t report Privy Seal would act, and, if they brought him
a false report, Privy Seal would act falsely.

Udal stood perfectly still, looking at nothing, his thin brown hand
clasped round his thin brown chin.

'But, above all,' Throckmorton had concluded, 'show ye no papers to
Kat Howard. For it is very certain that she will have no falsehoods
employed to bring down Privy Seal, though she hate him as the
Assyrian cockatrice hateth the symbol of the Cross.'

'Sir Throckmorton,' Margot Poins had uttered, 'though ye be a paid
spy, ye speak true words there.'

He pulled his beard and blinked at her.

'I am minded to reform,' he said. 'Your mistress hath worked a miracle
of conversion in me.'

She shrugged her great fair shoulders at this, and spoke to the
magister:

'It is very true,' she said, 'that this spying knight affects my
mistress. But whether it be for the love of virtue, or for the love of
her body, or because the cat jumps that way and there he observeth
fortune to rise, I leave to God who reads all hearts.'

'There speaks a wench brought up and taught by Protestants,'
Throckmorton gibed pleasantly at her; 'or ye have caught the trick of
Kat Howard, who, though she be a Papist as good as I, yet prates
virtue like a Lutheran.'

'Ye lie!' Margot said; 'my mistress getteth her virtue from good
letters.'

Throckmorton smiled at her again.

'Wench,' he said, 'in all save doctrine, this Kat Howard and her
learning are nearer Lutheran than of the old faith.'

With his malice he set himself to bewilder Margot. They made a little,
shadowy knot in the long corridor. For he wished to give Udal, who in
his long gown stood deaf-faced, like a statue of contemplation, the
time to come to a conclusion.

'Why, you are a very mean wag,' Margot said. 'I have heard my
uncle--who is, as ye wot, a Protestant and a printer--I have heard him
speak of Luther and of Bucer and of the word of God and suchlike
canting books, but never once of Seneca and Tully, that my mistress
loves.'

'Why, ye are learning the trick of tongues,' Throckmorton mocked.
'Please God, when your mistress cometh to be Queen--may He send it
soon!--there shall be such a fashion and contagion of talking----'

Having his eyes on Udal, he broke off suddenly, and said with a harsh
sharpness:

'I have given you time to make a resolution. Speak quickly. Will you
come into our boat with us that will bring down Privy Seal?'

Udal winced, but Throckmorton