'"Yes, to be sure. What a good thought, Frances! What was I about, not to think of it before? I'll write to my father too. Perhaps between them they might manage. They might petition the King. We won't despair. There are many worse off than we are, child."
'"Where shall we get paper and pens and ink?" I said, longing to begin, but casting a despairing glance round the room which was bare of any furniture but the table, and a couple of long benches on either side of it.
'"I have got them all in my trunk. Mrs. Fortescue thought of that," replied Henrietta. "She never forgets anything, I believe."
'It was a great comfort to have something to do. My fears for Bessie did not make me quite so unhappy when I was telling mamma all about them. Writing home made me feel less lonely; and, besides, there was the hope (I tried hard to think the certainty) that an answer to my petition would set all our misgivings at rest, and prove that my father was able and willing to pay any amount of money rather than that a hair of Bessie's head should be injured.
'Thus the afternoon slipped away much more quickly than the morning had done. Writing a letter was a serious business, and absorbed all our attention. Even Henrietta, who was considered one of the most accomplished of Madame St. Aubert's young ladies, proceeded very slowly, and paused a long time when she had to spell a difficult word; while, as for my epistle, it was so disfigured by blots, tears, bad writing, and mistakes, that I began to have grave doubts, as I went down, whether mamma would be able to read it. Then I had to consider what I had better say to interest my father in Bessie's case. I was so afraid of him, that I doubt if anything short of Bessie's danger would have made me bold enough to ask him a favour; but I would have done anything for her, and so I laboured away till my fingers were soaked with ink, and my head ached with composing sentences that should be as respectful as mamma could think necessary, and at the same time as urgent as I could make them.
'Bessie came to see what we were doing after a time, and said mournfully that her writing to her uncle was of no use, for she did not know where he was. She had never heard a word from him since the Battle of Sedgemoor. I was so afraid that she would see what I had written about poor Sir Geoffrey, that I put my arm on my letter, while I drew Bessie down to give her an affectionate kiss, and in consequence made the blots ten times worse. Then I laughed hysterically; and if it had not been for the example set me by Henrietta's grave face, I should have revealed the whole truth then and there.
'"How do you mean to send the letter?" asked Bessie, when she had comforted me for the blots by the assurance that mamma would not care.
'"I shall give them to the jailer next time I see him," replied Henrietta, "and beg him to give them into the keeping of the first letter-carrier that rides from Taunton. I think he will do it, especially if I give him a little money. He was not nearly so rough with us as that dreadful Master Noakes."
'"Don't let any one see you, then," said Bessie, lowering her voice. "That girl I was talking to but a moment ago, told me there are some women here who will never rest till they get every farthing of your money, if you let them find out that you have any. They bribe the jailer to get them drink whenever they can scrape a little money together, and then the noise they make is fearful."
'Bessie glanced, as she spoke, to the further end of the room, where sat a group of those women who had frightened us so much in the morning by their loud voices and reckless language. They were playing cards with a very greasy pack, and had done little else but quarrel over their game ever since dinner. The noise they made was distracting enough now, and what it would be when they were excited by drink we trembled to imagine. Alas! we knew only too well before the evening was over; for though Henrietta's purse remained safe hidden in her bosom, the prisoners found some other means of getting what they wanted, and the scene which ensued is beyond my power to describe. I do not suppose any of us were as fastidious as you would be now. For a gentleman to drink more wine than was good for him, was so sadly common in those days, that we had all seen instances of it in our own homes or amongst our father's guests; but the revel which was held in that wretched room was unlike anything we had ever seen before. We could only cower into a corner and try to remain blind and deaf to the shouts, the songs, the fighting, and quarrelling that were going on around us, and which continued, it seemed to me, hour after hour, until sleep overpowered the most noisy of the revellers, and they sank down, one after another, on the heaps of straw, which were their only beds. Silence reigned again, broken only by the deep snores which announced that our dreaded companions would alarm us no longer. The rest of the prisoners soon followed their example; and we were left the only wakeful ones, talking in frightened whispers, and not daring to move from our cramped position, lest we should rouse some of those still shapeless figures which lay ranged around the floor. How strange it was to sit there in the dim light watching the shadows grow blacker as the moon rose and peeped in at the high, narrow window. Bessie's golden hair looked pale and unnatural as the cold, white light fell upon it; and I hardly knew the pale, grave face for the same as the merry, bright one I loved so well. Yes, that night was indeed a miserable one. Even now it makes me quite melancholy whenever I think of it. I remember falling repeatedly into a kind of half-doze, and waking with a violent start each time from the same dream. I thought Master Noakes was trying to push me down-stairs. I did at last fall into a restless, uncomfortable sleep for a few hours, but all the time I never seemed quite to forget where I was; and when I woke at dawn, it was with a consciousness of something terrible hanging over me, though I could not at first distinctly recall what it was. So I raised my head from Henrietta's lap (it was on Bessie's I had gone to sleep), and looked round the great dismal room. Everything rushed back into my mind in a moment then: all the painful events of the day before—the past trouble and fear, and, what was yet worse, the dread of what might be to come. Henrietta was awake: she was sitting upright, supporting herself against the stone wall, and looking miserably white and tired, as if she had not slept the whole night.