh treble voice, and knew it. But he was as comically anxious as Thomas Hall himself that he and the fair Tabitha should not cross each other's path that evening. To run away he felt to be an undignified proceeding, and if Tabitha had set her mind on speaking to him, utterly useless. Accordingly, he kept his back carefully turned to her, and professed an absorbing interest in the dominoes.

The cakes and ale having received due attention, Mr Hall paid the bill, and slunk out of the door, with the stealthy air and conscious face of a man engaged in the commission of a crime. Mrs Hall, on the contrary, took up her big basket with the open, leisurely aspect of virtue which had nothing to fear, and marched after her husband out of the Chequers.

"Now then, Thomas Hall, whither reckon you to be a-going?" she inquired, before she was down the steps of the inn, in a voice which must have penetrated much further than to the ears of Mr Benden in the kitchen. "Not that way, numskull!—to the left."

Poor Thomas, accustomed to these conjugal amenities, turned meekly round and trotted after his Tabitha, who with her big basket took the lead, and conducted him in a few minutes to the door of the gaol.

"Good den, Master Porter! We be some'at late for visitors, but needs must. Pray you, may we have speech of Mistress Benden, within here?"

The porter opened the wicket, and they stepped inside.

"You're nigh on closing time," said he. "Only half-an-hour to spare."

"I can do my business in half-an-hour, I thank you," replied Tabitha, marching across the courtyard.

The porter, following them, unlocked the outer door, and locked it again after them. To the gaoler who now received them they repeated their errand, and he produced another key, wherewith he let them into the women's prison. Alice and Rachel were talking together in the corner of the room, and Tabitha set down herself and her basket by the side of her sister-in-law.

"Good even, Alice!" she said, leaving her husband to see after himself, as she generally did. "We're a bit late, but better late than never, in especial when the ship carrieth a good cargo. Here have I brought you a couple of capons, a roll of butter, a jar of honey, and another of marmalade, a piece of a cheese, a goose-pie baken with lard, a pot o' green ginger, and nutmegs. I filled up with biscuits and reasons."

By which last word Mistress Tabitha meant to say that she had filled the interstices of her basket, not with intelligent motives, but with dried grapes.

"I con you right hearty thanks, Sister Tabitha," said Alice warmly, "for so rich provision! Verily, but it shall make a full pleasant change in our meagre diet; for my friend here, that hath been a mighty comfort unto me, must share in all my goods. 'Tis marvellous kindly in you to have thus laden yourself for our comforts. Good even, Tom! I am fain to behold thee. I trust you and all yours be well?"

"Maids lazy, Father 'plaining of pains in his bones, Christabel as is common, Roger well, Mary making o' candles," replied Tabitha rapidly. "As for yon ill-doing loon of a husband of yours, he's eating cakes and supping ale at the Chequers Inn."

"Edward here!" repeated Alice in surprised tones.

"Was when we came forth," said Tabitha, who while she talked was busy unlading her basket. "Hope your lockers 'll hold 'em. Time to close— good even! No room for chatter, Thomas Hall—say farewell, and march!"

And almost without allowing poor Thomas a moment to kiss his imprisoned sister, and beg her to "keep her heart up, and trust in the Lord," Mistress Tabitha swept him out of the door in front of her, and with the big basket on her arm, lightened of its savoury contents, marched him off to the Chequers for the horse.



CHAPTER TWELVE.

PANDORA.

In the projecting oriel window of a very pleasant sitting-room, whose inside seat was furnished with blue velvet cushions, sat a girl of seventeen years, dressed in velvet of the colour then known as lion-tawny, which was probably a light yellowish-brown. It was trimmed, or as she would have said, turned up, with satin of the same colour, was cut square, but high, at the throat, and finished by gold embroidery there and on the cuffs. A hood of dark blue satin covered her head, and came down over the shoulders, set round the front with small pearls in a golden frame shaped somewhat like a horseshoe. She was leaning her head upon one hand, and looking out of the window with dreamy eyes that evidently saw but little of the landscape, and thinking so intently that she never perceived the approach of another girl, a year or two her senior, and similarly attired, but with a very different expression in her lively, mischievous eyes. The hands of the latter came down on the shoulders of the meditative maiden so suddenly that she started and almost screamed. Then, looking up, a faint smile parted her lips, and the intent look left her eyes.

"Oh! is it you, Gertrude?"

"Dreaming, as usual, Pan? Confess now, that you wist not I was in the chamber."

"I scarce did, True." The eyes were growing grave and thoughtful again.

"Sweet my lady!—what conneth she, our Maiden Meditation? Doth she essay to find the philosopher's stone?—or be her thoughts of the true knight that is to bend low at her feet, and whisper unto her some day that he loveth none save her? I would give a broad shilling for the first letter of his name."

"You must give it, then, to some other than me. Nay, True; my fantasies be not of thy lively romancing sort. I was but thinking on a little maid that I saw yester-even, in our walk with Aunt Grena."

"What, that dainty little conceit that came up to the house with her basket of needlework that her mother had wrought for Aunt Grena? She was a pretty child, I allow."

"Oh no, not Patience Bradbridge. My little maid was elder than she, and lay on a day-bed within a compassed window. I marvelled who she were."

"Why, you surely mean that poor little whitefaced Christabel Hall! She's not pretty a whit—without it be her hair; she hath fair hair that is not over ill. But I marvel you should take a fantasy to her; there is nought taking about the child."

"You alway consider whether folks be pretty, Gertrude."

"Of course I do. So doth everybody."

"I don't."

"Oh, you! You are not everybody, Mistress Dorrie."

"No, I am but one maid. But I would fain be acquaint with that child. What said you were her name? All seems strange unto me, dwelling so long with Grandmother; I have to make acquaintance with all the folks when I return back home."

"Christabel Hall is her name; she is daughter to Roger Hall, the manager at our works, and he and she dwell alone; she hath no mother."

"No mother, hath she?—and very like none to mother her. Ah, now I conceive her looks."

"I marvel what you would be at, Pandora. Why, you and I have no mother, but I never mewled and moaned thereafter."

"No, Gertrude, I think you never did."

"Aunt Grena hath seen to all we lacked, hath not she?"

"Aunt is very kind, and I cast no doubt she hath seen to all you lacked." Pandora's tone was very quiet, with a faint pathos in it.

"Why, Dorrie, what lacked you that I did not?" responded Gertrude, turning her laughing face towards her sister.

"Nothing that I could tell you, True. What manner of man is this Roger Hall?"

"A right praisable man, Father saith, if it were not for one disorder in him, that he would fain see amended: and so being, Dorrie, I scarce think he shall be a-paid to have you much acquaint with his little maid, sithence he hath very like infected her with his foolish opinions."

"What, is he of the new learning?"

Gertrude failed to see the sudden light which shot into Pandora's eyes, as she dropped them on the cushion in the endeavour to smooth an entangled corner of the fringe.

"That, and no less. You may guess what Father and Aunt reckon thereof."

"Father was that himself, Gertrude, only five years gone, when I went to dwell in Lancashire."

"Pan, my dear heart, I do pray thee govern thy tongue. It maybe signifies but little what folks believe up in the wilds and forests yonder, and in especial amongst the witches: but bethink thee, we be here within a day's journey or twain of the Court, where every man's eyes and ears be all alive to see and hear news. What matters it what happed afore Noah went into the ark? We be all good Catholics now, at the least. And, Pan, we desire not to be burned; at all gates, I don't, if you do."

"Take your heart to you, sister; my tongue shall do you none ill. I can keep mine own counsel, and have ere now done the same."

"Then, if you be so discreet, you can maybe be trusted to make acquaintance with Christie. But suffer not her nor Roger to win you from the true Catholic faith."

