carving was
properly Lady Enville's prerogative; but as with all things which gave
her trouble, she preferred to delegate it to her sister-in-law.

Sir Thomas came in late, and said grace hastily. The Elizabethan grace
was not limited to half-a-dozen words. It took about as long as family
prayers usually do now. Jack, in his usual style, came scampering in
just when grace was finished.

"Good sooth! I have had such discourse with Master Tremayne," said Sir
Thomas. "He hath the strangest fantasies. Only look you--"

"A shive of beef, Sister?" interpolated Rachel, who had no notion of
allowing the theoretical to take precedence of the practical.

Lady Enville languidly declined anything so gross as beef. She would
take a little--very little--of the venison pasty.

"I'll have beef, Aunt!" put in unseasonable Jack.

"Wilt thou have manners?" severely returned Rachel.

"Where shall I find them, Aunt?" coolly inquired Jack, letting his eyes
rove about among the dishes. "May I help you likewise?"

"Behave thyself, Jack!" said his father, laughing.

The rebuke was neutralised by the laughter. Rachel went on carving in
dignified silence.

"Would you think it?" resumed Sir Thomas, when everybody was helped, and
conversation free to flow. "Master Tremayne doth conceive that we
Christian folk be meant to learn somewhat from those ancient Jews that
did wander about with Moses in the wilderness. Ne'er heard I no such a
fantasy. To conceive that we can win knowledge from the rotten old
observances of those Jew rascals! Verily, this passeth!"

"Beats the Dutch, Sir!" said incorrigible Jack.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Note 1. All members of the Enville family and household are fictitious
persons.

CHAPTER THREE.

BREAKERS AHEAD.

"Our treasures moth and rust corrupt:
Or thieves break through and steal; or they
Make themselves wings and fly away.
One man made merry as he supped,
Nor guessed how, when that night grew dim,
His soul should be required of him."

_Ellen Alleyn_.

Eleven years had passed away since the events of the previous chapters,
and in the room where we first saw her, Rachel Enville sat with the four
girls around her. Little girls no longer,--young ladies now; for the
youngest, Blanche, was not far from her fifteenth birthday. Margaret--
now a young woman of four-and-twenty, and only not married because her
betrothe