such moment that it may not wait till morning or be despatched by me."

"That is for you to say, Master Francis. What think you of this for a
toy?" as he produced the parcel with the whistle and its contents. "I
went home betimes to-day, as you know, and found my boy Humfrey had
just made young Master Babington taste of his fists for trying to make
our little wench pass this packet to yonder huckster-woman who was
succoured some months back by the Queen of Scots."

Francis Talbot silently took the whistle and unrolled the long narrow
strip of paper. "This is the cipher," said he, "the cipher used in
corresponding with her French kin; Phillipps the decipherer showed me
the trick of it when he was at Tutbury in the time of the Duke of
Norfolk's business. Soh! your son hath done good service, Richard.
That lad hath been tampered with then, I thought he was over thick with
the lady in the lodge. Where is he, the young traitor?"

"At Bridgefield, under my wife's ward, having his bruises attended to.
I would not bring him up here till I knew what my Lord would have done
with him. He is but a child, and no doubt was wrought with by sweet
looks, and I trust my Lord will not be hard with him."

"If my father had hearkened to me, he should never have been here,"
said Francis. "His father was an honest man, but his mother was, I
find, a secret recusant, and when she died, young Antony was quite old
enough to have sucked in the poison. You did well to keep him,
Richard; he ought not to return hither again, either in ward or at
liberty."

"If he were mine, I would send him to school," said Richard, "where the
masters and the lads would soon drive out of him all dreams about
captive princesses and seminary priests to boot. For, Cousin Francis,
I would have you to know that my children say there is a rumour that
this woman Tibbott the huckstress hath been seen in a doublet and hose
near Chesterfield."

"The villain! When is she looked for here again?"

"Anon, I should suppose, judging by the boy leaving this charge with
Cis in case she should come while he is gone to Chatsworth."

"We will take order as to that," said Francis, compressing his lips; "I
know you will take heed, cousin, that she, or he, gets no breath of
warning. I should not wonder if it were Parsons himself!" and he
unfolded the scroll with the air of a man seeking to confirm his
triumph.

"Can you make anything of it?" asked Richard, struck by it