“From all that I can hear she has not said your name, not once! It was of her own movement, once Abbey and Priory would promise her safety and London town and gold. ‘Thou monstrous witch! Thou daughter of the Father of Lies!’ crieth Silver Cross and Westforest and Middle Forest; aye, even, I hear now, Saint Leofric. But for all that, Robert--” “‘Robert’?” “Sir Robert Somerville. But for all that I know, I think, where most lying lies. Save for the Great Lie that she acted and made, and wicked it was to do it! But if she is the wicked one, who else beside? And though she be made of evil is she to burn without a word, who says no word herself?” Somerville answered him. “Are you mad? What do you mean? When they stoned her out of town I made it possible for her to hide at the ruined farm. I am badly repaid, and I close my mouth, and if they ask me there I will lie to them, pardie! Put her at the ruined farm, not I! But who asketh? It is enough that she be pure Satan with Satan. Witch found here, why easily found there! Who believes but what they wish to believe? Who can save her from her burning? God, perhaps, if He chose to do it!” “Then I will go pray,” said Thomas Bettany. “I was not her lover.” “Psha!” said Somerville. “She was a common lover.” The young merchant turned red. “Only great fright could make you say that, Somerville!” “Were you noble,” answered Somerville, “I would take that up. As it is, let us be better strangers.” “That bargain is made, merchant with ‘Sir’ to your name!” Somerville opened the parlour door. “Reckoning, host--and a cup of sack!” When the younger man had gone, as he did go immediately, he turned back to the room to sit at table with his wine and wait out the storm which had now come pelting. Dusk was the air and a chill wind came in at crevices. A boy arrived to lay and kindle a fire. The flames reddened the room. Somerville, hand around cup, sat and watched them. Storm over, he left the Maid and Garland, mounted his big bay and rode out of town. “Who can tell The weird he drees? Who can read His shield that hangs In hall above? Parcel gilt, pied white and black. Alas!” CHAPTER XIX As soon as might be, Montjoy would go that pilgrimage to Canterbury. Had it been true, that frightful story, were Mark and Westforest treacherous, Silver Cross down in the mire, evened and more than evened with Hugh across the river, he would have gone not to Canterbury only, but to Rome, to Palestine! Only there, in Gethsemane garden-- He sat, a slight, dark man with a worn, handsome face, beneath a cedar in his castle garden. This was lord’s corner. A castle, God wot, is a public place! But just here was retirement, appropriated long since and possessed for long. Wall and ivy and cedar row, and hardly a narrow window to overlook! Montjoy once had been quick for company, but now for long he sighed toward solitariness. Solitariness that still should be splendour!