’I knew him at court.  I know him well.  Father, make these fellows cease their insults!  I have heard nothing yet.  See here!’ holding out what Mericour had put into his hand; ’this you cannot doubt, mother.’

‘Parted the pearls!  Ah, the little minx!’ cried the lady, as she recognized the jewels.

‘I thought he had been robbed?’ added Sir Marmaduke.

‘The gentleman doubts?’ said Mericour, catching some of the words.  ’He should know that what is confided in a French gentleman is only taken from him with his life.  Much did I lose; but the pearl I kept hidden in my mouth.’

Therewith he produced the letter.  Lady Thistlewood pronounced that no power on earth should induce her to open it, and drew off herself and her little girls to a safe distance from the secret poison she fancied it contained; while Sir Marmaduke was rating the constables for taking advantage of his absence to interpret the Queen’s Vagrant Act in their own violent fashion; ending, however, by sending them round to the buttery-hatch to drink the young Lord’s health.  For the messeger, the good knight heartily grasped his hand, welcoming him and thanking him for having ’brought comfort to you poor lad’s heart.’

But there Sir Marmaduke paused, doubting whether the letter had indeed brought comfort; for Berenger, who had seized on it, when it was refused by his mother, was sitting under the tree—­turning away indeed, but not able to conceal that his tears were gushing down like rain.  The anxious exclamation of his step-father roused him at length, but he scarce found power or voice to utter, as he thrust the letter into the knight’s hand, ’Ah! see what has she not suffered for me! me, whom you would have had believed her faithless!’

He then grasped his friend’s arm, and with him disappeared into the house, leaving Sir Marmaduke holding the letter in a state of the utmost bewilderment, and calling by turns on his wife and daughter to read and explain it to him.

And as Lucy read the letter, with her mother could not yet prevail on herself to touch, she felt at each word more grateful to the good Aunt Cecily, whose influence had taught her always to view Berenger as a brother, and not to condemn unheard the poor young wife.  If she had not been thus guarded, what distress might not this day of joy to Berenger have brought to Lucy!  Indeed, Lady Thistlewood was vexed enough as it was, and ready to carry her incredulity to the most inconsistent lengths.  ’It was all a trick for getting the poor boy back, that they might make an end of him altogether.  Tell her they thought him dead.—­’Tilley-valley!  It was a mere attempt on her own good-nature, to get a little French impostor on her hands.  Let Sir Duke look well to it, and take care that her poor boy was not decoyed among them.  The Frenchman might be cutting his throat at that moment!  Where was he?  Had Sir Duke been so lost as to let them out of sight together?  No one had either pity or prudence now that her poor father was gone;’ and she began to weep.