"She just made us feel ashamed of ourselves," said one of the lads, when Dame Drayton went down to the workshop, and she and the senior apprentice were discussing what had better be done. "Sim said his mother would not like him to stay with a Quaker, and thought he had better go home at once. We might have done the same if Bessie had not said she should stay and work as long as she could get any to do; and so we decided to wait and see what would happen." "I thank thee for thy thoughtfulness," answered the lady, wishing she knew as much of her husband's business as Bessie did; for now she was at her wit's end to know how to manage and what to do. She would not let the lads see her distress and how little she understood of the business details; but as she passed the corner where Bessie was at work, the girl saw the tears in her eyes, and at once guessed the cause. "May I come with you?" she asked, as the lady was leaving the workshop. Dame Drayton held out her hand, and Bessie slipped hers into it. "Friend Martha, didst thou see my mother yesterday?" she asked eagerly. "Nay, Bessie; I was not taken to Bridewell, but to Newgate. Poor child, poor child!" she said, laying her hand on Bessie's shoulder, and drawing her to her side as she entered the quiet keeping-room. "May I tell thee what I have been thinking?" said Bessie, sitting down on a low stool at the lady's feet. "I have learned to do a good deal to the hats, and Friend Drayton said I could do it as well, or almost as well, as he; but there are some things I cannot do, and yet it would not take a man long to finish off our work, if we all did it carefully, as Tom says he will do for the future." Bessie talked on eagerly and quickly, too full of the plans she had thought of for helping the family over this time of difficulty to notice at first that her friend did not answer any of her proposals or appear to notice them, and at length, looking up, she saw that Dame Drayton had fainted. The shock of being arrested and led through the streets to prison, the horror and fright that had made sleep impossible amid such surroundings, then the excitement of being brought before the Lord Mayor and the crowded court, had produced such a nervous condition in Dame Drayton that she could bear up no longer, and from sheer physical exhaustion had sunk into a state of unconsciousness. Bessie's screams soon brought Deborah, and with her came Madam Lowe and Audrey; for Sim Tompkins, having taken home the news to his mother, she ran with it at once to the vicarage; and although the vicar and his wife professed to be dreadfully shocked at the wickedness and folly of their relatives connecting themselves with the Quakers, Audrey at once insisted that she should be allowed to go and see what could be done for her cousins in the absence of their mother and father, and, finding she was determined to do this, her mother decided to accompany her.