“Feed thyself, thou little worldling!” chuckled old Antony, and covered the remaining bits of cheese with her hand.  “Who art thou to come here presuming to teach thy betters lessons of self-sacrifice?  First feed thyself; then give to the hungry, the fragments that remain.  Had I five squealing children here—­which Heaven forbid—­I should eat mine own mess, and count myself charitable if I let them lick the dish.  The holy Ladies give to the poor at the Convent gate, that for which they have no further use.  Does thy jaunty fatherhood presume to shame our saintly celibacy?  Mother Sub-Prioress did chide me sharply because, to a poor soul with many hungry mouths to feed, I gave a good piece of venison, and not the piece which was tainted.  Truth to tell, I had already made away with the tainted piece; but Mother Sub-Prioress was pleased to think it was in the pot, seething for the holy Ladies’ evening meal; and wherefore should Mother Sub-Prioress not think as she pleased?

“‘Woman!’ she cried; ’Woman!’—­and when Mother Sub-Prioress says ‘Woman!’ the woman she addresses feels her estate would be higher had God Almighty been pleased to have let her be the Man, or even the Serpent, so much contempt does Mother Sub-Prioress infuse into the name—­’Woman!’ said Mother Sub-Prioress, ’wouldst thou make all the Ladies of the Convent ill?’

“‘Nay,’ said I, ’that would I not.  Yet, if any needs must be ill, ’twere easier to tend the holy Ladies in their cells, than the Poor, in humble homes, outside the Convent walls, tossing on beds of rushes.’

“‘Tush, fool!’ snarled Mother Sub-Prioress. “’The Poor are not easily made ill.’

“Tush indeed!  I tell thee, little bright-eyed man, old Antony, can ‘tush’ to better purpose!  That night there were strong purging herbs in the broth of Mother Sub-Prioress.  Yet she did but keep her bed for one day.  Like the Poor, she is not easily made ill! . . .  Well, have thy way; only peck not my fingers, Master Robin, or I will have thee flogged through the Tything at the cart-tail, as was done to a certain pieman, whose history I will now relate.

“Once upon a time, when Sister Mary Antony was young, and fair to look upon—­Nay, wink not thy naughty eye——­”

At that moment came the sound of a key turning slowly in the lock of the door at the bottom of the steps leading from the crypt to the cloister.

CHAPTER III

THE PRIORESS PASSES

A key turned slowly in the lock of the oaken door at the entrance to the underground way.

The old lay-sister seized her wallet and pulled out the bag of peas.

Below, the heavy door swung back upon its hinges.

Mary Antony dropped upon her knees to the right of the steps, her hands hidden beneath her scapulary, her eyes bent in lowly reverence upon the sunlit flagstones, her lips mumbling chance sentences from the Psalter.