"And what said the squire and dame?"
"That I should then be indeed their daughter."
"And hath the contract gone no farther?"
"No, madam. He hath been to the North with Captain Frobisher, and since that to the Western Main, and we look for his return even now."
"How long is it since this pledge, as thou callest it, was given?"
"Five years next Lammas tide, madam."
"Was it by ring or token?"
"No, madam. Our mother said we were too young, but Humfrey meant it with all his heart."
"Humfrey! That was the urchin who must needs traverse the correspondence through the seeming Tibbott, and so got Antony removed from about us. A stout lubberly Yorkshire lad, fed on beef and pudding, a true Talbot, a mere English bull-dog who will have lost all the little breeding he had, while committing spulzie and piracy at sea on his Catholic Majesty's ships. Bah, mon enfant, I am glad of it. Had he been a graceful young courtly page like the poor Antony, it might have been a little difficult, but a great English carle like that, whom thou hast not seen for five years—" She made a gesture with her graceful hands as if casting away a piece of thistledown.
"Humfrey is my very good—my very good brother, madam," cried Cicely, casting about for words to defend him, and not seizing the most appropriate.