"I think there is little fear," said Pandora quietly.

The two sisters were nieces of Mr Justice Roberts, and daughters of Mr Roberts of Primrose Croft, who was owner of the works of which Roger Hall was manager. Theirs was one of the aristocratic houses of the neighbourhood, and themselves a younger branch of an old county family which dated from the days of Henry the First. The head of that house, Mr Roberts of Glassenbury, would almost have thought it a condescension to accept a peerage. The room in which the girls sat was handsomely furnished according to the tastes of the time. A curtain of rich shot silk—"changeable sarcenet" was the name by which they knew it—screened off the window end of it at pleasure; a number of exceedingly stiff-looking chairs, the backs worked in tapestry, were ranged against the wall opposite the fire; a handsome chair upholstered in blue velvet stood near the fireplace. Velvet stools were here and there about the room, and cushions, some covered with velvet, some with crewel-work, were to be seen in profusion. They nearly covered the velvet settle, at one side of the fire, and they nestled in soft, plumy, inviting fashion, into the great Flanders chair on the other side. In one corner was "a chest of coffins"—be not dismayed, gentle reader! the startling phrase only meant half-a-dozen boxes, fitting inside each other in graduated sizes. Of course there was a cupboard, and equally of course the white-washed walls were hung with tapestry, wherein a green-kirtled Diana, with a ruff round her neck and a farthingale of sufficient breadth, drew a long arrow against a stately stag of ten, which, short of outraging the perspective, she could not possibly hit. A door now opened in the corner of the room, and admitted a lady of some forty years, tall and thin, and excessively upright, having apparently been more starched in her mind and carriage than in her dress. Pandora turned to her.

"Aunt Grena, will you give me leave to make me acquainted with Master Hall's little maid—he that manageth the cloth-works?"

Aunt Grena pursed up her lips and looked doubtful; but as that was her usual answer to any question which took her by surprise, it was not altogether disheartening.

"I will consult my brother," she said stiffly.

Mr Roberts, who was a little of the type of his brother the Justice, having been consulted, rather carelessly replied that he saw no reason why the maid should not amuse herself with the child if she wished it. Leave was accordingly granted. But Aunt Grena thought it necessary to add to it a formidable lecture, wherein Pandora was warned of all possible and impossible dangers that might accrue from the satisfaction of her desire, embellished with awful anecdotes of all manner of misfortunes which had happened to girls who wanted or obtained their own way.

"And methinks," concluded Mistress Grena, "that it were best I took you myself to Master Hall's house, there to see the maid, and make sure that she shall give you no harm."

Gertrude indulged herself in a laugh when her aunt had departed.

"Aunt Grena never can bear in mind," she said, "that you and I, Pan, are above six years old. Why, Christie Hall was a babe in the cradle when I was learning feather-stitch."

"Laugh not at Aunt Grena, True. She is the best friend we have, and the kindliest."

"Bless you, Dorrie! I mean her no ill, dear old soul! Only I believe she never was a young maid, and she thinks we never shall be. And I'll tell you, there was some mistake made in my being the elder of us. It should have been you, for you are the soberer by many a mile."

Pandora smiled. "I have dwelt with Grandmother five years," she said.

"Well, and haven't I dwelt with Aunt Grena well-nigh nineteen years? No, Pan, that's not the difference. It lieth in the nature of us two. I am a true Roberts, and you take after our mother's folks."

"Maybe so. Will you have with us, True, to Master Hall's?"

"I? Gramercy, no! I'm none so fond of sick childre."

"Christie is not sick, so to speak, Bridget saith; she is but lame and weak."

"Well, then she is sick, so not to speak! She alway lieth of a couch, and I'll go bail she whines and mewls enough o'er it."

"Nay, Bridget saith she is right full of cheer, and most patient, notwithstanding her maladies. And, True, the poor little maid is alone the whole day long, save on holy-days, when only her father can be with her. Wouldst thou not love well to bring some sunshine into her little life?"

"Did I not tell you a minute gone, Pandora Roberts, that you and I were cast in different moulds? No, my Minorite Sister, I should not love it—never a whit. I want my sunshine for mine own life—not to brighten sick maids and polish up poor childre. Go your ways, O best of Pandoras, and let me be. I'll try over the step of that new minuet while you are gone."

"And would you really enjoy that better than being kind to a sick child? O True, you do astonish me!"

"I should. I never was cut out for a Lady Bountiful. I could not do it, Dorrie—not for all the praises and blessings you expect to get."

"Gertrude, did you think—"

"An't like you, Mistress Pandora, the horses be at the door, and Mistress Grena is now full ready."



CHAPTER THIRTEEN.

A NEW FRIEND FOR CHRISTABEL.

"O Aunt Tabitha! have you and Uncle Thomas been to Canterbury? and did you really see dear Aunt Alice? How looks she? and what said she? I do want to know, and Father never seems to see, somehow, the things I want. Of course I would not—he's the best father that ever was, Aunt Tabitha, and the dearest belike; but somehow, he seems not to see things—"

"He's a man," said Aunt Tabitha, cutting short Christabel's laboured explanation; "and men never do see, child. They haven't a bit of gumption, and none so much wit. Ay, we've been; but we were late, and hadn't time to tarry. Well, she looks white belike, as folks alway do when they be shut up from the air; but she seems in good health, and in good cheer enough. She was sat of the corner, hard by a woman that hath, said she, been a good friend unto her, and a right comfort, and who, said she, must needs have a share in all her good things."

"Oh, I'm glad she has a friend in that dreadful place! What's her name, Aunt, an' it like you?"

"Didn't say."

"But I would like to pray for her," said Christie with a disappointed look; "and I can't say, 'Bless that woman.'"

"Why not?" said Aunt Tabitha bluntly. "Art 'feared the Lord shall be perplexed to know which woman thou meanest, and go and bless the wrong one?"

"Why, no! He'll know, of course. And, please, has Aunt Alice a cushion for her back?"

Tabitha laughed curtly. "Cushions grow not in prisons, child. Nay, she's never a cushion."

"Oh, I'm sorry!" said Christie mournfully. "And I've got three! I wish I could give her one of mine."

"Well, I scarce reckon she'd have leave to keep it, child. Howbeit, thou canst pray thy father to make inquiration."

"Oh ay! I'll pray Father to ask. Thank you, Aunt Tabitha. Was Aunt Alice very, very pleased to see you?"

"Didn't ask her. She said some'at none so far off it. Dear heart! but what ado is here?"

And Tabitha rose to examine the details of the "ado." Two fine horses stood before the gate, each laden with saddle and pillion, the former holding a serving-man, and the latter a lady. From a third horse the rider, also a man-servant in livery, had alighted, and he was now coming to help the ladies down. They were handsomely dressed, in a style which showed them to be people of some consequence: for in those days the texture of a woman's hood, the number of her pearls, and the breadth of her lace and fur were carefully regulated by sumptuary laws, and woe betide the esquire's daughter, or the knight's wife, who presumed to poach on the widths reserved for a Baroness!

"Bless us! whoever be these?" inquired Tabitha of nobody in particular. "I know never a one of their faces. Have they dropped from the clouds?"

"Perhaps it's a mistake," suggested Christie.

"Verily, so I think," rejoined her aunt. "I'd best have gone myself to them—I'm feared Nell shall scarce—"

But Nell opened the door with the astonishing announcement of—"Mistress Grena Holland, and Mistress Pandora Roberts, to visit the little mistress."

If anything could have cowed or awed Tabitha Hall, it would certainly have been that vision of Mistress Grena, in her dress of dark blue velvet edged with black fur, and her tawny velvet hood with its gold-set pearl border. She recognised instinctively the presence of a woman whose individuality was almost equal to her own, with the education and bearing of a gentlewoman added to it. Christabel was astonished at the respectful way in which Aunt Tabitha rose and courtesied to the visitors, told them who she was, and that the master of the house was away at his daily duties.

