'No, Aunt,' she said, firmly and clearly, 'at the first I did not want to come. There was my home, thou seest; I love Hutton Conquest, and my mother, and the maids, my sisters. Also I had many friends in our village with whom I was wont to have rare frolics and games. When first my mother told me of the Governor's permission, I did not want to leave the pleasant Bedfordshire meadows that lie around our dear farm, and go to live cooped up behind bolts and bars. Besides, I had heard that Warwick Gaol was a fearsome place. I was affrighted at the thought of being shut up among the thieves and murderers. And--' She hesitated. 'Poor maid,' said her aunt, 'still thou didst come in the end?' 'In the end it was made clear to me that my place was with dear grandfather,' said the child in her crisp, old-fashioned way. 'My mother said she could not force me; for she feared the gaol fever for me. I feared it too. And it is worse even than I feared. At nights I hear the prisoners screaming with it often. Nearly every day some of them die. They say it is worse for the young, and I know my grandfather dreads that I may take it. He looks at me often very sadly, or he did when I first came. Always then at nightfall he grew sad. But, latterly, we have been so comfortable together that I think he hath forgot his fears. When the evenings darken, and he can no longer read or write, we sit and watch the stars. Then if I can persuade him to tell me stories of what he hath undergone, that doth turn his thoughts, and afterwards he will fall asleep, and sleep well the whole night through.' 'Thou art a comfort to him, sure enough,' her aunt answered. 'It is wonderful how much brighter he hath been since he had thee, though he hath never smiled since my mother's death. But thou thyself must surely grow tired of the prison and its bare stone walls? Thou must long to be back at play with thy sisters in the Bedfordshire meadows?' 'That do I no longer,' little Mary Samm made answer firmly. 'I love my sisters dearly, dearly,' she raised her voice unconsciously as she spoke, and a chaffinch on a branch overhead filled in the pause with an answering chirp, 'I love my mother too. Didst thou really say thou wert expecting her to visit thee right soon? My dear, dear mother! But I love my dear grandfather best of all, for he hath nobody but me to care for him. At least, of course, he hath thee, Aunt Joan,' she added hastily, noticing a slight shade pass over her aunt's face. 'And what should we do without thee to bake bread for us, and go to the farm to fetch him fresh eggs, and butter, and cheese, and sweet, new milk? He would soon starve on the filthy prison fare. See, I have the milk bottle safe hidden under my flowers.' 'Aye, thou wast ever a careful maid,' answered her aunt; 'but, tell me, hath the Governor indeed grown gentler of late, and hath he given my father more liberty, and a better room?'