However, she then turned her attention to the accounts, where Sir Andrew Melville was ready to question and debate every item set down by Shrewsbury's steward; while his mistress showed herself liberal and open-handed. Indeed she had considerable command of money from her French dowry, the proceeds of which were, in spite of the troubles of the League, regularly paid to her, and no doubt served her well in maintaining the correspondence which, throughout her captivity, eluded the vigilance of her keepers. On taking leave of her, which Richard Talbot did before joining his host at the mid-day meal, she reiterated her thanks for his care of her daughter, and her charges to let no persuasion induce him to consent to Babington's overtures, adding that she hoped soon to obtain permission to have the maiden amongst her authorised attendants. She gave him a billet, loosely tied with black floss silk and unsealed, so that if needful, Sadler and Shrewsbury might both inspect the tender, playful, messages she wrote to her "mignonne," and which she took care should not outrun those which she had often addressed to Bessie Pierrepoint.
Cicely was a little disappointed when she first opened the letter, but ere long she bethought herself of the directions she had received to hold such notes to the fire, and accordingly she watched, waiting even till the next day before she could have free and solitary access to either of the two fires in the house, those in the hall and in the kitchen.
At last, while the master was out farming, Ned at school, and the mistress and all her maids engaged in the unsavoury occupation of making candles, by repeated dipping of rushes into a caldron of melted fat, after the winter's salting, she escaped under pretext of attending to the hall fire, and kneeling beside the glowing embers, she held the paper over it, and soon saw pale yellow characters appear and deepen into a sort of brown or green, in which she read, "My little jewel must share the ring with none less precious. Yet be not amazed if commendations as from me be brought thee. Jewels are sometimes useful to dazzle the eyes of those who shall never possess them. Therefore seem not cold nor over coy, so as to take away all hope. It may be much for my service. Thou art discreet, and thy good guardians will hinder all from going too far. It might be well that he should deem thee and me inclined to what they oppose. Be secret. Keep thine own counsel, and let them not even guess what thou hast here read. So fare thee well, with my longing, yearning blessing."
Cicely hastily hid the letter in the large housewifely pocket attached to her girdle, feeling excited and important at having a real secret unguessed by any one, and yet experiencing some of the reluctance natural to the pupil of Susan Talbot at the notion of acting a part towards Babington. She really liked him, and her heart warmed to him as a true friend of her much-injured mother, so that it seemed the more cruel to delude him with false hopes. Yet here was she asked to do a real service to her mother!
Poor Cis, she knelt gazing perplexed into the embers, now and then touching a stick to make them glow, till Nat, the chief of "the old blue bottles of serving-men," came in to lay the cloth for dinner, exclaiming, "So, Mistress Cis! Madam doth cocker thee truly, letting thee dream over the coals, till thy face be as red as my Lady's new farthingale, while she is toiling away like a very scullion."
CHAPTER XXI.
A TANGLE.
It was a rainy November afternoon. Dinner was over, the great wood fire had been made up, and Mistress Talbot was presiding over the womenfolk of her household and their tasks with needle and distaff. She had laid hands on her unwilling son Edward to show his father how well he could read the piece de resistance of the family, Fabyan's Chronicle; and the boy, with an elbow firmly planted on either side of the great folio, was floundering through the miseries of King Stephen's time; while Mr. Talbot, after smoothing the head of his largest hound for some minutes, had leant back in his chair and dropped asleep. Cicely's hand tardily drew out her thread, her spindle scarcely balanced itself on the floor, and her maiden meditation was in an inactive sort of way occupied with the sense of dulness after the summer excitements, and wonder whether her greatness were all a dream, and anything would happen to recall her once more to be a princess. The kitten at her feet took the spindle for a lazily moving creature, and thought herself fascinating it, so she stared hard, with only an occasional whisk of the end of her striped tail; and Mistress Susan was only kept awake by her anxiety to adapt Diccon's last year's jerkin to Ned's use.
Suddenly the dogs outside bayed, the dogs inside pricked their ears, Ned joyfully halted, his father uttered the unconscious falsehood, "I'm not asleep, lad, go on," then woke up as horses' feet were heard; Ned dashed out into the porch, and was in time to hold the horse of one of the two gentlemen, who, with cloaks over their heads, had ridden up to the door. He helped them off with their cloaks in the porch, exchanging greetings with William Cavendish and Antony Babington.