man heart which lie so open to God, but scarcely read by man himself,
there was a mustard-seed of faith--a faint "Who can tell?" which did not
rise to hope--and certainly a love ready to endure all if it might gain
its blessed end.

"Sir," said Perrote, "I entreat a moment's speech of you."

Sir Godfrey, who was sauntering under the trees in the garden, stopped
and looked at her. Had he spoken out his thoughts, he would have said,
"What on earth does this bothering old woman want?" As it was, he stood
silent, and waited for her to proceed.

"Sir, my Lady is full sick."

"Well! let Father Jordan see her."

"He hath seen her, Sir, and full little can he do."

"What would you? No outer physician can be called in."

"Ah, Sir, forgive me, but I am thinking rather of the soul than the
body: it is the worser of the twain."

"Verily, I guess not how, for she should be hard put to it to commit
mortal sin, when mewed for eight years in one chamber. Howbeit, if so
be, what then? Is not Father Jordan a priest? One priest is full as
good as another."

"Once more, forgive me, Sir! For the need that I behold, one priest is
not as good as another. It is not a mass that my Lady needeth to be
sung; it is counsel that she lacketh."

"Then let Father Jordan counsel her."

"Sir, he cannot."

"Cannot! What for, trow? Hath he lost his wits or his tongue?"

"No, he hath lost nothing, for that which he lacketh I count he never
had, or so little thereof that it serveth not in this case. Man cannot
sound a fathom with an inch-line. Sir, whether you conceive me or not,
whether you allow me or no, I do most earnestly entreat you to suffer
that my Lady may speak with one of the poor priests that go about in
frieze coats bound with leather girdles. They have whereof to minister
to her need."

Sir Godfrey thought contemptuously that there was no end to the fads and
fancies of old women. His first idea of a reply was to say decidedly
that it was not possible to trust any outsider with the cherished secret
of the Countess's hiding-place; his next, that the poor priests were in
tolerably high favour with the great, that the King had commanded the
prisoner to be well treated, that the priest might be sworn to secrecy,
and that if the Countess were really near her end, little mischief would
be done. Possibly, in his inner soul, too, a power was at work which he
was not capable of recognising.

"Humph!" was all he said; but