“Only, mother, sweet mother,” cried the girl, childlike, set upon her pleasure, “I will be as good as can be.  I will transgress in nought if only thou wilt get my father to take me to see Master Eyre’s cavern.”

She was altogether the home daughter again in her eagerness, entreating and promising by turns with the eager curiosity of a young girl bent on an expedition, but Richard was not to be prevailed on.  He had little or no acquaintance with the Eyre family, and to let them go to the cost and trouble of lighting up the cavern for the young lady’s amusement would be like the encouragement of a possible suit, which would have been a most inconvenient matter.  Richard did not believe the young gentleman had warrant from his father in giving this invitation, and if he had, that was the more reason for declining it.  The Eyres, then holding the royal castle of the Peak, were suspected of being secretly Roman Catholics, and though the Earl could not avoid hospitably bidding them to supper, the less any Talbot had to do with them the better, and for the present Cis must be contented to be reckoned as one.

So she had to put up with her disappointment, and she did not do so with as good a grace as she would have shown a year ago.  Nay, she carried it to Queen Mary, who at night heard her gorgeous description of the wonders of the cavern, which grew in her estimation in proportion to the difficulty of seeing them, and sympathised with her disappointment at the denial.

“Nay, thou shalt not be balked,” said Mary, with the old queenly habit of having her own way.  “Prisoner as I am, I will accomplish this.  My daughter shall have her wish.”

So on the ensuing morning, when the Earl came to pay his respects, Mary assailed him with, “There is a marvellous cavern in these parts, my Lord, of which I hear great wonders.”

“Does your grace mean Pool’s Hole?”

“Nay, nay, my Lord.  Have I not been conducted through it by Dr. Jones, and there writ my name for his delectation?  This is, I hear, as a palace compared therewith.”

“The Peak Cavern, Madam!” said Lord Shrewsbury, with the distaste of middle age for underground expeditions, “is four leagues hence, and a dark, damp, doleful den, most noxious for your Grace’s rheumatism.”

“Have you ever seen it, my Lord?”

“No, verily,” returned his lordship with a shudder.

“Then you will be edified yourself, my Lord, if you will do me the grace to escort me thither,” said Mary, with the imperious suavity she well knew how to adopt.

“Madam, madam,” cried the unfortunate Earl, “do but consult your physicians.  They will tell you that all the benefits of the Buxton waters will be annulled by an hour in yonder subterranean hole.”

“I have heard of it from several of my suite,” replied Mary, “and they tell me that the work of nature on the lime-droppings is so marvellous that I shall not rest without a sight of it.  Many have been instant with me to go and behold the wondrous place.”