“And Audrey?” said his wife.

Darden, about to rise, sank back again and sat still, a hand upon either arm of his chair.  “Eh!” he said; then, in a meditative tone, “That is so,—­there is Audrey.”

“If he has eyes, he’ll see that for himself,” retorted Mistress Deborah tartly. “‘More to the purpose,’ he’ll say, ’where is the money that I gave you for her?’”

“Why, it’s gone,” answered Darden “Gone in maintenance,—­gone in meat and drink and raiment.  He didn’t want it buried.  Pshaw, Deborah, he has quite forgot his fine-lady plan!  He forgot it years ago, I’ll swear.”

“I’ll send her now on an errand to the Widow Constance’s,” said the mistress of the house.  “Then before he comes again I’ll get her a gown”—­

The minister brought his hand down upon the table.  “You’ll do no such thing!” he thundered.  “The girl’s got to be here when he comes.  As for her dress, can’t she borrow from you?  The Lord knows that though only the wife of a poor parson, you might throw for gewgaws with a bona roba!  Go trick her out, and bring her here.  I’ll attend to the wine and the books.”

When the door opened again, and Audrey, alarmed and wondering, slipped with the wind into the room, and stood in the sunshine before the minister, that worthy first frowned, then laughed, and finally swore.

“’Swounds, Deborah, your hand is out!  If I hadn’t taken you from service, I’d swear that you were never inside a fine lady’s chamber.  What’s the matter with the girl’s skirt?”

“She’s too tall!” cried the sometime waiting woman angrily.  “As for that great stain upon the silk, the wine made it when you threw your tankard at me, last Sunday but one.”

“That manteau pins her arms to her sides,” interrupted the minister calmly, “and the lace is dirty.  You’ve hidden all her hair under that mazarine, and too many patches become not a brown skin.  Turn around, child!”

While Audrey slowly revolved, the guardian of her fortunes, leaning back in his chair, bent his bushy brows and gazed, not at the circling figure in its tawdry apparel, but into the distance.  When she stood still and looked at him with a half-angry, half-frightened face, he brought his bleared eyes to bear upon her, studied her for a minute, then motioned to his wife.

“She must take off this paltry finery, Deborah,” he announced.  “I’ll have none of it.  Go, child, and don your Cinderella gown.”

“What does it all mean?” cried Audrey, with heaving bosom.  “Why did she put these things upon me, and why will she tell me nothing?  If Hugon has hand in it”—­

The minister made a gesture of contempt.  “Hugon!  Hugon, half Monacan and half Frenchman, is bartering skins with a Quaker.  Begone, child, and when you are transformed return to us.”

When the door had closed he turned upon his wife.  “The girl has been cared for,” he said.  “She has been fed,—­if not with cates and dainties, then with bread and meat; she has been clothed,—­if not in silk and lace, then in good blue linen and penistone.  She is young and of the springtime, hath more learning than had many a princess of old times, is innocent and good to look at.  Thou and the rest of thy sex are fools, Deborah, but wise men died not with Solomon.  It matters not about her dress.”