“They sha’n’t say it of me, unless they smart for it!” cried Haimet hotly.
“Then wilt thou not be a true follower of the Lamb of God, who, when He was reviled, reviled not again, but committed Himself unto Him that judgeth righteously.”
“Saints be with you!” said Anania, lifting the latch, and intercepting a response from Haimet which might have been somewhat incisive. “I declare, I’m just killed with the heat!”
“I should have guessed you were alive, from the look of you,” returned Derette calmly.
“So you’re going into the anchorhold, I hear?” said Anania, fanning herself with her handkerchief.
“If Romund can obtain it for me.”
“Oh, he has; it’s all settled. Didn’t you know? I met Mabel in Saint Frideswide’s Street (which ran close to the north of the Cathedral), and she told me so.—Aunt Isel, I do wonder you don’t look better after that young woman! She’ll bring Romund to his last penny before she’s done. That chape (a cape or mantle) she had on must have cost as pretty a sum as would have bought a flock of sheep. I never saw such extravagance.”
“The money’s her own,” responded Isel shortly.
“It’s his too. And you’re his mother. You never ought to let her go on as she does.”
“Deary me, Anania, as if I hadn’t enough to do!”