"I think it is unlikely. Father feels a change approaching. The Protector’s health is failing rapidly; he is dying, Matilda, dying of the injustice and ingratitude he meets on every hand. ’Wounded,’ yes slain, ’in the house of my friends,’ is his constant cry." "’Tis most strange that a man of war like Oliver Cromwell should care what his friends think or say." "Yet he does. When he speaks to father about Harrison, Lambert, Alured, Overton and others of his old companions, he wrings his hands and weeps like a woman; or else he protests against them in such angry sorrow as distresses one to see and hear it." "He ought to know that he has been raised above the love of men who are less noble than himself, and that if beyond and above their love, then they will hate and abuse him. If he dies?——" "Father will leave England as soon as Cromwell is in his grave. Cymlin will keep old Swaffham fair, for Cymlin will never leave England while you are in it." "And you can bear to talk of leaving England in that calm way, without tears and without regrets. Jane, it is shameful; it is really wicked." "I do not leave England without tears and regrets, but there is Cluny, and——" "Cluny, of course. I suppose you will be married before you leave. But I have a mind not to be your bridesmaid, though I am promised to that office ever since I was a maid in ankle tights." "Dear Matilda, do not be angry at me because I had to do what I had to do. I was married to Cluny three days after he came home. We all thought he was going to die, and he wished me to be his wife." "Why was I not sent for? I would have come, Jane. It was cruel wrong in you to pass me by." "We were married by Doctor Verity at Cluny’s bedside. No one was present but my father and mother and the three servants to whom Cluny had become accustomed. He was then frightened at every strange face." "After this, nothing can astonish me. I was not a stranger——" "He would not have recognised you, then." "How could he lose himself so far? He ought to have had more courage. Why did he not do something or other?" "Oh, Matilda, what would you have done in a room eight feet by ten, and in the dark most of the time—your bread and water given without a word—your attendant deaf and dumb to you—no way to tell the passage of time—no way of knowing how the seasons went, but by the more severe cold—if you had been, like Cluny, really buried alive, what would you have done?" "I would have died."