"A truce to thy fooling, child! Thou wist well enough that I would say my Lord of Kent." "How lookest I should wit, Custance? We sisters of Saint Clare be no news-mongers.--Well, so far as I knowledge, my Lord of Kent is with the Court. I saw him at Westminster a month gone." "Is it well with him?" "Very well, I would say, from what I saw." Constance's mind was too much engrossed with her own thoughts to put the right interpretation on that cold, mocking smile which kept flitting across her cousin's lips. "And wist where be my little Dickon, and Nib?" [Isabel]. "At Langley, in care of Philippa, our fair cousin," [then synonymous with relative]. "Good. And Dickon my brother?" "I scantly wis--marry, methinks with the Court, at this present." "And my brother Ned?" "In Pevensey Castle." "What, governor thereof?" But Constance guessed her cousin's answer. "Nay,--prisoner." "For this matter?" "Ay, for the like gear thyself art hither." "Truly, I am sorry. And what came of our cousins of March?" "What had come aforetime." "They be had back to their durance at Windsor?" "Ay." "And what did my Lord when thou sawest him? Arede me all things touching him. What ware he?--and what said he?--and how looked he? Knew he thou shouldst see me?--and sent he me no word by thee?" "Six questions in a breath, Custance!" "Go to--one after other. What ware he?" "By my mistress Saint Clare! how should I wit? An hundred yards of golden baudekyn, and fifty of pink velvet; and pennes [plumes] of ostriches enough to set up a peltier [furrier] in trade." "And how looked he?" "As his wont is--right goodly, and preux [brave] and courteous." "Ay so!" said Constance tenderly. "And knew he thou shouldst see me?" "I am not well assured, but methinks rather ay than nay." "And what word sent he by thee?" "None." "What, not one word?" "Nay." Constance's voice sank to a less animated tone. "And what did he?" "They were about going in the hall to supper." "Handed he thee?" "Nay, my cousin the King's Grace handed me." "Then who was with my Lord?" "The Lady Lucy of Milan." "Lucy of Milan!--is she not rarely beauteous?" "I wis nought about beauty. If it lie in great staring black eyes, and a soft, debonere [amiable, pleasant] manner, like a black cat, belike so." For the first time, Constance fairly noticed Isabel's peculiar smile. She sat up in her bed, with contracted brow. "Isabel, there is worser behind." "There is more behind, Custance," said Isabel coolly. "Speak, and quickly!" "Well, mayhap better so. Wit thou then, fair Cousin, that thy wedding with my Lord of Kent is found not good, sith--" "Not good!" Constance said, or rather shrieked. "God in Heaven have mercy!--not good!" "Not good, fair Cousin mine," resumed Isabel's even tones, "seeing that the priest which wedded you was ere that day excommunicate of heresy, nor could lawfully marry any."