Two or three days passed on, and nothing was seen of Lucy. She remained shut up in her attic chamber, visited by her aunt or Hannah once a day, with scanty and coarse provisions. Sometimes the girls, listening, heard her sobbing as if her heart would break, sometimes moaning faintly; but Mrs. Bernard kept close watch, and they could not get near her. "I can't stand this any longer," said Anne to Margery, the third day. "The child will die before she will give way, and her blood will be on all our heads. I shall go to Parson Burgess and tell him the story. He is justice as well as parson; and we will see if something cannot be done." * * In England, the rector, or minister, of a parish is not unfrequently a justice also. "Do," said Margery. "No one can tell whether it will do any good; but things must not go on as they are. I know my mistress's temper but too well. It was just such a time as this with Lady Lucy which drove my poor young master to sea, where he perished miserably." It was not long before Anne was at the parson's gate, where she found the children all assembled, some admiring and feeding with grass the two beautiful horses which stood before the door, some watching half timidly the negro servant who held them, and who was trying to coax the youngest little girl to come to him. Anne's tale was soon told to Polly, who, as the eldest, was exercising a sort of supervision over the little ones. "What a shame!" exclaimed the warm-hearted girl, as Anne concluded her tale, which lost nothing from her manner of telling it. "Oh, if my father were only alone! There is a great gentleman with him, who came just now; and we must not interrupt him." "Tell mother," said Dulcie, the second girl: "mother will know what to do. And here she comes now." Mistress Burgess listened to Anne's repetition of the sad tale. "Isn't it a shame, mother?" exclaimed the girls. "Poor little Lady Lucy!" "Are you sure you are telling the truth, my girl?" asked Mistress Burgess, bending her mild, penetrating eyes on Anne's face, and hushing with an upraised finger the clamours of the children. "Recollect yourself; for this is a matter of the last importance, and you are come in the nick of time. The gentleman who arrived this morning is Lady Lucy's father." "Why, mamma, I thought he was dead long ago!" "And so thought every one; but it turns out a mistake. He was wounded and left for dead, and only recovered to find himself in a French prison, where he has languished all these years till just now that he has been exchanged; not by his own title,—for as Lord Stanton, he had been condemned to death, and had only saved his life by taking the name of his servant, who died in his cell. He has known naught of his own family,—not even that his poor wife was dead."