Ida Mara left her mistress to obey; but, in a moment after, she came back pale and trembling.
"What is the matter, Ida? what is the matter?" cried the lady, starting up.
"Ah, madam!" answered the girl, "I have just seen that terrible man, Weston, tripping across to the Bell-tower, where poor Sir Thomas Overbury is confined, and I shall now live in constant dread."
"Did he see you?" asked Arabella.
"I think not--I hope not," replied Ida Mara. "I was under the arch below, and he was going the other way, dressed in black velvet, with soft steps, like a cat creeping up to a bird."
Arabella mused. "Call Jane hither," she said. And when the girl appeared, she added, "Go to the warder opposite there, and ask him the name of the gentleman dressed in black velvet, who just now crossed to the Bell-tower."
The girl retired without any answer; for she was of a somewhat sullen disposition, and discontented at being kept so long in the Tower. She returned in a few minutes, saying, "His name is Doctor Foreman, my lady; and he has gone, by the King's order, to visit Sir Thomas Overbury, who is sick."
Ida cast down her eyes thoughtfully on the ground; and Arabella, after giving the maid a sign that she might retire, murmured, "Doctor Foreman!--why, that is the man of whom there was so much talk at the Court, a sort of wizard, a conjurer, and a cheat,--suspected, too, of dealing in poisons. I heard the Queen say, his majesty would have him hanged.--Can he be sent to Sir Thomas Overbury by the King?"
"Oh, lady, lady," cried Ida Mara, "it is the same man. Whatever name he may now call himself by, that is Weston. And I will tell you," she added, kneeling on the cushion at the lady's feet, "I will tell you now what it was he wished me to do, that made me fly from him in such terror, which I have never told you before. He wished me to go to a young nobleman of the Court, who had been pleased with my music, to live with him for a time in sin," and then she paused, and sunk her voice to a whisper, adding, "and then--to put poison in his drink."
Arabella shuddered: "Good heaven!" she cried, "is it possible that such iniquity should live and prosper?--But why did you not accuse him, and bring him to punishment, Ida?"