She pressed her face between her arms, and as she did so, felt against her cheek the blood that had stiffened on her sleeve. At the feel of it she cried aloud. Oh, she was sick and frightened of it all! She was ashamed of the boy's dress that she wore, of Digby's oaths that had been on her tongue, of the draught that she had drunk at the buttery hatch, of the loud threats that she had spoken against the rebels. She was not the lad, Tibbott Venner, and she knew it now. She was Lady Sybil's little goddaughter. She wanted to be again where she could wear her own girlish dress, where she would hear only gentle voices, where such things as she had seen this day could never be done. "But I did not kick him after he had fallen," she kept repeating. "I remembered not to strike one that was weaker than myself." She found her only comfort in thinking that in this, at least, she had done as Lady Sybil would have wished her to do. For in that hour she felt so soiled in body and in soul that she feared that she never again could be Lady Sybil's little girl. It was pitchy dark in the wash-house when Merrylips heard steps just outside and the clatter of the door flung open. She burrowed deeper among the sacks and held her breath. In the stillness she heard rough voices speak:-- "In with you, you cursed rebel!" "Stand on your feet, you dog!" Then she heard a sound as of a dead weight let fall upon the floor, the bang of a door shut to, the rattle of a bolt in its socket. Softly she drew breath again, and as she did so, she heard in the darkness a stifled moan. All at once she realized what had happened. A wounded rebel, a dying man, it might be, had been imprisoned in the very place where she was hidden. In terror she flung aside the sacks that covered her. No matter if she was afraid of Digby! She was more afraid to stay here with this Roundhead. She would run to the door and shout to them to open and let her out. But as Merrylips rose softly to her feet, a pale light flickered through the wash-house. It came from the narrow window, high in the eastern wall, that looked into the great court, where, no doubt, torches had been newly kindled. The light fell upon a man who was sitting on the stone floor, not ten feet from her corner, with his arm cast across his knee and his head bowed heavily upon his arm. His hair was chestnut-colored, ruddy in the light, like Munn's, and by that token Merrylips knew him for Dick Fowell. For many moments she stood, without daring to move, while she wondered what she should do. For if she called at the door, as she had planned to do, perhaps Digby would come. If he came, perhaps he would strike Fowell again. Perhaps he would try to make her strike him. No, no, she could not call now, but surely she could not stay a prisoner for hours with this Roundhead!