He spoke to Janet with quick breath:—­“Bring her down to see the game.”—­Then, suddenly,—­“Where are thy jewels, Kate?” He espied a casket, and hastening to it took from it rings, fitting them upon Mistress Penwick’s tapering fingers, until her hand was heavy.  Of other jewels she’d have none.  “But thou must have a shoulder knot,” said Cedric, and he took from the casket a glittering shoulder brooch of opals and clasped it in the satin of her frock, and drew from a tripod of white and gold a flaming jacqueminot and gave it into her hand and led her forth, followed closely by Janet.  Down the great stairway he led her proudly, through corridor and passage, until they reached the servants’ hall, where the clamour of voices and baying hounds was like pandemonium; and at the sound Mistress Penwick drew back with fear.  For a moment Cedric was sorely tried to keep from bending to those rose-bowed lips.  She saw him hesitate, and stammered forth: 

“Lead on, my lord!”

He swung open the door and instantly all eyes were set upon his fair ward.  First his Lordship’s face was exultant, then seeing Mistress Penwick’s glances that pierced every masculine heart, and her dazzling beauty drunk in by all; his face grew dark, and jealousy possessed him, and fear crept in, and he vowed to wed her at the earliest moment.

“’Tis Sir John Penwick’s daughter, Mistress Katherine Penwick, my father’s ward,” and he led her to their midst.

“She is a wondrous beauty,” many murmured as they saw her.

“Dazzling, by God!” whispered some of the masculines that stood apart, and there were others that spoke not a word, but stood spell-bound at her majestic mien.  A gorgeously apparelled figure swept to his Lordship’s side, and a little hand crept into his and black flashing eyes looked up, and a soft voice whispered,—­

“Thou didst never speak of—­this, the most charming of thy possessions, heretofore, Cedric.  I knew not thou didst inherit so beauteous a being from thy father.  But Sir John,—­England has not heard of his death—­”

“Sh! sh! she does not know,” Cedric answered.

“Not know—­ah!” and Lady Constance drew from him and looked at Katherine with malice and thought evil; “’tis not Sir John’s daughter, ’tis some trick Cedric plays upon his guests and me; it goes to show that his relations to her are ill, and his intentions are to raise her to our level.  Nay, nay, Cedric, I will lift thee beyond such a thing.  When he has time alone, I will gain his ear and taunt him with a debauched youth; free from heart or conscience; a rake to betray; and I will win him from beauteous, youthful Bacchante.  ’Tis his pleasure to swear and swagger; but at twenty-three he should not begin to carouse with female beauty.  ’Tis time, and I will tell him so, for him to bring a lady as wife to the castle.  I will speak to him at once.  He has gone too far.”

Lord Cedric drew Katherine to inspect the trophies of the chase, and explained their kind and the mode of capture.  She with others followed him; the gentler folk raising frocks from pools and streams of blood, thereby displaying high-heeled shoe and slender ankle and ruffles of rare lace; and they gathered close about Mistress Penwick, drinking in her simple convent ways of glance and gesture and fresh, young spirit.