“Well, ’tis only a sayin’, ye know, and no new one neither,” said Tom, wiping his mouth with his sleeve, and standing up. “But the mistress is a pretty lady, and a kind—and a gentle-born as all may see, and I’d give or take a shrewd blow or two, or harm should happen her.”
“Ye’d be no man else, Tom, and I don’t doubt ye. Little thought I last night what was in her head, the sly villain, when I left her back again in her bed, and the cross door shut and locked. Lord a’ mercy on us! To think how the fiend works wi’ his own—smooth and sly sometimes, as if butter would not melt in her mouth.”
“’Tis an old sayin’—
“‘When the cat winketh,
Little wots mouse what the cat thinketh,’”
said Tom, with a grin and a wag of his head.
“She was neither sleek, nor soft, nor sly for that matter, when I saw her. I thought she’d a’ had her claws in my chops; such a catamaran I never did see.”
“And how’s the young lady?” asked Tom, clapping his greasy hat on his head.
“Hey! dear! I’m glad ye asked,” exclaimed the old woman—“easier she’ll be, no doubt, now that devil’s gone. But, dearie me! all’s in a jumble till Master Charles comes back, for she’ll not know, poor thing, what she’s to do till he talks wi’ her—now all’s changed.”
And Mildred trotted off to see for herself, and to hear what the young lady might have to say.