"Ouch!" moaned Angel, "oh, Mary El-len, you're hurting me! That's my so-ore spot, eeeoow!"
"Well, Master Angel," said Mary Ellen, "I don't want to hurt ye, but it do make me heart-sick to see ye bashin' aitch other wid pokers for the sake av a bit girl that's not worth a tinker's curse to ye! Now thin—here's a piece of cowld puddin' to each av ye—sit on the durestep where the missus won't see ye, an' git outside av it."
In a chastened mood we sat outside the back door and ate our pudding. It was cold, clammy, very sweet, and deliciously satisfying.
To our right the wall excluded any glimpse of the Bishop's garden, and beyond loomed the Cathedral, with two grey pigeons circling about its spire.
I yearned to know what was going on beyond the wall. I could not help fancying that Jane, touched by remorse, was weeping by the fountain for me, and me only. Angel spoke.
"I say—" he hunched his shoulders mischievously—"let's go 'round and see what she's doin' all alone, eh?"
I leaped to the proposal. I had an insatiable desire to hear her speak once more, if it were only to taunt me.
We made the passage stealthily; all the world seemed drowsing on that hazy Sunday afternoon. The blinds in the Bishop's study were drawn. Little did he guess the life his great-niece led!
The grass was like moist velvet beneath our feet. A pair of sparrows were quarrelling over their bath at the fountain rim. We heard a low murmur of voices. A glint of Jane's white frock could be seen behind a guelder rose near the fountain. We crept up behind and peered through the foliage.
There on a garden bench sat Jane, and there, clasped in her slim white arms was—The Seraph! The wretched Dorothea lay, face downward, on the grass at their feet.