"The Red, Madam, from my cradle; and shall so do to my coffin."
"So do I," said Lady Anne, quietly, "down in mine heart, Frideswide. He wears it; and what he is, I am. Ah, would I could pass further!—'Where thou goest, I will go, and where thou lodgest, I will lodge.' I had asked God no more. Yet at the least, his people can be my people, as his God is my God. And may-be, when he dies, if not where, then may I die and be buried."
"My Lady, you are young to count on dying."
"It seems long since I counted on living," she said in a low voice. "Life is not worth much, Frideswide."
Frideswide knew too much to ask why. But she knew that for her, under similar circumstances, life would have gone on; and she wondered whether her physical nature were stronger than that of Lady Anne, or her moral nature more blunt and hard.
"I mind," said Lady Anne, in the same tone, "once hearing my Lady of Clarence my aunt to say that none save weak folks brake their hearts. I reckon I must be weak. For mine is broken. I misdoubt if it were ever otherwise than weak and easily shattered. It has not taken much to break it. Thou mayest despise me if thou wilt."
"None less, Madam! It would be impossible."
"Would it?" she answered, rather wistfully. "Yet methinks thy nature is far stronger than mine. The blows which have crushed me into a poor handful of dust should have rebounded from thee with scarce a bruise. I can see it in thy face; and thy sister is like thee."
"It may be so, my Lady. But I take it, He told us to pity the weak, who is a God so strong and patient, and who was crucified through weakness for our sakes. Is it not in His strength we can do all things?"
"Dost thou know Him, Frideswide?"