MY mistress was certainly a wonderful woman. After all she had gone through, she awoke as fresh as a daisy, and I believe would have even got up, if Mistress Curtis would have allowed such a thing. I do think the dear old woman was almost vexed with her for being so well, after all she had gone through.
As for the babe, he was a famous fellow, as well as a little pig, and squalled so lustily when he was christened, that our hostess prophesied great things for his future. 'Tis accounted almost a fatal sign there if a babe, and specially a boy, does not cry at his baptism. My lady called him Peregrine in remembrance of our midnight wanderings, and I was his godmother—a great honor for me. I can not, however, claim much of the credit of his education.
"Are there any English here now?" asked Mr. Batie, as we sat at dinner next day. He would have us all sit down together, saying that it was no time for worldly forms, as indeed it was not. "We heard the English congregation was wholly broken up."
"It hath been so!" answered Monsieur Claude. "But the pastor resides here still. His name is Winter!"
"Winter!" I exclaimed. "Not Arthur Winter from Middleburg."
"The same, madam!"
"Do you know him?" asked Mr. Batie.
"Know him!" said I. "He married my own cousin, and his daughter is our dear adopted child. How stupid of me not to remember that it was to Wesel they came. It was Arthur Winter that married me."
And I had much ado not to burst out weeping. Mr. Batie poured me out a glass of wine, which I drank, and restrained myself with a great effort. Madam Claude stepped out of the room and presently returned with a smelling bottle which she had been some time in finding. I suppose it may seem strange to some, but I dreaded to see Arthur and Katherine. It seemed like a tearing open of the unhealed wound, and I felt in the perverseness of grief, as if I could bear any thing better than their sympathy. There was no use in giving way to such feelings, however, and I was nerving myself to ask Madam Claude for a guide to their house, when the door opened, and I found myself in Katherine's arms—the very same Katherine I had left in Middleburg so many years before—a little older, but serene and fair as ever. Naturally her first question was for her child.
"Katherine is well and in good hands!" said I, and I told her how I had left her. "She will be safe there if any where! My lord is king on his own domain, and any one coming to molest him would go to feed the crabs and codlings within two hours afterward."