She passed behind my chair, and, hearing her hand upon the latch, I had thought her gone—gone down to welcome my enemy and his riding mate, the factor. But while I was cursing my unready tongue and repenting that I had not given her some small word of warning, she spoke again.
"You say 'Richard Jennifer or another.' What know you of any other, Monsieur John?"
"Nay, I know nothing save what you have told me; and from that I have been hoping there was no other."
"But if I say there may be?"
My heart went sick at that. True, I had thought to give her generously to Dick, whose right was paramount; but to another—
"Margery, come hither where I may see you." And when she stood before me like a bidden child: "Tell me, little comrade, who is that other?"
But now her mood was changed again, and from standing sweet and pensive she fell a-laughing.
"What impudence!" she cried. "Ma foi! You should borrow Père Matthieu's cassock and breviary; then, mayhap, I might confess to you. But not before."
But still I pressed her.
"Tell me, Margery."