“Each word in this dear paper is worth the whole string, my girl.  But come to my tiring-room, girl; we must be brave, my lord comes hither to-night.—­He bids me grace you, Master Varney, and to me his wish is a law.  I bid you to a collation in my bower this afternoon; and you, too, Master Foster.  Give orders that all is fitting, and that suitable preparations be made for my lord’s reception to-night.”  With these words she left the apartment.

“She takes state on her already,” said Varney, “and distributes the favour of her presence, as if she were already the partner of his dignity.  Well, it is wise to practise beforehand the part which fortune prepares us to play—­the young eagle must gaze at the sun ere he soars on strong wing to meet it.”

“If holding her head aloft,” said Foster, “will keep her eyes from dazzling, I warrant you the dame will not stoop her crest.  She will presently soar beyond reach of my whistle, Master Varney.  I promise you, she holds me already in slight regard.”

“It is thine own fault, thou sullen, uninventive companion,” answered Varney, “who knowest no mode of control save downright brute force.  Canst thou not make home pleasant to her, with music and toys?  Canst thou not make the out-of-doors frightful to her, with tales of goblins?  Thou livest here by the churchyard, and hast not even wit enough to raise a ghost, to scare thy females into good discipline.”

“Speak not thus, Master Varney,” said Foster; “the living I fear not, but I trifle not nor toy with my dead neighbours of the churchyard.  I promise you, it requires a good heart to live so near it.  Worthy Master Holdforth, the afternoon’s lecturer of Saint Antonlin’s, had a sore fright there the last time he came to visit me.”

“Hold thy superstitious tongue,” answered Varney; “and while thou talkest of visiting, answer me, thou paltering knave, how came Tressilian to be at the postern door?”

“Tressilian!” answered Foster, “what know I of Tressilian?  I never heard his name.”

“Why, villain, it was the very Cornish chough to whom old Sir Hugh Robsart destined his pretty Amy; and hither the hot-brained fool has come to look after his fair runaway.  There must be some order taken with him, for he thinks he hath wrong, and is not the mean hind that will sit down with it.  Luckily he knows nought of my lord, but thinks he has only me to deal with.  But how, in the fiend’s name, came he hither?”

“Why, with Mike Lambourne, an you must know,” answered Foster.

“And who is Mike Lambourne?” demanded Varney.  “By Heaven! thou wert best set up a bush over thy door, and invite every stroller who passes by to see what thou shouldst keep secret even from the sun and air.”