But Miss Primrose had gone as green as grass, and was gibbering with terror: "Marigold! Marigold!" she cried, wringing her hands, "How can you think such things? The dear, devoted Doctor! The best and kindest man in Lud-in-the-Mist! Nobody was angrier with me over what he called my 'criminal carelessness' in allowing that horrible stuff to be smuggled into my loft, I assure you he is quite rabid on the subject of ... er ... fruit. Why, when he was a young man at the time of the great drought he was working day and night trying to stop it, he...."
But not for nothing was Dame Marigold descended from generations of judges. Quick as lightning, she turned on her: "The great drought? But that must be forty years ago ... long before Endymion Leer came to Dorimare."
"Yes, yes, dear ... of course ... quite so ... I was thinking of what another doctor had told me ... since all this trouble my poor head gets quite muddled," gibbered Miss Primrose. And she was shaking from head to foot.
Dame Marigold rose from her chair, and stood looking down on her in silence for a few seconds, under half-closed lids, with a rather cruel little smile.
Then she said, "Good-bye, Miss Primrose. You have provided me with most interesting food for thought."
And then she left her, sitting there with frightened face against the faded tapestry.
That same day, Master Nathaniel received a letter from Luke Hempen that both perplexed and alarmed him.
It was as follows:
Your Worship,—I'd be glad if you'd take Master Ranulph away from this farm, because the widow's up to mischief, I'm sure of that, and some of the folks about here say as what in years gone by she murdered her husband, and she and somebody else, though I don't know who, seem to have a grudge against Master Ranulph, and, if I might take the liberty, I'll just tell your Worship what I heard.
It was this way—one night, I don't know how it was, but I couldn't get to sleep, and thinking that a bite, may be, of something would send me off, towards midnight I got up from my bed to go and look in the kitchen for a bit of bread. And half-way down the stairs I heard the sound of low voices, and someone said, "I fear the Chanticleers," so I stood still where I was, and listened. And I peeped down and the kitchen fire was nearly out, but there was enough left for me to see the widow, and a man wrapped up in a cloak, sitting opposite to her with his back to the stairs, so I couldn't see his face. Their talk was low and at first I could only hear words here and there, but they kept making mention of the Chanticleers, and the man said something like keeping the Chanticleers and Master Ambrose Honeysuckle apart, because Master Ambrose had had a vision of Duke Aubrey. And if I hadn't known the widow and how she was a deep one and as fly as you make them, I'd have thought they were two poor daft old gossips, whose talk had turned wild and nasty with old age. And then the man laid his hand on her knee, and his voice was low, but this time it was so clear that I could hear it all, and I think I can remember every word of it, so I'll write it down for your Worship: "I fear counter orders. You know the Chief and his ways—at any moment he might betray his agents. Willy Wisp gave young Chanticleer fruit without my knowledge. And I told you how he and that doitered old weaver of yours have been putting their heads together, and that's what has frightened me most."