"Ay," said Mistress Grena gently, "we wot that Master Hall must needs leave his little maid much alone, for my brother, Master Roberts of Primrose Croft, is owner of the works whereof he is manager."

This announcement brought a yet lower courtesy from Tabitha, who now realised that members of the family of Roger Hall's master had come to visit Christabel.

"And as young folks love well to converse together apart from their elders, and my niece's discretion may well be trusted," added Mistress Grena, "if it serve you, Mistress Hall, we will take our leave. Which road go you?"

"I will attend you, my mistress, any road, if that stand with your pleasure."

"In good sooth, I would gladly speak with you a little. I have an errand to Cranbrook, and if it answer with your conveniency, then shall you mount my niece's horse, and ride with me thither, I returning hither for her when mine occasion serveth."

Tabitha having intimated that she could make this arrangement very well suit her convenience, as she wished to go to Cranbrook some day that week, the elder women took their departure, and Pandora was left alone with Christie.

Some girls would have been very shy of one another in these circumstances, but these two were not thus troubled; Pandora, because she was too well accustomed to society, and Christie because she was too much excited by the unwonted circumstances. Pandora drew Christie out by a few short, well-directed questions; and many minutes had not passed before she knew much of the child's lonely life and often sorrowful fancies.

"Father's the best father that ever was, or ever could be!" said Christie lovingly: "but look you, Mistress, he is bound to leave me—he can't tarry with me. And I've no sisters, and no mother; and Aunt Tabitha can't be here often, and Aunt Alice is—away at present."

"Thou art somewhat like me, little Christie, for though I have one sister, I also have no mother."

"Do you miss her, Mistress?" asked Christie, struck by the pathos of Pandora's tone.

"Oh, so much!" The girl's eyes filled with tears.

"I can't remember my mother," said Christie simply. "She was good, everybody says; but I can't recollect her a whit. I was only a baby when she went to Heaven, to live with the Lord Jesus."

"Ah, but I do remember mine," was Pandora's answer. "My sister was thirteen, and I was eleven, when our mother died; and I fretted so much for her, they were feared I might go into a waste, and I was sent away for five years, to dwell with my grandmother, well-nigh all the length of England off. I have but now come home. So thou seest I can feel sorry for lonesome folks, little Christie."

Christie's face flushed slightly, and an eager, wistful look came into her eyes. She was nerving herself to make a confession that she had never made before, even to her father or her Aunt Alice. She did not pause to ask herself why she should choose Pandora as its recipient; she only felt it possible to say it to the one, and too hard to utter it to the others.

"It isn't only lonesomeness, and that isn't the worst, either. But everybody says that folks that love God ought to work for Him, and I can't do any work. It doth Him no good that I should work in coloured silks and wools, and the like; and I can't do nothing else: so I can't work for God. I would I could do something. I wouldn't care how hard it was. Justine—that's one of my cousins—grumbles because she says her work is so hard; but if I could work, I wouldn't grumble, however hard it was—if only it were work for God."

"Little Christie," said Pandora softly, stroking the fair hair, "shall I tell thee a secret?"

"If it please you, Mistress." The answer did not come with any eagerness; Christie thought the confession, which had cost her something, was to be shelved as a matter of no interest, and her disappointment showed itself in her face.

Pandora smiled. "When I was about thy years, Christie, one day as I came downstairs, I made a false step, and slid down to the bottom of the flight. It was not very far—maybe an half-dozen steps or more: but I fell with my ankle doubled under me, and for nigh a fortnight I could not walk for the pain. I had to lie all day on a day-bed; and though divers young folks were in the house, and many sports going, I could not share in any, but lay there and fretted me o'er my misfortune. I was not patient; I was very impatient. But there was in the house a good man, a friend of my grandmother, that came one even into the parlour where I lay, and found me in tears. He asked me no questions. He did but lay his hand upon my brow as I lay there with my kerchief to mine eyes, and quoth he, 'My child, to do the work of God is to do His will.' Hast thou yet learned my lesson, Christie?"

Christie's eyes were eager enough now. She saw that the answer was coming, not put aside for something more entertaining to Pandora.

"Many and many a time, Christie, hath that come back to me, when I have been called to do that which was unpleasing to me, that which perchance seemed lesser work for God than the thing which I was doing. And I have oft found that what I would have done instead thereof was not the work God set me, but the work I set myself."

"Then can I work for God, if I only lie here?"

"If God bid thee lie there, and bear pain and weakness, and weariness, dear child, then that is His work, because it is His will for thee. It would not be work for God, if thou wert to arise and scour the floor, when He bade thee 'bide still and suffer. Ah, Christie, we are all of us sore apt to make that blunder—to think that the work we set ourselves is the work God setteth us. And 'tis very oft He giveth us cross-training; the eager, active soul is set to lie and bear, while the timid, ease-loving nature is bidden to arise and do. But so long as it is His will, it is His work."

It did not strike Christie as anything peculiar or surprising that her new acquaintance should at once begin to talk to her in this strain. She had lived exclusively with people older than herself, and all whom she knew intimately were Christian people. Aunt Tabitha sometimes puzzled her; but Christie's nature was not one to fret and strain over a point which she could not comprehend. It seemed to her, therefore, not only right, but quite a matter of course, that Pandora Roberts should be of the same type as her father and her Aunt Alice.

"I thank you, Mistress," she said earnestly. "I will do mine utmost to bear it in mind, and then, maybe, I shall not be so impatient as oft I am."

"Art thou impatient, Christabel?"

"Oh, dreadfully!" said Christie, drawing a long sigh. "Not always, look you; there be times I am content, or if not, I can keep it all inside mostly. But there be times it will not tarry within, but comes right out, and then I'm so 'shamed of myself afterward. I marvel how it is that peevishness isn't like water and other things—when they come pouring out, they are out, and they are done; but the more peevishness comes out of you, the more there seems to be left in. 'Tis not oft, look you, it really comes right outside: that would be shocking! but 'tis a deal too often. And I do want to be like the Lord Jesus!"

Something bright and wet dropped on Christabel's forehead as Pandora stooped to kiss her.

"Little Christie," she said tenderly, "I too right earnestly desire to be like the Lord Jesus. But the best of all is that the Lord Himself desires it for us. He will help us both; and we will pray each for other."



CHAPTER FOURTEEN.

UNEXPECTED TIDINGS.

When Roger Hall came home that evening, he was greeted by Christie with an amount of excited enthusiasm which he did not often hear from his little invalid daughter.

"Oh Father, Father! I have a new friend, and such a good, pleasant maid she is!"

Christie did not term her new friend "nice," as she certainly would have done in the present day. To her ear that word had no meaning except that of particular and precise—the meaning which we still attach to its relative "nicety."

"A new friend, forsooth?" said Christie's father with a smile. "And who is she, sweet heart? Is it Mistress Final's niece, that came to visit her this last week?"

"Oh no, Father! 'Tis somebody much—ever so much grander! Only think, the master's daughter, Mistress Pandora Roberts, came with her aunt, Mistress Holland; and Mistress Holland went on to Cranbrook, and took Aunt Tabitha with her—she was here when she came—and Mistress Pandora tarried with me, and talked, till her aunt came back to fetch her. Oh, she is a sweet maid, and I do love her!"

