held him by the wrist.

'Then unpouch quickly thy Cleves papers,' he said; 'we have but a
little time to turn them round.'

Udal's thin hand sought nervously the opening of his jerkin beneath
his gown: he drew it back, moved it forward again, and stood quivering
with doubt.

Throckmorton stood vaingloriously back upon his feet and combed his
great beard with his white fingers.

'Magister,' he uttered triumphantly, 'well you wot that such a man as
you cannot plot for himself alone; you will make naught of your
treasure trove save a cleft neck!'

And, furtively, cringing back into the dark hangings, a bent, broken
figure like a miser unpouching his gold, Udal undid his breast
lacings.

* * * * *

It was hot from this colloquy that Margot Poins had led the two men in
upon her mistress in her large dim room. Because she hated the great
spy, since he loved Kat Howard and had undone many good men with false
tales, she had not been able to keep her tongue from seeking to wound
him.

'Ye are too true to mix in plots,' she brought out gruffly.

Cicely Rochford came close to Katharine and measured her neck with the
span of her small hand.

'There is room!' she said. 'Hast a long and a straight neck.'

Her husband muttered that he liked not these talkings. By diligent
avoidance of such, he had kept his own hair and neck uncut in
troublesome times.

'I will take thee to another place,' Cicely threw at him over her
shoulder. 'Shalt kiss me in a dark room. It is very certain maids'
talk is no fit hearing for thy jolly old ears.'

She took him delicately at the end of his short white beard between
her long finger and thumb, and, with her high and mincing step, led
him through the door.

'God save this room, where all the virtues bide!' she cried out, and
drew her overskirt closer to her as she passed near the great, bearded
spy.

Katharine turned and faced Throckmorton.

It is even as the maid saith,' she uttered. 'I am too true to mix in
plots.'

'Neither will ye give us to death!' Throckmorton faced her back so
that she paused for breath, and the pause lasted a full minute.

'Sir,' she said, 'I do give you a fair and a full warning that, if you
do plot against Privy Seal, and if knowledge of your plotting cometh
to mine ears--though I ask not to know of them--I will tell of your
plottings----'

'Oh, before God!' Udal cried out, 'I have suckled you with learned
writers; I ha