“All this is nothing of your history,” answered Roland Graeme, began to be much interested in the congenial vivacity of this facetious young gentlewoman,--“tale for tale is fellow-traveller's justice.”
“Wait till we are fellow-travellers, then,” replied Catherine.
“Nay, you escape me not so,” said the page; “if you deal not justly by me, I will call out to Dame Bridget, or whatever your dame be called, and proclaim you for a cheat.”
“You shall not need,” answered the maiden--“my history is the counterpart of your own; the same words might almost serve, change but dress and name. I am called Catherine Seyton, and I also am an orphan.”
“This is the only question,” said she, throwing down her fine eyes with a sudden expression of sorrow, “that is the only question I cannot laugh at.”
The sudden cloud passed away like that which crosses for an instant the summer sun, and she answered with her usual lively expression, “Worse by twenty degrees--Dame Bridget is my maiden aunt.”
“Over gods forbode!” said Roland--“Alas! that you have such a tale to tell! and what horror comes next?”
“Your own history, exactly. I was taken upon trial for service--”
“And turned off for pinching the duenna, or affronting my lady's waiting-woman?”
“Nay, our history varies there,” said the damsel--“Our mistress broke up house, or had her house broke up, which is the same thing, and I am a free woman of the forest.”
“And I am as glad of it as if any one had lined my doublet with cloth of gold,” said the youth.
“I thank you for your mirth,” said she, “but the matter is not likely to concern you.”
“Nay, but go on,” said the page, “for you will be presently interrupted; the two good dames have been soaring yonder on the balcony, like two old hooded crows, and their croak grows hoarser as night comes on; they will wing to roost presently.--This mistress of yours, fair gentlewoman, who was she, in God's name?”
“Oh, she has a fair name in the world,” replied Catherine Seyton. “Few ladies kept a fairer house, or held more gentlewomen in her household; my aunt Bridget was one of her housekeepers. We never saw our mistress's blessed face, to be sure, but we heard enough of her; were up early and down late, and were kept to long prayers and light food.”