uctantly
thought it due to Mr. Talbot to invite his presence, but he declined.
He and his son had much to say to one another, he observed, and not
long to say it in.

"Besides," he added, when he found himself alone with Humfrey, having
despatched Diccon on some errand to the stables, "'tis a sorry sight to
see all the poor Lady's dainty hoards turned out by strangers. If it
must be, it must, but it would irk me to be an idle gazer thereon."

"I would only," said Humfrey, "be assured that they would not light on
the proofs of Cicely's birth."

"Thou mayst be at rest on that score, my son. The Lady saw them, owned
them, and bade thy mother keep them, saying ours were safer hands than
hers. Thy mother was sore grieved, Humfrey, when she saw thee not; but
she sends thee her blessing, and saith thou dost right to stay and
watch over poor little Cis."

"It were well if I were watching over her," said Humfrey, "but she is
mewed up at Tixall, and I am only keeping guard over poor Mistress
Seaton and the rest."

"Thou hast seen her?"

"Yea, and she was far more our own sweet maid than when she came back
to us at Bridgefield."

And Humfrey told his father all he had to tell of what he had seen and
heard since he had been at Chartley. His adventures in London had
already been made known by Diccon. Mr. Talbot was aghast, perhaps most
of all at finding that his cousin Cuthbert was a double traitor. From
the Roman Catholic point of view, there had been no treason in his
former machinations on behalf of Mary, if she were in his eyes his
rightful sovereign, but the betrayal of confidence reposed in him was
so horrible that the good Master Richard refused to believe it, till he
had heard the proofs again and again, and then he exclaimed,

"That such a Judas should ever call cousin with us!"

There could be little hope, as both agreed, of saving the unfortunate
victims; but Richard was all the more bent on fulfilling Lord
Shrewsbury's orders, and doing his utmost for Babington. As to
Humfrey, it would be better that he should remain where he was, so that
Cicely might have some protector near her in case of any sudden
dispersion of Mary's suite.

"Poor maiden!" said her foster-father, "she is in a manner ours, and we
cannot but watch over her; but after all, I doubt me whether it had not
been better for her and for us, if the waves had beaten the little life
out of her ere I carried her home."

"She hath been the jo