When the six hours were nearly up, I saw Nick Tresidder come to the market-place with two maidens. One I saw was his sister, the other was a stranger to me. I knew they had come to add to my shame, and the sight of them made me mad again. I tried to speak, but the socket was too small, and I could not get enough breath to utter a word. Still, anger, I am sure, glared from my eyes as I looked at Nick and his sister; but when I looked at the other maiden, a feeling which I cannot describe came over me. She was young--not, I should think, quite eighteen--and her face was more beautiful than anything I have ever seen. Her eyes were large and brown, while her hair was also brown, and hung in curls down her back. Her face, thank God! was not like that of the Tresidders; it was kind and gentle, and she looked at me in a pitying way. "What has he done?" she asked, in a voice which, to me, was as sweet as the sound of a brook purling its way through a dell in a wood. "Done!" said Nick Tresidder. "He is a blackguard; he nearly killed both me and my father." She looked at me steadfastly, and as she did so my heart throbbed with a new feeling, and tears came into my eyes in spite of myself. "Surely no," she replied; "he has a kind, handsome face, and he looks as though he might be a gentleman." "Gentleman!" cried Nick. "He will be flogged presently, then you will see what a cur he is." "Flogged! Surely no." "But he will be, and I wish that I were allowed to use the whip. Why, he belongs to the scum of the earth." By this time I felt my degradation as I had never felt it before, for I felt that I would give worlds, did I possess them, to tell her the whole truth. I wondered who she was, and I writhed at the thought of Nick poisoning her mind against me. Seeing them there others came up, and I heard one ask who this beauteous maiden was. "Don't you know?" was the reply. "She is Mistress Naomi Penryn." "What is his name?" asked this maiden, presently. "Can't you see?" replied Nick. "Ah! the eggs have almost blotted out the name. It is Jasper Pennington, street brawler and vagabond." And this was the way I first met Naomi Penryn. CHAPTER IV I ESCAPE FROM THE WHIPPING-POST, AND FIND MY WAY TO GRANFER FRADDAM'S CAVE No words can describe the shame I felt at the time. Before Naomi Penryn came there and looked upon me I was mad with rage and desire for vengeance. I longed to get to a place where I could meet the whole Tresidder brood face to face. But now a new feeling came to me. Had I not after all been a brute, and had I not acted like a maniac? For the look on her face made me love goodness and beauty. I could do nothing, however; my hands were numb, and my tongue was dry and parched. All I was capable of at this moment was to listen and to look into the fair maid's face, and feel a great longing that she might not despise me as Nick Tresidder evidently intended that she should.