drunk, "a very generous wine. You
nuns know the best in liquor; be careful, I pray you, to include it in
your inventory. Why, woman, are you not one of those whom that Abbot
would have burnt? Yes, and there is your mistress, Dame Foterell, or
Dame Harflete, with whom I desire a word."

"I am at your service, Sir," said Cicely.

"Well, Madam, you and your servant have escaped the stake to which, as
near as I can judge, you were sentenced upon no evidence at all. Still,
you were condemned by a competent ecclesiastical Court, and under that
condemnation you must therefore remain until or unless the King pardons
you. My judgment is, then, that you stay here awaiting his command."

"But, Sir," said Cicely, "if the good nuns who have befriended me are to
be driven forth, how can I dwell on in their house alone? Yet you say
I must not leave it, and indeed if I could, whither should I go? My
husband's hall is burnt, my own the Abbot holds. Moreover, if I bide
here, in this way or in that he will have my life."

"The knave has fled away," said Dr. Legh, rubbing his fat chin.

"Aye, but he will come back again, or his people will, and, Sir, you
know these Spaniards are good haters, and I have defied him long. Oh,
Sir, I crave the protection of the King for my child's sake and my own,
and for Emlyn Stower also."

The Commissioner went on rubbing his chin.

"You can give much evidence against this Maldon, can you not?" he asked
at length.

"Aye," broke in Emlyn, "enough to hang him ten times over, and so can
I."

"And you have large estates which he has seized, have you not?"

"I have, Sir, who am of no mean birth and station."

"Lady," he said, with more deference in his voice, "step aside with me,
I would speak with you privately," and he walked to the window, where
she followed him. "Now tell me, what was the value of these properties
of yours?"

"I know not rightly, Sir, but I have heard my father say about L300 a
year."

His manner became more deferential still, since for those days such
wealth was great.

"Indeed, my Lady. A large sum, a very comfortable fortune if you can get
it back. Now I will be frank with you. The King's Commissioners are not
well paid and their costs are great. If I so arrange your matters
that you come to your own again and that the judgment of witchcraft
pronounced against you and your servant is annulled, will you promise to
pay me one year's rent of these estates to meet the vario