Roger Hall looked rather grave. He had kept himself, and even more, his Christie, from the society of outsiders, for safety's sake. For either of them to be known as a Gospeller, the name then given to the true, firm-hearted Protestants, would be a dangerous thing for their liberties, if not their lives. Pandora Roberts was the daughter of a man who, once a Protestant, had conformed to the Romanised form of religion restored by Queen Mary, and her uncle was one of the magistrates on the Cranbrook bench. Roger was sorry to hear that one so nearly allied to these dangerous people had found his little violet under the leaves where he had hoped that she was safely hidden. A sharp pang shot through his heart as the dread possibility rose before him of his delicate little girl being carried away to share the comfortless prison of his sister. Such treatment would most likely kill her very soon. For himself he would have cared far less: but Christie!

He was puzzled how to answer Christie's praises of Pandora. He did not wish to throw cold water on the child's delight, nor to damage her newly found friend in her eyes. But neither did he wish to drag her into the thorny path wherein he had to walk himself—to hedge her round with perpetual cautions and fears and terrors, lest she should let slip some word that might be used to their hurt. An old verse says—

"Ye gentlemen of England That sit at home at ease, Ye little know the miseries And dangers of the seas."

And it might be said with even greater truth—Ye men and women, ye boys and girls of free, peaceful, Protestant England, ye little know the dangers of life in lands where Popish priests rule, nor the miseries that you will have to endure if they ever gain the ascendancy here again!

Roger Hall had never heard Dr Abernethy's wise advice—"When you don't know what to do, do nothing." But in this emergency he acted on that principle.

"I trust, my dear heart," he said quietly, "that it may please the Lord to make thee and this young gentlewoman a blessing to each other."

"Oh, it will, I know, Father!" said Christie, quite unsuspicious of the course of her father's thoughts. "Only think, Father! she told me first thing, pretty nigh, that she loved the Lord Jesus, and wanted to be like Him. So you see we couldn't do each other any hurt, could we?"

Roger smiled rather sadly.

"I am scarce so sure of that, my Christie. Satan can set snares even for them that love the Lord; but 'tis true, they be not so like to slip as they that do not. Is this young mistress she that dwelt away from home some years back, or no?"

"She is, Father; she hath dwelt away in the shires, with her grandmother, these five years. And there was a good man there—she told me not his name—that gave her counsel, and he said, 'To do God's work is to do God's will.' That is good, Father, isn't it?"

"Good, and very true, sweeting."

Roger Hall had naturally all the contempt of a trueborn man of Kent for the dwellers in "the shires," which practically meant everybody in England who was not a native of Kent. But he knew that God had said, "He that despiseth his neighbour sinneth;" so he said in his heart, "Get thee behind me, Satan," to the bad feeling, and went on to wonder who the good man might be. Had Pandora told the name of that man, half Roger's doubts and terrors would have taken flight. The name of Master John Bradford of Manchester—the martyr who eighteen months before had glorified the Lord in the fires—would have been an immediate passport to his confidence. But Pandora knew the danger of saying more than was needful, and silently suppressed the name of her good counsellor.

Some days elapsed before Roger was again able to visit Canterbury. They were very busy just then at the cloth-works, and his constant presence was required. But when February began, the pressure was past, and on the first holy-day in that month, which was Candlemas Day, he rode to the metropolitan city of his county on another visit to Alice. On his arm he carried a basket, which held a bottle of thick cream, a dozen new-laid eggs, and a roll of butter; and as he came through Canterbury, he added to these country luxuries the town dainties of a bag of dates and half a pound each of those costly spices, much used and liked at that time—cloves, nutmeg, and cinnamon. On these articles he spent 7 shillings 8 pence—8 pence for the dates, 3 shillings for cinnamon, 2 shillings 6 pence for cloves, and 1 shilling 6 pence for nutmegs. Lastly, he bought a sugarloaf, then an unusual luxury, which cost him 7 pence. The basket was now quite full, and leaving his horse at the Star Inn, he went up to the prison, and struck with his dagger on the great bell, which was then the general mode of ringing it. Every man, except labourers, carried a dagger. The porter had become so accustomed to the sight of Roger, that he usually opened the door for him at once, with a nod of greeting. But this morning, when he looked from the wicket to see who it was, he did not open the door, but stood silently behind it. Roger wondered what this new style of conduct meant.

"May I within, by your good leave, to see my sister?" he asked.

"You may within, if you desire to tarry here, by my Lord's good leave," said the porter; "but you'll not see your sister."

"Why, what's ado?" asked Roger in consternation.

"Removed," answered the porter shortly.

"Whither?"

"Ask me no questions, and I'll tell you no lies," was the proverbial reply.

"Lack-a-day! Can I find out?"

The porter elevated his eyebrows, and shrugged his shoulders.

"Come within a moment," said he.

Roger obeyed, and the porter drew him into his lodge, where he spoke in a cautious whisper.

"Master Hall, you be an honest man; and though I am here found, yet I trust so am I. If you be likewise a wise man, you will find somewhat to keep you at home for the future. Whither Mistress Benden is now taken, I could not tell you if I would: but this can I say, you'll follow if you have not a care. Be ruled by me, that am dealing by you as by a friend, and keep out of Canterbury when you are out, and let that be as soon as you may. For your good stuff, leave it an' you will for Mistress Potkin: but if you tarry here, or return and be taken, say not you were not warned. Now, void your basket, and go."

Like a man dazed or in a dream, Roger Hall slowly emptied his basket of the good things which he had brought for Alice. He was willing enough that Rachel Potkin should have those or any other comforts he could bring her. But that basket had been packed under Christie's eyes, and in part by Christie's hands, and the child had delighted herself in the thought of Aunt Alice's pleasure in every item. And when at last the roll of butter was lifted out, and behind it the eggs which it had confined in a safe corner, and Roger came to the two tiny eggs which Christie had put in with special care, saying, "Now, Father, you'll be sure to tell Aunt Alice those eggs were laid by my own little hen, and she must eat them her own self, because I sent them to her"—as Roger took out the eggs of Christie's hen, he could hardly restrain a sob, which was partly for the child's coming disappointment, and partly caused by his own anxious suspense and distress. The porter had not spoken very plainly—he had probably avoided doing so on purpose—but it was sufficiently manifest that the authorities had their eyes on Roger himself, and that he ran serious risk of arrest if he remained in Canterbury.

But what had they done with Alice? He must find her. Whatever became of him, he must look for Alice.

Roger turned away from the gate of the gaol, sick at heart. He scarcely remembered even to thank the friendly porter, and turned back to repair the omission.

"If you be thankful to me," was the porter's significant answer, "look you take my counsel."

Slowly, as if he were walking in a dream, and scarcely knew where he was going, Roger made his way back to the Star. There all was bustle and commotion, for some people of high rank had just arrived on a pilgrimage to the shrine of Saint Thomas of Canterbury, or rather to the place where the shrine had stood in past ages. King Henry the Eighth had destroyed the shrine, and a soldier had "rattled down proud Becket's glassy bones," but the spot where it had been was considered holy, and the poor deluded people even yet sometimes came to worship there, and to make their painful way up the Pilgrims' Stairs, which they had to ascend on their knees. Those stairs are now to be seen in Canterbury Cathedral, worn by the thousands of knees which went up them, the poor creatures fancying that by this means they would obtain pardon of their sins, or earn a seat in Heaven.

The bustle in the inn rather favoured Roger's escape. He mounted his horse, tied the basket to his saddle, and rode out of Wincheap Gate, wondering all the while how he could discover the place to which Alice had been removed, and how he should tell Christie. He met several people on the road, but noticed none of them, and reached his own house without having exchanged a word with any one he knew. He let himself in, and with a sinking heart, opened the parlour door.

"Dear heart, Master Hall!" said the voice of Collet Pardue, who was seated by Christie's couch, "but there's ill news in your face! What's ado, prithee?"

"Oh, Father, is Aunt Alice sick?" cried Christie.

Roger came round to the couch, and knelt down, one hand clasping that of his little girl, and the other tenderly laid upon her head.

