"Oh ay!" sighed the ex-scullery-maid.
"And hast marked how the dough, ere he be set in the oven, should take
any pattern thou list to set him on?"
"Ay."
"Then thou hast seen what the Lord Earl is like."
"But who setteth pattern on the Lord Earl?" inquired Maude, looking up
in some surprise.
"All the world, saving my Lady his wife, and likewise in his wrath.
Hast ever seen one of our Princes in a passion of ire?"
"Never had I luck yet to see one of their Graces," said Maude
reverently.
"Then thou wist not what a man _can_ be like when he is angered."
"But not, I ensure me, the Lady Custance!" objected Maude, loth to
surrender her Fairy Queen.
"Wait awhile and see!" was the ominous answer.
"Methought she were sweet and fair as my Lady her mother," said Maude in
a disappointed tone.
"`Sweet and fair'!--and soft, is my Lady Countess. Why, child, she
should hardly say this kirtle were red, an' Dame Joan told her it were
green. Thou mayest do aught with her, an' thou wist how to take her."
"How take you her?" demanded Maude gravely.
"By 'r Lady! have yonder fond [foolish] books of the Lutterworth parson
at thy tongue's end, and make up a sad face, and talk of faith and grace
and forgiving of sins and the like, and mine head to yon shred of tinsel
an' she give thee not a gown within the se'nnight."
"But, Mistress Alvena! that were to be an hypocrite, an' you felt it
not."
"Hu-te-tu! We be all hypocrites. Some of us feign for one matter, and
some for other. I wis somewhat thereabout, child; for ere I came hither
was I maid unto the Lady Julian [a fictitious person], recluse of
Tamworth Priory. By our dear Lady her girdle! saw I nothing of
hypocrisy there!"
"You never signify, Mistress, that the blessed recluse was an
hypocrite?"
"The blessed recluse was mighty fond of sweetbreads," said Alvena,
taking a pin out of her mouth, "and many an one smuggled I in to her
under my cloak, when Father Luke thought she was a-fasting on bread and
water. And one clereful [glorious] night had we, she and I, when one
that I knew had shot me a brace of curlews, and coming over moorland by
the church, he dropped them--all by chance, thou wist!--by the door of
the cell. And I, oping the door--to see if it rained, trow!--found
these birds a-lying there. Had we no supper that night!--and 'twas a
vigil even. The blessed martyr or apostle (for I mind me not what day
it were) forgive us!"
"But how dressed you them?" said Maude.
Alvena stopped in her fitting and pinning to laugh.
"Thou sely maid! The sacristan was my mother's brother."
Maude looked up as if she did not see the inference.
"I roasted them in the sacristy, child. The priests were all gone home
to bed; and so soon as the ground were clear, mine uncle rapped of the
door; and the Lady Julian came after me to the sacristy, close lapped in
my cloak--"
How long Alvena might have proceeded to shock Maude's susceptibilities
and outrage her preconceived opinions, it is impossible to say; for at
this moment Thurstan opened the door and announced in a rather
consequential manner--
"The Lord Le Despenser, to visit the Lady Custance, and Dame Margaret
his sister."
Maude lifted her eyes to the height of Alvena, and found that she had to
lower them to her own. A young lady of about sixteen entered, dressed
in a rose-coloured silk striped with gold, and a gold-coloured mantle
lined with the palest blue. She led by the hand a very pretty little
boy of ten or eleven years of age, attired in a velvet tunic of that
light, bright shade of apple-green which our forefathers largely used.
It was edged at the neck by a little white frill. He carried in his
hand a black velvet cap, from which depended a long and very full red
plume of ostrich feathers. His stockings were white silk, his boots red
leather, fastened with white buttons. The brother and sister were
alike, but the small, delicately-cut features of both were the more
delicate in the boy, and on his dark brown hair was a golden gloss which
was not visible on that of his sister.
"Give you good morrow, Mistress Alvena," said Dame Margaret pleasantly.
"The Lady Custance--may one have speech of her?"
Before Alvena could reply, the curtain which shrouded the door leading
to the Countess's rooms was drawn aside, and Constance came forward
herself.
"Good morrow, Meg," said she, kissing the young lady. "Thou hast
mistaken thy road, Tom."
"Wherefore so?" asked Dame Margaret; for her little brother was silent,
except that he offered a kiss in his turn, and looked rather
disconcerted when no notice was taken of it.
"Why, Ned is playing quoits below, and Tom should have bidden with him.
Come hither, Meg; I have a pretty thing to show thee."
"But Tom came to see your Ladyship."
"Well, he has seen me!" said the little Princess impatiently. "I love
not lads. They are fit for nought better than playing quoits. Let them
go and do it."
"What, Dickon?" said Margaret, smiling.
"Oh, Dickon!" returned Constance in a changed tone. "But Tom is not
Dickon. Neither is he an angel, I wis, for I heard him gainsay once his
preceptor."
Tom looked very unhappy at this raking up of bygone misdeeds.
"Methinks your Ladyship is in ill humour this morrow," said Margaret.
"Be not so hard on the lad, for he loveth you."
"When I love him, I will do him to wit," said Constance cuttingly.
"Come, Meg."
Dame Margaret obeyed the command, but she kept hold of the hand of her
little brother. When they were gone, Alvena laid down her work and
laughed.
"Thy Queen of Faery is passing gracious, Maude."
"She scarce seemed to matter the lad," was Maude's reply.
"Yet she hath sworn to do his bidding all the days of her life," said
Alvena.
"Why," said Maude, looking up in surprise, "would you say the Lady
Custance is troth-plight unto this imp?" [Little boy.]
"Nay, she is wedded wife. 'Tis five years or more sithence they were
wed. My Lady Custance had years four, and my Lord Le Despenser five.
They could but just syllable their vows. And I mind me, the Lady
Custance stuck at `obey,' and she had to be threatened with a
fustigation [beating, whipping] ere she would go on."
"But who dared threaten her?" inquired Maude.
"Marry, my Lord her father, which fell into a fit of ire to see her
perversity.--There goeth the dinner bell; lap thy work, child. For me,
I am well fain to hear it."
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note 1. The child was Constance, only daughter of Edmund Duke of York
(seventh son of Edward the Third) and Isabel of Castilla.
Note 2. Agnes de La Marche had been the nurse of two of Edward the
Third's sons, Lionel and Edmund. She lived to old age, and was long in
receipt of a pension from the Crown for her former service.
Note 3. Wycliffe's rendering of Revelations sixteen 6. In various
places he follows what are now determined to be the best and most
ancient authorities.