a few short extracts from
contemporary letters, in which the spelling would not pass muster these
days, but there were no real standards of spelling in those times. In
a very few cases in these letters we have adjusted the spelling to give
you, the reader, greater ease in comprehending them.

You may care to make this book into an audiobook, in which case it will
take about 12.5 hours to play. We hope you will do this because it will
make it much easier for you to enjoy the book.

________________________________________________________________________
IT MIGHT HAVE BEEN, BY EMILY SARAH HOLT.

PREFACE.

"There is a way that seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are
the ways of death." That is one of the main lessons to be learned from
the strange story of the Gunpowder Plot.

The narrative here given, so far as its historical portion is concerned,
is taken chiefly from original and contemporaneous documents. It has
been carefully kept to facts--in themselves more interesting than any
fiction--and scarcely a speech or an incident has been admitted, however
small, for which authority could not be adduced.

Those of my Readers who have made the acquaintance of _Lettice Eden_,
and _Joyce Morrell's Harvest_, will meet some old friends in this tale.

CHAPTER ONE.

THE LAST NIGHT IN THE OLD HOME.

"Which speaks the truth--fair Hope or ghastly Fear?
God knoweth, and not I.
Only, o'er both, Love holds her torch aloft,
And will, until I die."

"Fiddle-de-dee! Do give over snuffing and snivelling and sobbing, and
tell me if you want your warm petticoat in the saddle-bag. You'd make a
saint for to swear!" More sobs, and one or two disjointed words, were
all that came in answer. The sobbing sister, who was the younger of the
pair, wore widow's mourning, and was seated in a rocking-chair near the
window of a small, but very comfortable parlour. Her complexion was
pale and sallow, her person rather slightly formed, and her whole
appearance that of a frail, weak little woman, who required perpetual
care and shielding. The word require has two senses, and it is here
used in both. She needed it, and she exacted it.

The elder sister, who stood at the parlour door, was about as unlike the
younger as could well be. She was quite a head taller, rosy-cheeked,
sturdily-built, and very brisk in her motions. Disjointed though her
sister's words were, she took them up at once.