"My Christie," he said, "they have taken Aunt Alice away, I know not whither. But our Father knows. Perchance He will show us. But whether or not, all is well with her, for she is in His care that loveth her more than we."



CHAPTER FIFTEEN.

MR. BENDEN'S DESSERT.

"Taken her away from the gaol! and you wot not whither? Well, Roger Hall, you're as pretty a man of your hands as ever I did behold!"

"How signify you, Sister Tabitha?"

"Would I ever have turned back from Canterbury till I'd found out? Marry, not I! I'd have known all about it in half a twink."

"Please, Aunt Tabitha, if you have half a twink to spare—I know not what it is, but I suppose you do—won't you go and find out Aunt Alice?"

This practical suggestion from Christie was quietly ignored.

"'Tis right like a man as ever I did see! Catch a woman turning back in that fashion afore she'd half done her work!"

"But, Aunt Tabitha," urged Christie, for her father sat in silence, and she felt herself bound to defend him, "have you forgotten what the porter said to Father? If they—"

"Pack o' nonsense!" snorted Aunt Tabitha. "He would fain keep him from continual coming, and he spake out the first thing that came in his head, that's all. None but a babe like thee should take any note of such rubbish. Can't you speak up, Roger Hall? or did you drop your tongue where you left your wits?"

"Methinks you have a sufficiency for us both, Tabitha," said Roger quietly, leaving it uncertain whether he alluded to the tongue or the wits.

"Mean you to go again to-morrow?"

"That cannot I yet say. I lack time to think—and to pray likewise."

"Lack time to think! Gramercy me! How long doth a man want to gather up his wits together? I should have thought of fifty things whilst I rode back from Canterbury."

"So I did, Tabitha; but I wis not yet which was the right."

"Ay, you're a brave hand at thinking, but I want to do."

"That will I likewise, so soon as I have thought out what is best to do. I see it not as yet."

"Lack-a-daisy me! Well, my fine master, I'll leave you to your thinking, and I'll get to my doing. As to second and third, I'll tarry till I reach 'em; but I know what comes first."

"What mean you to do, Tabitha?"

"I mean to walk up to Briton's Mead, and give Edward Benden a sweet-sop to his supper. I've had a rod in pickle any day this three months, and I reckon 'tis in good conditions by now. I'll give him some'at he'll enjoy. If he skrike not afore I've done with him—!"

Leaving her sentence the more expressive for its incompleteness, Mistress Tabitha stalked out of the room and the house, not pausing for any farewells.

"Father," said Christie, a little fearfully, "aren't you 'feared Aunt Tabitha shall get into prison, the way she talks and runs right at things?"

"Nay, Christie, I scarce am," said Roger.

He knew that Faithful is brought to the stake in Vanity Fair more frequently than Talkative.

In the dining-room at Briton's Mead Mr Benden was sitting down to his solitary supper. Of the result of his application to the Bishop he had not yet heard. He really imagined that if Roger Hall could be kept out of her way, Alice would yield and do all that he wished. He gave her credit for no principle; indeed, like many in his day, he would have laughed at the bare idea of a woman having any principle, or being able to stand calmly and firmly without being instigated and supported by a man. Roger, therefore, in his eyes, was the obstacle in the way of Alice's submission. He did not in the least realise that the real obstacle against which he was striving was the Holy Spirit of God.

To a man in Mr Benden's position, who, moreover, had always been an epicure, his meals were a relief and an enjoyment. He was then less troubled by noxious thoughts than at any other time. It was with a sigh of something like satisfaction that he sat down to supper, unfolded his napkin, and tucked it into his doublet, muttered a hurried grace, and helped himself to the buttered eggs which Mary had sent up light and hot. He was just putting down the pepper-cruet, when he became aware of something on the settle in the corner, which he could not fairly see, and did not understand. Mr Benden was rather short-sighted. He peered with eyes half shut at the unknown object.

"What's that?" he said, half aloud.

That responded by neither sound nor motion. It looked very like a human being; but who could possibly be seated on his settle at this late hour without his knowing it? Mr Benden came to the conclusion that it would be foolish to disturb himself, and spoil an excellent supper, for the sake of ascertaining that Mary had forgotten to put away his fur-lined cloak, which was most likely the thing in the corner. He would look at it after supper. He took up his spoon, and was in the act of conveying it to his mouth, when the uncanny object suddenly changed its attitude.

"Saints bless us and love us!" ejaculated Mr Benden, dropping the spoon.

He really was not at all concerned about the saints loving him, otherwise he would have behaved differently to his wife; but the words were the first to occur to him. The unknown thing was still again, and after another long stare, which brought him no information, Mr Benden picked up the spoon, and this time succeeded in conveying it to his lips.

At that moment the apparition spoke.

"Edward Benden!" it said, "do you call yourself a Christian?"

Mr Benden's first gasp of horror that the hobgoblin should address him by name, was succeeded by a second of relief as he recognised the voice.

"Bless the saints!" he said to himself; "it's only Tabby."

His next sensation was one of resentment. What business had Tabitha to steal into his house in this way, startling him half out of his wits as he began his supper? These mixed sentiments lent a sulky tone to his voice as he answered that he was under the impression he had some claim to that character.

"Because," said the apparition coolly, "I don't."

"Never thought you were," said Mr Benden grimly, turning the tables on the enemy, who had left him a chance to do it.

Tabitha rose and advanced to the table.

"Where is Alice?" she demanded.

"How should I know?" answered Mr Benden, hastily shovelling into his mouth another spoonful of eggs, without a notion what they tasted like. "In the gaol, I reckon. You are best to go and see, if you'd fain know. I'm not her keeper."

"You're not? Did I not hear you swear an oath to God Almighty, to 'keep her in sickness and in health?' That's how you keep your vows, is it? I've kept mine better than so. But being thus ignorant of what you should know better than other folks, may be it shall serve you to hear that she is not in the gaol, nor none wist where she is, saving, as I guess, yon dotipole men call Dick o' Dover. He and Satan know, very like, for I count they took counsel about it."

Mr Benden laid down his spoon, and looked up at Tabitha. "Tabitha, I wist nought of this, I ensure you, neither heard I of it aforetime. I—"

He took another mouthful to stop the words that were coming. It would hardly be wise to let Tabitha know what he had said to the Bishop.

"Sit you down, and give me leave to help you to these eggs," he said, hospitably in appearance, politically in fact.

"I'll not eat nor drink in your house," was the stern reply. "Must I, then, take it that Dick o' Dover hath acted of his own head, and without any incitement from you?"

Poor Mr Benden! He felt himself fairly caught. He did not quite want to tell a point blank falsehood.

"They be good eggs, Tabitha, and Mall wist well how to dress them," he urged. "You were best—"

"You were best answer my question, Edward Benden: Did you in any wise excite yon mitred scoundrel to this act?"

"Your language, Tabitha, doth verily 'shame me. 'Mitred scoundrel,' in good sooth! Fear you not to be brought afore the justices for—"

"I fear nought so much as I fear you are a slippery snake, as well as a roaring lion," said Tabitha, in grim defiance of natural history. "Answer my question, or I'll make you!"

Until that moment Mr Benden had not noticed that Tabitha kept one hand behind her. It suddenly struck him now, in disagreeable combination with the threat she uttered.

"What have you behind your back?" he said uneasily.

"A succade to follow your eggs, which you shall have if you demerit it."

"What mean you, Sister Tabitha?"

"Let be your slimy coaxing ways. Answer my question."

