went out riding with Thomas Bolle, who was fully
armed, as she said, to try two of the horses that should carry them on
the morrow, and it was late when she returned out of the dark night.

"Have you got them?" asked Cicely, when they were together in their
room.

"Aye," she answered, "every one; but some stones have fallen, and it
was hard to win an entrance to that vault. Indeed, had it not been for
Thomas Bolle, who has the strength of a bull, I could never have done
it. Moreover, the Abbot has been there before us and dug over every inch
of the floor. But the fool never thought of the wall, so all's well.
I'll sew half of them into my petticoat and half into yours, to share
the risk. In case of thieves, the money that hungry Visitor has left to
us, for I paid him over half when you signed the deeds, we will carry
openly in pouches upon our girdles. They'll not search further. Oh, I
forgot, I've something more besides the jewels, here it is," and she
produced a packet from her bosom and laid it on the table.

"What's this?" asked Cicely, looking suspiciously at the worn sail-cloth
in which it was wrapped.

"How can I tell? Cut it and see. All I know is that when I stood at the
Nunnery door as Thomas led away the horses, a man crept on me out of the
rain swathed in a great cloak and asked if I were not Emlyn Stower. I
said Yea, whereon he thrust this into my hand, bidding me not fail to
give it to the Lady Harflete, and was gone."

"It has an over-seas look about it," murmured Cicely, as with eager,
trembling fingers she cut the stitches. At length they were undone and a
sealed inner wrapping also, revealing, amongst other documents, a little
packet of parchments covered with crabbed, unreadable writing, on the
back of which, however, they could decipher the names of Shefton and
Blossholme by reason of the larger letters in which they were engrossed.
Also there was a writing in the scrawling hand of Sir John Foterell, and
at the foot of it his name and, amongst others, those of Father Necton
and of Jeffrey Stokes. Cicely stared at the deeds, then said--

"Emlyn, I know these parchments. They are those that my father took with
him when he rode for London to disprove the Abbot's claim, and with them
the evidence of the traitorous words he spoke last year at Shefton. Yes,
this inner wrapping is my own; I took it from the store of worn linen in
the passage-cupboard. But how come they here?"

Emlyn made no answer,