"Base man, it is false!" cried the lady, roused into indignation by the charge. I have confessed to naught whereof a woman should be ashamed. There is no infamy attached to my name; and as high as Heaven is above the earth, so far is Sir Christopher above thy craven nature."
"Heyday!" said Dudley; "it thunders and lightens. I bandy not words with thee, but the record of the Secretary will show."
"I find not the exact word," said the Secretary, Master Nowell, after examining his minutes, "but she doth acknowledge this pretended Knight as her protector since they left England, and the terms are equivalent."
"I meant it not so. I have acknowledged nothing to my disgrace," exclaimed the lady. "Ye have enveigled and entrapped me by artful questions, and then put constructions on my answers which do not belong to them. A worthy business, truly, for grave and learned men to be engaged in, to set their wits to work against a forlorn woman, to pervert her language into shameful meanings."
"Madam," said Winthrop, "you have permission to retire. Bring with thee," he added, addressing the beadle, "the little Indian girl, without letting her come to speech with this gentlewoman, and also Sassacus, properly guarded."
CHAPTER XXX.
"Vainly, but well, that Chief had fought,
He was a captive now;
Yet pride, that fortune humbles not,
Was written on his brow.