"We shall see if he be. Goodcole, a chance to prove your mettle. Where's Jeremy? Pray send him to me, mistress, and I'll thank you."
While Meg was at the kitchen door calling the old man-servant, Jerningham spoke quietly to Goodcole. Jeremy appeared, blinking and bowing; as he passed Meg, he chuckled, and said, in undertone, "A husband mends all, sooth!" Master Jerningham, ascertaining from Meg what chamber the captain lay in, bade the old man show Goodcole the way. The pair took a lantern, of which Goodcole concealed all but a small part in his jerkin.
During the absence of the two, Jerningham directed Meg's attention to Meadows: "This is the man shall abide here for a time; I must send t'other on business that bears no delay,—him that lies up-stairs, I mean. 'Tis partly for that reason I have come here. And partly 'tis that I may, for an hour or so, play the host to a visitor that must perforce lodge here to-night,—a young woman."
He paused; but Meg merely paid attention to him with eyes and ears, and displayed no emotion.
"She is daughter to a merchant I much esteem in London; she has been in some manner bewitched, or constrained, or seduced, to fly from her home to this neighbourhood with an unthrift knave. By chance the plot came to my ears, and for her father's sake, and her honour's, I have caused her to be stayed in her flight and fetched hither. To-morrow I will come and put her aboard a vessel that shall carry her to Tilbury, where her father hath gone upon his affairs. If it fall to you to comfort or serve her while she is here, take heed you talk nothing of the matter, for all she may say to you. And not a word of this before Captain Ravenshaw when he comes down."
Whatever were Meg's thoughts, she kept them to herself. Though she might fear ghosts and witches, she was not to be thrown out of composure by surprises and visits, even if they came thick in a few hours, after months of the still and solitary life that was the rule at the Grange.
Goodcole and Jeremy returned, the former carrying the rapier and dagger with a nonchalant, even contemptuous, air, as if his task had been too easy. Jerningham smiled approval; he took the weapons, thrust the dagger in his girdle, and laid the rapier behind him on the table, as his own scabbard was, of course, occupied. He then sent Jeremy back with a candle to summon the captain down to the hall.
When the captain came, it was he that held the candle; while with one hand he dragged Jeremy by the collar.
"Hell and furies!" he roared; "what nest of rogues, what den of thieves, what—what—" He paused, and stared open-mouthed at Jerningham, who was standing with folded arms and a look of amusement.