"And so your aunt be none the wiser? Well, such folly deserves to be cozened--the folly of forbidding her husband coming to London."
"Oh," replied Mistress Millicent, blushing a little as she smiled, "my dear aunt is, in truth, as jealous as Sir Peregrine would have us believe his wives were. There is a lady in London that Uncle Bartlemy played servant to before he was married, and Aunt Margaret made him promise never to come within sight of the town."
"I marvel how you laid your plans with him, without discovery of your people or his."
"There was a carrier's man that goes betwixt London and Rochester, who used to come courting one of our maids. We passed letters privately by means of him, till he fell out with the maid, and now comes hither no more. The last word I had of my uncle was after that night. He told me of his mishap with the watch, and of his getting free--though he said not how. And he vowed he must leave me to my fate, for he would never venture for me again as he had done. So I was left without hope. When I recognised you to-day as my preserver that night, and remembered that the Holydays were my uncle's neighbours, I thought--mayhap--you might have some message from him; but, alas--!"
"And that is why you followed me to the garden?" said the captain, carelessly, though inwardly he winced.
"Ay. Your look seemed to promise--but woe's me! And yet you spoke of my running away again?"
"Oh, I talked wildly. I know not what possessed me. Some things I said must have been very strange."
"Why, forsooth," said she, smiling again, and colouring most sweetly, "they seemed not so strange at the time, for I had forgot you are to be married; but now that I remember that--Belike you imagined for a moment you were speaking to the lady you are to marry?"
"Belike that is so. But touching this marriage: what is to hinder your running away to your uncle's now, with a trusty person to conduct you?"
"My uncle, in his letter, said he washed his hands of my affairs. He counselled me to make the best of Sir Peregrine's estate; he gave me warning he would not harbour me if I came to him."
"Nay, his love had not altered. But what befell him in London that night gave him such a fright of meddling in the matter."