"Ah, yes," cried the old woman, turning upon him. "I had forgotten you, poor showy dunghill Tom, in your feathers and spurs. You are to be caught, I suppose, for a husband for Miss Jezebel there. But keep away; go while your life is safe. There be death and destruction and misery there. Flee from the wrath to come, for in wedding that dressed-up-doll you tie yourself to the cursed, and may die as well. Hear me, good people, and judge between us; mark me that it will all come true." "Shame on you, Mother Goodhugh," cried Mace, with her pale cheeks flushing; "and judge between them, all of you," she said, addressing the little crowd of workmen and their wives who had gradually gathered round. "You all know how it was an accident when poor Luke Goodhugh fell into the Pool, when fishing against my dear father's orders, and was drowned." "Yes, yes, that be a true word, mistress," rose in chorus. "And how my dear father grieved when that sad explosion came which killed poor Goodhugh, our best workman, through the folly of one who would smoke." "That be true enough. Yes, it be true, Mother Goodhugh." "You know all that," cried Mace, with her handsome young face lighting up more and more, ignorant the while of Sir Mark's admiring gaze. "You know all that," she repeated, "but you don't know that ever since that luckless day--" "There, there, child, enough said," cried the founder, as Mother Goodhugh stood muttering and mouthing in impotent malice at the speaker, who had robbed her of her audience for the time. "Nay, father, dear, but they shall hear now," cried Mace, speaking with energy, and her face flushing up with pride. "Judge between them all of you, when I tell you that from that dreadful day my father's hand has always been open to this woman; his is the hand that has fed and clothed and sheltered her, when otherwise she must have gone forth a wanderer and a beggar upon the face of the earth." "Tut, tut, child!" cried the founder; "be silent." "Not yet, dear father," cried Mace. "And for this," she continued, "while he has fed her with bread, and had his heart sore with pity for her solitary fate, she has never ceased to shower down curses on his head."