MY Lady Crabtree hurried Mistress Betty from Greenwich. At sunset of that fateful day, the two went by water to Deptford. The barge glided gently along the placid river; the soft spring air was full of fragrance and the banks of the Thames on either hand were clad in a mantle of varied green, while above the blue sky was flecked with rosy clouds. Betty and old Madam sat in the center of the boat, and the young girl was silent and manifestly unhappy. After casting one or two of her eagle glances at the beautiful, downcast face, Lady Crabtree accosted her with her accustomed frankness. “What ails you, wench?” she asked sharply; “you had no love for this queen when you were sent to her, and now you pull as long a face as ever you did for the Lady Catherine.” “I had only condemnation for her when I went first to Greenwich,” Betty answered, “nor do I love her as does poor Mary Wyatt, and a few of the others also; but it seems a cowardly thing to leave her now--it hurts me to seem a time-server.” “Tush!” retorted the old woman, calmly, “the queen cares naught for you. Nor would they let you go if you would. They took her to the Tower without even giving her time to change her farthingale,--like men it is to do it so,--and I hear that the king’s grace will have her aunt, Lady Boleyn, and Mrs. Cousins, whom she hates, attend her. Doubtless they will strive to wring some confession from her, poor thing!” “She is charged with high treason, so Mary Wyatt told me, weeping,” Betty said; “but the whole matter has been conducted so secretly that the unhappy lady knows not the charges.” Lady Crabtree’s stern face stiffened. “That may and may not be,” she retorted dryly; “Anne Boleyn has been more foolish than ever she was wise. The greatest fool was she to think that the man whom she had made unfaithful to his wife would be faithful to her. Poor shallow pate! she but taught him the door by which he should slip out. Well, well, there will be a great trial, and what will my lord of Wiltshire do?” “The queen’s father?” Betty said; “alas, poor gentleman!” “Alas, poor ass!” retorted Lady Crabtree; “yet was he clever enough to wring a promise from the king’s grace to marry Mistress Anne before Queen Catherine was put away. They tell a tale of his visit to the Bishop of Rome,” she added, laughing. “The king sent him upon this business of the divorce, and he, getting there, refused to kiss the pope’s toe. ’Tis added that his dog bit it, in which case it is no great wonder that his highness’s cause suffered at Rome.” “My Lady Rochford does not love the queen,” Betty remarked thoughtfully, “nor does the queen love her.”