“Aunt Avice,” she said, “there is a commotion in the Jews’ quarter, and here is a Jew maiden that wants to know if we will shelter her. I suppose she won’t hurt us much, will she?”
The very breath of a Jew was fancied to be poisonous.
Avice looked at the pale, terrified face and trembling limbs of the girl who had cast herself on her mercy.
“Well, I dare say not,” said she; “at any rate, we will risk it. Perhaps the good Lord may not be very angry; or if He is, we
must say more prayers, and beg our Lady Saint Mary to intercede for us. Come in, child.”
Poor Avice! she knew no better. She had been taught that the Lord who died for her was a stern, angry Judge, and that all the mercy rested in His human mother. And the Jews had crucified Christ; so, thought Avice, He must hate them! Perhaps, of such Christians as she was, He may have said again, “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.”
Hester came in quietly. “May God bless you!” she said. “I will try not to breathe on you, for I know what you think.” And she sat down meekly on the floor, in a dark corner, not daring to offer any help, lest they should imagine that she would pollute anything she touched. Avice threw her a cake of bread, as she might have done to a dog; and Hester knew that it was a kinder act than she would have received from most of the Christians around.
It was not yet quite bed-time, and Bertha sat down again to her work, begging her aunt to finish the tale. They took no notice of Hester.
“It is almost finished,” said Avice; “there is little more to tell. The winter got over, but spring was scarcely begun when our little Lady’s health failed again. The Lord King was so anxious about her that when he was away from Windsor, he bade the Lady Queen to send him a special messenger with news of her; and so delighted was he to hear of her recovery, that he commanded a good robe to be given to the messenger, and offered in thanksgiving an image of silver, wrought in the form of a woman, to the shrine of Saint Edward.”