“Then haste and bid measure be taken for a coffin, for one shall lack either for thee or me ere thou depart!”
“Alack, alack!”
But Isabel rose and withdrew, signing to her companion to follow. The elder nun, who had not yet finished her rosary, stopped in the middle of a Paternoster, and obeyed.
“Leave me likewise, thou, Maude,” said Constance, in a voice in which anguish and languor strove for the predominance.
“Dear my Lady, could I not—?” Maude began pityingly.
“Nay, my good Maude, nought canst thou do. Unless it were true that God would hearken prayer, and then, perchance—”
“Trust me for that, Lady mine!—Take I the babe withal?”
“Poor little maid!—Ay,—take her to thee.”
Maude followed the nuns into the drawing-room. She found the beads-woman still busy, on her knees in the window, and Isabel seated in the one chair sacred to royalty.
“’Tis a soft morrow, Dame Lyngern,” complacently remarked the lady whose heart lay bleeding. “Be that your little maid?”