CHAPTER XI.
BREATHING-TIME.
As Aliva entered the little chapel on the bridge, she saw, in the uncertain twilight, two figures kneeling before the altar. One was that of a stalwart young man in the garb of a lay-brother of the Benedictine order, and the other that of an elderly woman in the dress of a peasant.
Both rose from their knees, disturbed by the hurried entrance of Aliva, and were surprised to see before them a lady of the upper classes so damp and bedraggled and hoodless. The heart of the woman was touched.
"Lack-a-day, lady!" she exclaimed; "hast thou been in Ouse water?" she added, with a slight shudder.
"I have come here for rest," replied Aliva, not wishing to reveal her story to peasant strangers. "I have indeed, as you say, suffered somewhat by mishap in a stream, and I have lost my horse."
As she spoke, the sound of her voice, and a closer scrutiny of her features, increased the astonishment of the two listeners.
"Gramercy on us!" cried the woman; "if this is not our lady from Bletsoe!"
Aliva looked more narrowly at her, and then at the lay-brother.
"Our Lady be praised!" she murmured faintly; "I find friends. Are you not the wife of Goodman Hodges; and is this not your son, the lay-brother from St. Alban's?"