Like all bullies, Mr Benden was a coward. With a woman of Tabitha's type he had never before had to deal at such close quarters. Alice either yielded to his wishes, or stood quietly firm, and generally silent. He began to feel considerable alarm. Tabitha was a powerful woman, and he was a man of only moderate strength. Briton's Mead was not within call of any other house, and its master had an unpleasant conviction that to summon Mary to his aid would not improve his case. It was desirable to compromise with Tabitha. The only way that he could see to do it was to deny his action. If he did commit a sin in speaking falsely, he said to himself, it was Tabitha's fault for forcing him to it, and Father Bastian would absolve him easily, considering the circumstances.

"No, Tabitha; I did not say a word to the Bishop."

"You expect me to believe you, after all that fencing and skulking under hedges? Then I don't. If you'd said it fair out at first, well—may be I might, may be I mightn't. But I don't now, never a whit. And I think you'd best eat the succade I brought you. I believe you demerit it; and if you don't, you soon will, or I'm a mistaken woman, and I'm not apt to be that," concluded Mistress Tabitha, with serene consciousness of virtue.

"Tabitha, my dear sister, I do ensure you—"

"You'd best ensure me of nothing, my right undear brother. Out on your snaky speeches and beguiling ways! You'll have your succade, and I'll leave you to digest it, and much good may it do you!"

And he had it. After which transaction Mistress Tabitha went home, and slept all the better for the pleasing remembrance that she had horsewhipped Mr Edward Benden.



CHAPTER SIXTEEN.

AT THE WHITE HART.

There was a good deal of bustle going on in the kitchen of the White Hart, the little hostelry at Staplehurst. It was "fair day," and fairs were much more important things in the olden time than now. A fair now-a-days is an assemblage of some dozen booths, where the chief commodities are toys and sweetmeats, with an attempt at serious business in the shape of a little crockery or a few tin goods. But fairs in 1557 were busy places where many people laid in provisions for the season, or set themselves up with new clothes. The tiny inn had as many guests as it could hold, and the principal people in the town had come together in its kitchen—country inns had no parlours then—to debate all manner of subjects in which they were interested. The price of wool was an absorbing topic with many; the dearness of meat and general badness of trade were freely discussed by all. Amongst them bustled Mistress Final, the landlady of the inn, a widow, and a comely, rosy-faced, fat, kindly woman, assisted by her young son Ralph, her two daughters, Ursula and Susan, and her maid Dorcas. Cakes and ale were served to most of the customers; more rarely meat, except in the form of pies, which were popular, or of bacon, with or without accompanying eggs.

The company in the kitchen were all more or less acquainted with each other, two persons excepted. Those who were not Staplehurst people had come in from the surrounding villages, or from Cranbrook at the farthest. But these two men were total strangers, and they did not mix with the villagers, but sat, in travelling garb, at one corner of the kitchen, listening, yet rarely joining in the talk which went on around them. One of them, indeed, seemed wrapped in his own thoughts, and scarcely spoke, even to his companion. He was a tall spare man, with a grave and reserved expression of countenance. The other was shorter and much more lively in his motions, was evidently amused by the conversation in his vicinity, and looked as if he would not object to talk if the opportunity were given him.

Into this company came Emmet Wilson and Collet Pardue. Both had brought full baskets from the fair, which they set down in a corner, and turned to amuse themselves with a little chat with their friends.

"Any news abroad?" asked Collet. She dearly loved a bit of news, which she would retail to her quiet husband as they sat by the fireside after the day's work was done.

"Well, not so much," said John Banks, the mason, to whom Collet had addressed herself. He was the brother of Mr Benden's servant Mary. "Without you call it news to hear what happed at Briton's Mead last night."

"Why, whatso? Not the mistress come home, trow?"

"Alack, no such good hap! Nay, only Tabby came down to see the master, and brought her claws with her."

"Scrat him well, I hope?"

"Whipped him, and laid on pretty hard to boot."

"Why, you never mean it, real true, be sure!"

"Be sure I do. He's a-bed this morrow."

"I have my doubts if there'll be many tears shed in Staplehurst," said Mistress Final, laughing, as she went past with a plate of biscuit-bread, which, to judge from the receipt for making it, must have been very like our sponge cake.

"He's none so much loved of his neighbours," remarked Nicholas White, who kept a small ironmonger's shop, to which he added the sale of such articles as wood, wicker-work, crockery, and musical instruments.

The shorter and livelier of the travellers spoke for the first time.

"Pray you, who is this greatly beloved master?"

John Fishcock, the butcher, replied. "His name is Benden, and the folks be but ill-affected to him for his hard ways and sorry conditions."

"Hard!—in what manner, trow?"

"Nay, you'd best ask my neighbour here, whose landlord he is."

"And who'd love a sight better to deal with his mistress than himself," said Collet, answering the appeal. "I say not he's unjust, look you, but he's main hard, be sure. A farthing under the money, or a day over the time, and he's no mercy."

"Ah, the mistress was good to poor folks, bless her!" said Banks.

"She's dead, is she?" asked the stranger.

"No, she's away," replied Banks shortly.

"Back soon?" suggested the stranger.

John Banks had moved away. There was a peculiar gleam in his questioner's eye which he did not admire. But Collet, always unsuspicious, and not always discreet, replied without any idea of reserve.

"You'd best ask Dick o' Dover that, for none else can tell you."

"Ah, forsooth!" replied the stranger, apparently more interested than ever. "I heard as we came there were divers new doctrine folks at Staplehurst. She is one of them, belike?—and the master holds with the old? 'Tis sore pity folks should not agree to differ, and hold their several opinions in peace."

"Ah, it is so," said unsuspicious Collet.

"Pray you, who be the chief here of them of the new learning? We be strangers in these parts, and should be well a-paid to know whither we may seek our friends. Our hostess here, I am aware, is of them; but for others I scarce know. The name of White was dropped in mine hearing, and likewise Fishcock; who be they, trow? And dwells there not a certain Mistress Brandridge, or some such?—and a Master Hall or Ball— some whither in this neighbourhood, that be friends unto such as love not the papistical ways?"

"Look you now, I'll do you to wit all thereanent," said Collet confidentially. "For Fishcock, that was he that first spake unto you; he is a butcher, and dwelleth nigh the church. Nicholas White, yon big man yonder, that toppeth most of his neighbours, hath an ironmongery shop a-down in the further end of the village. Brandridge have we not: but Mistress Bradbridge—"

"Mistress, here's your master a-wanting you!" came suddenly in John Banks' clear tones; and Collette, hastily lifting her basket, and apologising for the sudden termination of her usefulness, departed quickly.

"She that hath hastened away is Mistress Wilson, methinks?" asked the inquisitive traveller of the person next him, who happened to be Mary Banks.

Mary looked quietly up into the animated face, and glanced at his companion also before replying. Then she said quietly—

"No, my master; Mistress Wilson is not now here."

"Then what name hath she?"

"I cry you mercy, Master; I have no time to tarry."

The grave man in the corner gave a grim smile as Mary turned away.

"You took not much by that motion, Malledge," he said in a low tone.

"I took a good deal by the former," replied Malledge, with a laugh. "Beside, I lacked it not; I wis well the name of my useful friend that is now gone her way. I did but ask to draw on more talk. But one matter I have not yet."

These words were spoken in an undertone, audible only to the person to whom they were addressed; and the speaker turned back to join in the general conversation. But before they had obtained any further information, the well-known sounds of the hunt came through the open door, and the whole company turned forth to see the hunters and hounds go by. Most of them did not return, but dispersed in the direction of their various homes, and from the few who did nothing was to be drawn.

John Banks walked away with Nicholas White. "Saw you those twain?" he asked, when they had left the White Hart a little way behind them. "The strange men? Ay, I saw them."

"I misdoubt if they come for any good purpose."

"Ay so?" said Nicholas in apparent surprise. "What leads you to that thought, trow?"

