“I would do some way, thou shouldst see,” saith Aunt Joyce, sturdily.
And so she let the matter drop; or should so have done, but Nell saith—
“I reckon we all, both men and women, have in us a touch of our father, old Adam!”
“And our mother, old Eva,” said I.
“You say well, childre,” quoth Aunt Joyce: “and she that hath the biggest touch of any I know is a certain old woman of Oxfordshire, by name Joyce Morrell.”
Up springeth Edith, and giveth Aunt Joyce a great hug.
“She is the best, sweetest, dearest old woman (if so be) ever I knew,” saith she. “I except not even Mother, for I count not her an old woman.”
Aunt Joyce laughed, and paid Edith back her hug with usury.
Then, when Edith was set down again to her work, Aunt Joyce saith—
“Anstace was wont to say—my Anstace, not yours, my maids—that she which did commonly put herself in the lowest place should the seldomest find her out of her reckoning.”