'Aye, pull down Cur Crummock,' Cicely said. 'I think the King shall not long stay away from thy desires.'
The old knight burst in:
'I take it ill that ye speak of these things. I take it ill. I will not have 'ee lose thy head in these quarrels.'
'Husband,' Cicely laughed round at him, 'three years ago Cur Crummock had the heads of all my menfolk, having sworn they were traitors.'
'The more reason that he have not mine and thine now,' the old knight answered grimly. 'I am not for these meddlings in things that concern neither me nor thee.'
Cicely Elliott set her elbows upon her knees and her chin upon her knuckles. She gazed into the fire and grew moody, as was her wont when she had chanced to think of her menfolk that Cromwell had executed.
'He might have had my head any day this four years,' she said. 'And had you lost my head and me you might have had any other maid any day that se'nnight.'
'Nay, I grow too old,' the knight answered. 'A week ago I dropped my lance.'
Cicely continued to gaze at nothings in the fire.
'For thee,' she said scornfully to Katharine, 'it were better thou hadst never been born than have meddled between kings and ministers and faiths and nuns. You are not made for this world. You talk too much. Get you across the seas to a nunnery.'