each from the carved roundel in the centre of the table, and seemed
absorbed in its contemplation.

Ralph had had some scruples at first about reporting private
conversations, but Cromwell had quieted them long since, chiefly by the
force of his personality, and partly by the argument that a man's duty
to the State over-rode his duty to his friends, and that since only talk
that was treasonable would be punished, it was simpler to report all
conversations in general that had any suspicious bearing, and that he
himself was most competent to judge whether or no they should be
followed up. Ralph, too, had become completely reassured by now that no
injury would be done to his own status among his friends, since his
master had never yet made direct use of any of his information in such a
manner as that it was necessary for Ralph to appear as a public witness.
And again, too, he had pointed out that the work had to be done, and
that was better for the cause of justice and mercy that it should be
done by conscientious rather than by unscrupulous persons.

He talked to him now very freely about the conversations in his father's
house, knowing that Cromwell did not want more than a general specimen
sketch of public feeling in matters at issue.

"They have great faith in the Maid of Kent, sir," he said. "My
brother-in-law, Nicholas, spoke of her prophecy of his Grace's death. It
is the devout that believe in her; the ungodly know her for a fool or a
knave."

"_Filii hujus saeculi prudentiores sunt_,"--quoted Cromwell gravely.
"Your brother-in-law, I should think, was a child of light."

"He is, sir."

"I should have thought so. And what else did you hear?"

"There is a good deal of memory of the Lady Katharine, sir. I heard the
foresters talking one day."

"What of the Religious houses?"

Ralph hesitated.

"My brother Christopher has just gone to Lewes," he said. "So I heard
more of the favourable side, but I heard a good deal against them, too.
There was a secular priest talking against them one day, with our
chaplain, who is a defender of them."

"Who was he?" asked Cromwell, with the same sharp, oblique glance.

"A man of no importance, sir; the parson of Great Keynes."

"The Holy Maid is in trouble," went on the other after a minute's
silence. "She is in my Lord of Canterbury's hands, and we can leave her
there. I suppose she will be hanged."

Ralph waited. He knew it was no good asking too much.

"What she