umbling out, who ran beneath my hiding-hole and out through
the kitchen passage to the stable. I was all a-tremble now, especially
at my cousin's cry; but I gave her credit for being as shrewd still as I
had heard her to be on the stairs; and I proved right in the event; for
almost immediately after that my Cousin Tom was let come downstairs, and
I heard every word, of the colloquy.

"Well, Mr. Jermyn," said the gentleman's voice, immediately without my
little door, "I am sorry indeed to have troubled you in this way; but I
am the King's justice of the peace and I must do my duty. Which way did
you say Mr. Mallock was gone?"

"By...by Puckeridge," stammered poor Tom.

"Ah! indeed," said the other voice, with something of a sneer in it.
"Why Mistress Dorothy here says it was by Barkway and so to Harwich; and
of the two versions I prefer the lady's. For, first, we should have seen
him if he had come by Puckeridge, since we have been lying there since
three o'clock this afternoon; and second, no such man in his senses
would go to Rome by London. I am sorry I cannot commend your
truthfulness, Mr. Jermyn, as much as your professions of loyalty."

"I tell you--" began my Cousin Tom, angrily enough.

"I need no telling, Mr. Jermyn. Your cousin is gone by Barkway; and my
men are gone to get the horses out to follow him. We shall catch him
before Newmarket, I make no doubt."

Then I heard Dolly's sobbing as she clung to her father.

"Oh! father! father!" she mourned. "The gentleman forced it out of me. I
could not help it. I could not help it!"

(As for me, I smiled near from ear to ear in the dark, to hear how well
she feigned grief; and I think I loved my Cousin Dolly then as never
before. It would have made a cat laugh, too, to hear the gentleman's
chivalry in return.)

"Mistress Dorothy," he said, "I grieve to have troubled you like this.
But you have done your duty as an English maid should; and set your
loyalty to His Majesty before all else."

Mistress Dorothy sobbed so admirably in return that my own eyes filled
with tears to hear her; and I was a little sorry for the poor gentleman
too. He was so stupid, and yet so well mannered too now that he had got
all that he wanted, or thought he had.

"Well, mistress, and Mr. Jermyn, I must not delay any longer. The horses
will be ready."

They moved away still talking, all except my Cousin Dolly who sank upon
the stairs still sobbing. She cried out after Mr. Harris