Prior, and the Old Bishop. Oh! God
help you, my sisters; God help us all!" and she fled away.

Now for a moment Emlyn's heart failed her, since before such a tribunal
what chance had they? The Abbot was their bitter enemy and accuser;
the strange Prior, no doubt, one of his friends and kindred; while the
ecclesiastic spoken of as the "Old Bishop" was well known as perhaps the
cruelest man in England, a scourge of heretics--that is, before
heresy became the fashion--a hunter-out of witches and wizards, and a
time-server to boot. But to Cicely she said nothing, for what was the
use, seeing that soon she would learn all?

They ate their food, knowing both of them that they would need strength.
Then Cicely nursed her child, and, placing it in Emlyn's arms, knelt
down to pray. While she was still praying the door opened and a
procession appeared. First came two monks, then six armed men of the
Abbot's guard, then the Prioress and three of her nuns. At the sight of
the beautiful young woman kneeling at her prayers the guards, rough men
though they were, stopped, as if unwilling to disturb her, but one of
the monks cried brutally--

"Seize the accursed hypocrite, and if she will not come, drag her with
you," at the same time stretching out his hand as though to grasp her
arm.

But Cicely rose and faced him, saying--

"Do not touch me; I follow. Emlyn, give me the child, and let us go."

So they went in the midst of the armed men, the monks preceding, the
nuns, with bowed heads, following after. Presently they entered the
large hall, but on its threshold were ordered to pause while way was
made for them. Cicely never forgot the sight of it as it appeared that
day. The lofty, arched roof of rich chestnut-wood, set there hundreds of
years before by hands that spared neither work nor timber, amongst the
beams of which the bright light of morning played so clearly that she
could see the spiders' webs, and in one of them a sleepy autumn
wasp caught fast. The mob of people gathered to watch her public
trial--faces, many of them, that she had known from childhood.

How they stared at her as she stood there by the head of the steps, her
sleeping child held in her arms! They were a packed audience and had
been prepared to condemn her--that she could see and hear, for did not
some of them point and frown, and set up a cry of "Witch!" as they had
been told to do? But it died away. The sight of her, the daughter of one
of their gr