"I loved not neither of their faces; nor I liked not of their talk. That shorter man was for ever putting questions anent the folks in this vicinage that loved the Gospel; and Collet Pardue told him more than she should, or I mistake."

Nicholas White smiled. "I reckoned you were in some haste to let her wit that her master wanted her," he said.

"I was that. I was in a hurry to stop her tongue."

"Well!" said the ironmonger after a short pause, "the Lord keep His own!"

"Amen!" returned the mason. "But methinks, friend, the Lord works not many miracles to save even His own from traps whereinto they have run with their eyes open."

They walked on for a few minutes in silence. "What think you," asked White, "is come of Mistress Benden?"

"Would I wist!" answered Banks. "Master Hall saith he'll never let be till he find her, without he be arrest himself."

"That will he, if he have not a care."

"I'm not so sure," said Banks, "that those two in the White Hart could not have told us an' they would."

"Good lack!—what count you then they be?"

"I reckon that they be of my Lord Cardinal's men."

"Have you any ground for that fantasy?"

"Methought I saw the nether end of a mitre, broidered on the sleeve of the shorter man, where his cloak was caught aside upon the settle knob. Look you, I am not sure; but I'm 'feared lest it so be."

"Jack, couldst thou stand the fire?"

"I wis not, Nichol. Could you?"

"I cast no doubt I could do all things through Christ, nor yet that without Christ I could do nothing."

"It may come close, ere long," said Banks gravely.

The two travellers, meanwhile, had mounted their horses, and were riding in the direction of Goudhurst. A third man followed them, leading a baggage-horse. As they went slowly along, the taller man said—

"Have you all you need, now, Malledge?"

"All but one matter, Master Sumner—we know not yet where Hall dwelleth. Trust me, but I coveted your grave face, when we heard tell of Tabby horsewhipping yon Benden!"

"He hath his demerits," said the sumner,—that is, the official who served the summonses to the ecclesiastical courts.

"Of that I cast no doubt; nor care I if Tabby thrash him every day, for my part. When come we in our proper persons, to do our work?"

"That cannot I tell. We must first make report to my Lord of Dover."

A young girl and a little child came tripping down the road. The short man drew bridle and addressed them.

"Pray you, my pretty maids, can you tell me where dwelleth Mistress Bradbridge? I owe her a trifle of money, and would fain pay the same."

"Oh yes, sir!" said little Patience Bradbridge eagerly; "she's my mother. She dwells in yon white house over the field yonder."

"And Master Roger Hall, where dwelleth he?"

Penuel Pardue hastily stopped her little friend's reply.

"Master Hall is not now at home, my masters, so it should be to no purpose you visit his house. I give you good-morrow."

"Wise maid!" said Malledge with a laugh, when the girls were out of hearing. "If all were as close as thou, we should thrive little."

"They are all in a story!" said the sumner.

"Nay, not all," replied Malledge. "We have one to thank. But truly, they are a close-mouthed set, the most of them."



CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.

THE JUSTICE IS INDISCREET.

"Methinks we be like to have further troubles touching religion in these parts. Marry, I do marvel what folks would be at, that they cannot be content to do their duty, and pay their dues, and leave the cure of their souls to the priest. As good keep a dog and bark thyself, say I, as pay dues to the priest and take thought for thine own soul."

The speaker was Mr Justice Roberts, and he sat at supper in his brother's house, one of a small family party, which consisted, beside the brothers, of their sister, Mistress Collenwood, Mistress Grena Holland, Gertrude, and Pandora. The speech was characteristic of the speaker. The Justice was by no means a bad man, as men go—and all of them do not go very straight in the right direction—but he made one mistake which many are making in our own day; he valued peace more highly than truth. His decalogue was a monologue, consisting but of one commandment: Do your duty. What a man's duty was, the Justice did not pause to define. Had he been required to do so, his dissection of that difficult subject would probably have run in three grooves—go to church; give alms; keep out of quarrels.

"It were verily good world, Master Justice, wherein every man should do his duty," was the answer of Mistress Grena, delivered in that slightly prim and didactic fashion which was characteristic of her.

"What is duty?" concisely asked Mistress Collenwood, who was by some ten years the elder of her brothers, and therefore the eldest of the company.

Gertrude's eyes were dancing with amusement; Pandora only looked interested.

"Duty," said Mr Roberts, the host, "is that which is due."

"To whom?" inquired his sister.

"To them unto whom he oweth it," was the reply; "first, to God; after Him, to all men."

"Which of us doth that?" said Mistress Collenwood softly, looking round the table.

Mistress Grena shook her head in a way which said, "Very few—not I."

Had Gertrude lived three hundred years later, she would have said what now she only thought—"I am sure I do my duty." But in 1557 young ladies were required to "hear, see, and say nought," and for one of them to join unasked in the conversation of her elders would have been held to be shockingly indecorous. The rule for girls' behaviour was too strict in that day; but if a little of it could be infused into the very lax code of the present time, when little misses offer their opinions on subjects of which they know nothing, and unblushingly differ from, or even contradict their mothers, too often without rebuke, it would be a decided improvement on social manners.

"Which of the folks in these parts be not doing their duty?" asked Mr Roberts of his brother.

"You know Benden of Briton's Mead?" replied the Justice.

"By sight; I am not well acquaint with him."

"Is he not an hard man, scarce well liked?" said his sister.

"True enough, as you shall say ere my tale come to an end. This Benden hath a wife—a decent Woman enough, as all men do confess, save that she is bitten somewhat by certain heretical notions that the priest cannot win her to lay by; will not come to mass, and so forth; but in all other fashions of good repute: and what doth this brute her husband but go himself to the Bishop, and beg—I do ensure you, beg his Lordship that this his wife may be arrest and lodged in prison. And in prison she is, and hath so been now these three or four months, on the sworn information of her own husband. 'Tis monstrous!"

"Truly, most shocking!" said Mistress Grena, cutting up the round of beef. The lady of the house always did the carving.

"Ah! As saith the old proverb: 'There is no worse pestilence than a familiar enemy,'" quoted the host.

"Well!" continued the Justice, with an amused look: "but now cometh a good jest, whereof I heard but yester-even. This Mistress Benden hath two brothers, named Hall—Roger and Thomas—one of whom dwelleth at Frittenden, and the other at yon corner house in Staplehurst, nigh to the Second Acre Close. Why, to be sure, he is your manager—that had I forgot."

Mr Roberts nodded. Pandora had pricked up her ears at the name of Hall, and now began to listen intently. Mistress Benden, of whom she heard for the first time, must be an aunt of her protegee, little Christabel.

"This Thomas Hall hath a wife, by name Tabitha, that the lads hereabout call Tabby, and by all accounts a right cat with claws is she. She, I hear, went up to Briton's Mead a two-three days gone, or maybe something more, and gave good Master Benden a taste of her horsewhip, that he hath since kept his bed—rather, I take it, from sulkiness than soreness, yet I dare be bound she handled him neatly. Tabitha is a woman of strong build, and lithe belike, that I would as lief not be horsewhipped by. Howbeit, what shall come thereof know I not. Very like she thought it should serve to move him to set Mistress Alice free: but she may find, and he belike, that 'tis easier to set a stone a-rolling down the hill than to stay it. The matter is now in my Lord of Dover's hands; and without Mistress Tabitha try her whip on him—"

Both gentlemen laughed. Pandora was deeply interested, as she recalled little Christie's delicate words, that Aunt Alice was "away at present." The child evidently would not say more. Pandora made up her mind that she would go and see Christie again as soon as possible, and meanwhile she listened for any information that she might give her.

"What is like to come of the woman, then?" said Mr Roberts, "apart from Mistress Tabitha and her whip?"

"Scarce release, I count," said the Justice gravely. "She hath been moved from the gaol; and that doubtless meaneth, had into straiter keeping."

