“My satin gown was made six years gone, Orige; and this that I bear seven; and my camlet—well-a-day!—it may be ten.”
“They be not fit to sweep the house in.”
“Marry come up!—Prithee, Tom, set Orige up in tinsel. But for Clare and Blanche, leave me see to them. Clare hath one gown was made this year—”
“A beggarly say!” (a coarse kind of silk, often used for curtains and covering furniture) put in Lady Enville.
“And Blanche hath one a-making.”
“A sorry kersey of twenty pence the yard!”
“Orige, prithee talk no liker a fool than thou canst help. Our gowns be right and—decent, according to our degree. We be but common folks, woman! For me, I go not about to prink (make smart and showy) me in cloth of gold,—not though Jack should wed all the countesses in England. If she love not me by reason of my gowns, she may hold me off with the andirons. I can do without her.”
And away marched Rachel in high dudgeon. “It is too bad of Rachel!” moaned Lady Enville, lifting her handkerchief to tearless eyes. “I would have nought but to be decent and fit for our degree, and not to shame us in the eyes of her that hath been in the Court. I was ne’er one to cast money right and left. If I had but a new velvet gown, and a fair kirtle of laced satin, and a good kersey for every day, and an hood, and a partlet or twain of broidered work, and two or three other small matters, I would ask no more. Rachel would fain don us all like scullery-maids!”
Sir Thomas hated to see a woman weep; and above all, his wife—whom he still loved, though he could no longer esteem her.
“Come, Orige,—dry thine eyes,” he said pityingly.