“And thou, Lettice?”
Mother hesitated a little. “Some part, I might,” she saith.
“Ay, some part: we could all pick out that,” returns Aunt Joyce. “What sayest thou, Bess?”
“What, to turn back, and begin all o’er again?” quoth Cousin Bess. “Nay, Mistress Joyce, I’m none such a dizard as that. I reckon Ned shall tell you, when a sailor is coming round the corner in sight of home, ’tis not often he shall desire to sail forth back again.”
“Why, we reckon that as ill as may be,” saith Ned, “not to be able to make your port, and forced to put to sea again.”
“And when the sea hath been stormy,” saith Aunt Joyce, “and the port is your own home, and you can see the light gleaming through the windows?”
“Why, it were well-nigh enough to make an old salt cry,” saith Ned.
“Ay,” saith Aunt Joyce. “Nay—I would not live it again. Yet my life hath not been an hard one—only a little lonely and trying. Dulcie, here, hath known far sorer sorrows than I. Yet I shall be glad to get home, and lay by my travelling-gear.”
“But thou hast had sorrow, dear Joyce,” saith my Lady Stafford gently.
“Did any woman ever reach fifty without it?” Aunt Joyce makes answer. “Ay, I have had my sorrows, like other women—and one sorer than ever any knew. May-be, Dulcie, if the roads were smoother and the rivers shallower to ford, we should not be so glad when we gat safe home.”