“Well, St. Giles’ is far enough away from us,” said the Master Builder.  “If the Magistrates do their duty, there is no fear that it will spread our way.  There were deaths over yonder of the plague last November, and it seems as though they had not yet stamped out the germs of it.  But a little firmness and sense will do that.  We have nothing to fear.  So long as the cases are duly reported, we shall soon be rid of the pest.”

Dinah pressed her lips rather closely together.  She had that fine resolute cast of countenance which often characterizes those who are constantly to be found at the bedside of the sick.  Her dress was very plain, and she wore a neckerchief of soft, white Indian muslin about her throat, instead of the starched yellow one which was almost universal amongst the women citizens of the day.  Her hands were large and white and capable looking.  Her only ornament was a chatelaine of many chains, to which were suspended the multifarious articles which a nurse has in constant requisition.  In figure she was tall and stately, and in the street strangers often paused to give her a backward glance.  She was greatly in request amongst the sick of the better class, though she was often to be found beside the sick poor, who could give her nothing but thanks for her skilled tendance of them.

“Ay, truly, so long as the cases are duly reported,” she repeated slowly.  “But do you think, sir, that that is ever done where means may be found to avoid it?”

The Master Builder looked a little startled at the question.

“Surely all good folks would wish to do what was right by their neighbours.  They would not harbour a case of plague, and not make it known in the right quarter.”

“You think not, perhaps.  Had you seen as much of the sick as I have, you would know that men so fear and dread the distemper, as they most often call it, that they will blind their eyes to it to the very last, and do everything in their power to make it out as something other than what they fear.  I have seen enough of the ways of folks with sickness to be very sure that all who have friends to protect the fearful secret, will do so if it be possible.  It is when a poor stranger dies of a sudden that it becomes known that the plague has found another victim.  Why are there double the number of deaths in this week’s bill, if more than are set down as such be not the distemper?”

All the faces in the room looked very grave at that, for in truth it was a most disquieting thought.  The sailor came a few steps nearer the fire, and remarked: 

“It has all come from those hounds of Dutchmen!  Right glad am I that we are to go to war with them at last, whether the cause be righteous or not.  They have gotten the plague all over their land.  I saw men drop down in the streets and die of it when I was last in port there.  They send it to us in their merchandise.”

“My wife will die of terror if she hears but a whisper of the distemper being anigh us,” remarked the Master Builder, with a sigh and a look of uneasiness.  “But men are always scaring us with tales of its coming and, after all, there is but a death here and one there, such as any great city may look to have.”