Mistress Knollys listened with widening eyes to Mary's account of their interview with the great man,—for she invested him with all the power of His Gracious Majesty, and regarded him with more awe than ever she had King George himself.
She laughed outright over the description of their having been caught in his apartments, and asked to see the paper he had given Dorothy, touching it as something most sacred.
Dorothy had gone above stairs, leaving Mary and the good woman together in the living-room, where the afternoon sunshine poured across the floor in broad slants from the two windows opening upon the garden at the rear of the house.
Presently Mistress Knollys said, "It would seem, my dear, to be the very best outcome for Dorothy's matter, the way things have befallen."
"Yes," Mary assented with a sigh, "so it does."
"And yet," added the old lady, "I fear it will be hard for the little maid, with a brother and husband fighting against one another."
"Ah, but you forget, dear Mistress Knollys, that he told her he thought of setting sail for his home in England."
"And then I suppose she would go with him."
"Aye;" and Mary sighed again. "I think she will surely wish to do this."
"Well, well, my dear," said Mistress Knollys, speaking more briskly, "that is not like to be right away, as he must await his exchange as a prisoner, and there's no telling when that will come to pass. Let us borrow no trouble until we know the end, which, after all, may be a happy one."