e be daily angering the
Lord. He's always forgiving us, be sure."

"A sight easier than men do, Collet Pardue, take my word for it."

"What mean you, neighbour?" asked Collet, turning round to look her
companion in the face, for Emmet's tone had indicated that she meant
more than she said.

"I mean one man in especial, and his name's Bastian."

"What, the priest? Dear heart! I've not angered him, trow?"

"You soon will, _if_ you cut your cloth as you've measured it. How many
times were you at mass this three months past?"

"How many were you?" was the half-amused answer.

"There's a many in Staplehurst as hasn't been no oftener," said Emmet,
"that I know: but it'll not save you, Collet. The priest has his eye on
you, be sure."

"Then I'll keep mine on him," said Collet sturdily, as she paused at her
own door, which was that of the one little shoemaker's shop in the
village of Staplehurst. "Good-morrow, neighbour. I'll but lay down my
fardel, and then step o'er to poor Sens Bradbridge."

"And I'll come to see her this even. Good-morrow."

And Emmet Wilson walked on further to her home, where her husband was
the village baker and corn-monger.

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

Note 1. Emmet is a very old variation of Emma, and sometimes spelt
Emmot; Sens is a corruption of Sancha, naturalised among us in the
thirteenth century; and Collet or Colette, the diminutive of Nichola, a
common and favourite name in the Middle Ages.

CHAPTER TWO.

CHRISTABEL.

Alice Benden had reached Cranbrook, and was busied with her various
errands. Her position was slightly superior to that of Emmet and
Collet, for she was the wife of a man who "lived upright," which
enigmatical expression signified that he had not to work for his living.
Edward Benden's father had made a little money, and his son, who had no
children to whom to leave his property, chose to spend it rather than
bequeath it to distant relatives who were strangers to him. He owned
some half-dozen houses at Staplehurst, one of which was occupied by the
Pardues, and he lived on the rents of these, and the money saved by his
thrifty father. The rents he asked were not unreasonable, but if a
tenant failed to pay, out he must go. He might as well appeal to the
door-posts as to Edward Benden.

This agreeable gentleman treated his wife much as he did his tenants.
He gave a sum of money into her hands for certa