Mary Gifford had found a quiet resting-place in the house of her husband's uncle, Master George Gifford, at Arnhem, and here, from time to time, she was visited by Humphrey Ratcliffe, who, in all the tumult of the war, kept well in view the quest for Mary's lost son. Again and again hope had been raised that he was in one of the Popish centres which were scattered over the Low Countries. Once Mary had been taken, under Humphrey's care, to watch before the gates of a retired house in a village near Arnhem, whence the scholars of a Jesuit school sometimes passed out for exercise. For the Papists were under protection of the Spanish forces, and were far safer than their Protestant neighbours. Spain had always spies on the watch, and armed men ready in ambush to resent any interference with the priests or Jesuit schools. The country was bristling with soldiers, and skirmishes were frequent between the English and Spaniards. Treachery and secret machinations were always the tactics of Spain, and the bolder and more open hostility of Elizabeth's army was often defeated by cunning. Mary Gifford's expedition to the little town had resulted in disappointment. With eager eyes and a beating heart she had watched the boys file out in that back street towards the river, and when the boy passed whom, at a sign from Humphrey, she was especially to notice, she turned away. The light of hope died out from her face, as she said,-- 'Ah! no, no! That boy is not my Ambrose!' 'He will be changed, whenever you do find him, Mistress Gifford,' Humphrey said, somewhat unwilling to give up his point. 'Methinks that stripling has as much likeness to the child of scarce seven years old as you may expect to find.' 'Nay,' Mary said. 'The eyes, if nought else, set the question at rest. Did you not note how small and deep-set were the eyes which this boy turned on us with a sly glance as he passed. My Ambrose had ever a bold, free glance, with his big, lustrous eyes, not a sidelong, foxy look. Nay, my good friend, the truth gets more and more fixed in my mind that my child is safe in Paradise, where only I shall meet him in God's good time.'