The children turned into the second cottage which was even humbler than its neighbours. It was a long, low, thatched building, roughly built of stone with clay instead of mortar. Within, a portion was divided off at one end by a wooden partition. There was no window save one small opening under the low eaves which was less than six feet from the ground. It was about eight inches square and filled with a piece of oiled canvas on a rudely made movable frame instead of glass. In warm weather it often stood open.
The children stumbled as they entered the dark room and crossed the uneven floor of stamped earth. There was no movable furniture save one or two wooden kists or chests, a dilapidated spinning wheel and a couple of small stools. In the very middle of the floor was a fire of peats on a flat slab of stone in the ground and a simple hole in the roof allowed the choking smoke to escape after it had wandered round the whole building.
An old man, bent double with rheumatism, hastened forward as the children came to the door and, holding out both his hands, shook Audry’s and Aline’s at the same time. “I am right glad to see you,” he said, “and may the Mother of God watch over you.”
He quickly brought two stools and, carefully dusting them first, bade his young visitors sit down by the fire.
“How is Joan to-day, Peter,” asked Aline, “she isn’t out again is she?”
“No, Mistress Aline, she has been worse the last few days and is in bed, but maybe the brighter weather will soon see her out and about.”
He hobbled over toward a corner of the cottage, where a box-bed stood out from the wall. It was closed in all around like a great cupboard, with sliding shutters in the front. These were drawn back, but the interior was concealed by a curtain. He drew aside this curtain and within lay a little girl about eleven years old with thin wasted cheeks and hollow sunken eyes. She stretched out her small hand as the two children approached and a smile lit up the white drawn face.
Aline stooped and kissed her. “Oh, Joan,” she said, “I wish you would get well, but it is always the same, no sooner are you up than you are back in bed again. I have been asking Master Mowbray about you and he has promised that the leech from Barnard Castle shall come and see you as soon as he can get word to him.”
“It is good of you to think and plan about me, Mistress Aline, and I believe I am not quite so badly to-day, but I wish that horrid old ‘Moll o’ the graves’ would not come in here and look at me. She does frighten me so. Mother was always so frightened of Moll.”
“She is a wretched old thing,” said Audry, “but do not let us think about her.”