His own intelligence would probably not have been sufficient to enable him to hurt the child, but he was a friend of the priest who served the chantry in Holwick. He was a low born fellow given to loose living and very fond of liquor, which Thomas would occasionally manage to steal for him from the Hall. He was one of the very few who did not like Aline. He felt her purity and charm was a reproach to him, and once, when she had met him in a condition somewhat the worse for drink, she had very gently spoken to him in a reproving tone, though she did not actually presume to reprove him. But he never forgot it. He liked enjoining heavy penances for the gentle sweet-natured child; while Aline, for her part, tended to avoid the confessional, when she could, not for the penances, but because she disliked the man and felt little or no spiritual value from communication with him. He had once or twice had slight suspicions about her orthodoxy, although he had paid no attention to it; but one day, when he and Thomas were talking over a measure of stolen ale, the conversation turned upon Aline. “I hate her pious face,” he said. “So do I,” assented Thomas. “It was a pity that Andrew did not finish his job.” “These wretched folk think more of her than they do of me,” said the priest. “When they are sick, it is always little St. Aline they want and not the good Father,--‘Little St. Aline,’ ha, ha, ha!” he laughed viciously. “The devil take her.” “Ay, that may he; it angereth me to see them blessing her and carrying on as they do; what right has she to act so grandly with her herbs and comforts from the Hall and her good talk? Who is she, I should like to know? Mistress Mowbray saith she is but a dependent.” “Good talk, indeed,” said the priest. “It’s just blasphemy. What is she to be talking about,--a girl too,--a wretched female.” “Yes, a lot of evil bringers all of them, eh, Father, from Mother Eve onwards?” and Thomas’ wicked face gave an ugly leer. “Ah, they are a deceitful lot, and there she is breaking Mistress Mowbray’s crockery and running out when she is forbidden and you will see her sitting with her book as if she did not know what wrong was.” “What book?” said the priest. “Can she read?” “A fine confessor you must be,” said Thomas, “if you have not found out that the skelpie can read. They say she can read like the Lady Jane Grey.” “The Lady Jane Grey, a pestilent heretic! Mother Church is well quit of her; a pestilent heretic, I say! Ay, and Mother Church would be well quit of this brat with her sanctimonious ways.” “I should not wonder if she be a heretic, too,” said Thomas. “What will Mother Church give me, if I catch her a heretic?” he asked greedily. “Oh, I cannot say,” said the priest, “but I think I could do the catching myself; but it is not in the least likely that she is a heretic. Where could she come by it?”