She lay quite still while it enveloped her.
Ten days ago, our Lady had given her to Hugh.
Eight days ago, the Bishop, voicing the Church, had done the same.
But to-day she—she herself—was going to give herself to her lover.
This was the true bridal! For this he had waited. And the reward of his chivalrous patience was to be, that to-day, of her own free will she would say; "Hugh, my husband, take me home."
She smiled to remember how, riding forth from the city gates of Warwick, she had planned within herself that, once safely established in her own castle, she would abide there days, weeks, perhaps even, months!
She stretched her arms wide, then flung them above her head.
"Take me home," she whispered. "Hugh, my husband, take me home."
A thrush in the coppice below, whistled in liquid notes: "Do it now!
Do it now! Do it now!"
Laughing joyously, Mora leapt from her bed and looked out upon a sunny summer's day, humming with busy life, fragrant with scent of flowers, thrilling with songs of birds.