“‘Kind to her!’ If they had starved her and beaten her, there might have been no harm done. Canst thou not see that the girl’s heart is with her Christian friends? Why, she had been crying behind her veil, quietly, all the journey.”
“Well, wife? What then?”
“‘What then?’ Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob! ‘What then?’ Why, then—she will do like Anegay.”
“The God of our fathers forbid it!” cried Abraham, in tones of horror and distress.
“It is too late for that,” said Licorice, with a short, contemptuous laugh. “Thou shouldst have said that a year ago, and have kept the child at home.”
“We had better marry her at once,” suggested Abraham, still in a voice of deep pain.
“‘There are no birds in last year’s nest,’ old man,” was the response. “Marry her or let it alone, the child’s heart is gone from us. She has left behind her in yonder Castle those for whom she cares more than for us, and, I should not wonder also, a faith dearer to her than ours. It will be Anegay over again. Ah, well! Like to like! What else could we expect?”
“Can she hear us, Licorice?”
“Not she! She was fast asleep an hour ago.”
“Wife, if it be so, have we not deserved it?”