"Poor fools!" said his brother, rather pityingly than scornfully.

"Ay, 'tis strange, in very deed, they cannot let be this foolish meddling with matters too high for them. If the woman would but conform and go to church, I hear, her womanish fantasies should very like be overlooked. Good lack I can a man not believe as he list, yet hold his tongue and be quiet, and not bring down the laws on his head?" concluded the Justice somewhat testily.

There was a pause, during which all were silent—from very various motives. Mr Roberts was thinking rather sadly that the only choice offered to men in those days was a choice of evils. He had never wished to conform—never would have done so, had he been let alone: but a man must look out for his safety, and take care of his property—of course he must!—and if the authorities made it impossible for him to do so with a good conscience, why, the fault was theirs, not his. Thus argued Mr Roberts, forgetting that the man makes a poor bargain who gains the whole world and loses himself. The Justice and Gertrude were simply enjoying their supper. No scruples of any kind disturbed their slumbering consciences. Mistress Collenwood's face gave no indication of her thoughts. Pandora was reflecting chiefly upon Christabel.

But there was one present whose conscience had been asleep, and was just waking to painful life. For nearly four years had Grena Holland soothed her many misgivings by some such reasoning as that of Mr Justice Roberts. She had conformed outwardly: had not merely abstained from contradictory speeches, but had gone to mass, had attended the confessional, had bowed down before images of wood and stone, and all the time had comforted herself by imagining that God saw her heart, and knew that she did not really believe in any of these things, but only acted thus for safety's sake. Now, all at once, she knew not how, it came on her as by a flash of lightning that she was on the road that leadeth to destruction, and not content with that, was bearing her young nieces along with her. She loved those girls as if she had been their own mother. Grave, self-contained, and undemonstrative as she was, she would almost have given her life for either, but especially for Pandora, who in face, and to some extent in character, resembled her dead mother, the sister who had been the darling of Grena Holland's heart. She recalled with keen pain the half-astonished, half-shrinking look on Pandora's face, as she had followed her to mass on the first holy-day after her return from Lancashire. Grena knew well that at Shardeford Hall, her mother's house in Lancashire, Pandora would never have been required to attend mass, but would have been taught that it was "a fond fable and a dangerous deceit." And now, she considered, that look had passed from the girl's face; she went silently, not eagerly on the one hand, yet unprotestingly, even by look, on the other. Forward into the possible future went Grena's imagination—to the prison, and the torture-chamber, and the public disgrace, and the awful death of fire. How could she bear those, either for herself or for Pandora?

These painful meditations were broken in upon by a remark from the Justice.

"There is some strong ale brewing, I warrant you, for some of our great doctors and teachers of this vicinage. I heard t'other day, from one that shall be nameless—indeed, I would not mention the matter, but we be all friends and good Catholics here—"

Mistress Collenwood's eyes were lifted a moment from her plate, but then went down again in silence.

"Well, I heard say two men of my Lord Cardinal's had already been a-spying about these parts, for to win the names of such as were suspect: and divers in and nigh Staplehurst shall hear more than they wot of, ere many days be over. Mine hostess at the White Hart had best look out, and—well, there be others; more in especial this Master Ro— Come, I'll let be the rest."

"I trust you have not said too much already," remarked Mr Roberts rather uneasily.

That the Justice also feared he had been indiscreet was shown by his slight testiness in reply.

"Tush! how could I? There's never a serving-man in the chamber, and we be all safe enough. Not the tail of a word shall creep forth, be sure."

"'Three may keep counsel, if twain be away,'" said Mr Roberts, shaking his head with a good-humoured smile.

"They do not alway then," added Mistress Collenwood drily.

"Well, well!" said the Justice, "you wot well enough, every one of you, the matter must go no further. Mind you, niece Gertrude, you slip it not forth to some chattering maid of your acquaintance."

"Oh, I am safe enough, good Uncle," laughed Gertrude.

"Indeed, I hope we be all discreet in such dangerous matters," added Mistress Grena.

Only Mrs Collenwood and Pandora were silent.



CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

OUT OF HEART.

"Aunt Grena," said Pandora Roberts, "if it stand with your pleasure, may I have leave to visit little Christabel Hall this fine morrow?"

"Thou shouldst, my dear heart, with my very good will," was the kindly answer; "but misfortunately, at this time I am not in case to accompany thee."

Pandora did not reply, but she looked greatly disappointed, when her aunt, Mistress Collenwood, suggested—

"Could not old Osmund go with her, Grena?"

"He might, if it were matter of grave concern," replied Mistress Grena, in a tone which indicated that the concern would have to be very grave indeed.

"Well, Dorrie, thou mayest clear those troubled eyes," said Mistress Collenwood with a smile: "for I myself will accompany thee to visit thy friend."

"You, Aunt Francis? Oh, I thank you!" said Pandora joyfully, passing in a moment from distress to delight.

In half-an-hour the horses were at the door. Not much was said during the ride to Staplehurst, except that Pandora told her aunt that Christabel was an invalid child, and that her father was the manager at the cloth-works. Christie, who of course was always at home, was rejoiced to see her friend; and Mistress Collenwood inquired closely into her ailments, ending with the suggestion, which she desired might be conveyed to her father, that Christie should rub her limbs with oil of swallows, and take a medicine compounded of plantain water and "powder of swine's claws."

"Father's in the house," said Christie. "He had to return back for some papers the master desired."

Roger Hall confirmed her words by coming into the room in a few minutes, with the papers in his hand which he had been sent to seek. He made a reverence to his master's relatives.

"Master Hall," said Mrs Collenwood, "I would gladly have a word with you touching your little maid's ailments."

Roger detected her desire to say something to him out of Christie's hearing, and led her to the kitchen, which was just then empty, as Nell was busy in the wash-house outside.

"I pray you to bar the door," said Mrs Collenwood.

Roger obeyed, rather wondering at the request. Mrs Collenwood shortly told him that she thought the oil of swallows might strengthen Christie's limbs, and the medicine improve her general health, but she so quickly dismissed that subject that it was plain she had come for something else. Roger waited respectfully till she spoke.

Speech seemed to be difficult to the lady. Twice she looked up and appeared to be on the point of speaking; and twice her eyes dropped, her face flushed, but her voice remained silent. At last she said—

"Master Hall, suffer me to ask if you have friends in any other county?"

Roger was considerably surprised at the question.

"I have, my mistress," said he, "a married sister that dwelleth in Norfolk, but I have not seen her these many years."

He thought she must mean that Christie's health would be better in some other climate, which was a strange idea to him, at a time when change of air was considered almost dangerous.

"Norfolk—should scarce serve," said the lady, in a timid, hesitating manner. "The air of the Green Yard at Norwich [where stood the Bishop's prison for heretics] is not o'er good. I think not of your little maid's health, Master Hall, but of your own."

Roger Hall was on the point of asserting with some perplexity and much amazement, that his health was perfect, and he required neither change nor medicine, when the real object of these faltering words suddenly flashed on him. His heart seemed to leap into his mouth, then to retreat to its place, beating fast.

"My mistress," he said earnestly, "I took not at the first your kindly meaning rightly, but I count I so do now. If so be, I thank you more than words may tell. But I must abide at my post. My sister Alice is not yet found; and should I be taken from the child"—his voice trembled for a moment—"God must have care of her."

"I will have a care of her, in that case," said Mrs Collenwood. "Master Hall, we may speak freely. What you are, I am. Now I have put my life in your hands, and I trust you to be true."

"I will guard it as mine own," answered Roger warmly, "and I give you the most heartiest thanks, my mistress, that a man wot how to utter. But if I may ask you, be any more in danger? My brother, and Master White, and Mistress Final—"