eat men and the widow of another, standing in her innocent
beauty, the slumbering babe upon her breast, seemed to quell them, till
the hardest faces grew pitiful--full of resentment, too, some of them,
but not against her.

Then the three judges on the bench behind the table, at which sat the
monkish secretaries; the hard-faced, hook-nosed "Old Bishop" in his
gorgeous robes and mitre, his crozier resting against the panelling
behind him, peering about him with beady eyes. The sullen, heavy-jawed
Prior, from some distant county, on his left, clad in a simple black
gown with a girdle about his waist. And on the right Clement Maldon,
Abbot of Blossholme and enemy of her house, suave, olive-faced,
foreign-looking, his black, uneasy eyes observing all, his keen ears
catching every word and murmur as he whispered something to the Bishop
that caused him to smile grimly. Lastly, placed already in the roped
space and guarded by a soldier, poor old Bridget, the half-witted, who
was gabbling words to which no one paid any heed.

The path was clear now, and they were ordered to walk on. Half-way
up the hall something red attracted Cicely's attention, and, glancing
round, she saw that it was the beard of Thomas Bolle. Their eyes met,
and his were full of fear. In an instant she understood that he dreaded
lest he should be betrayed and given over to some awful doom.

"Fear nothing," she whispered as she passed, and he heard her, or
perhaps Emlyn's glance told him that he was safe. At least, a sign of
relief broke from him.

Now they had entered the roped space, and stood there.

"Your name?" asked one of the secretaries, pointing to Cicely with the
feather of his quill.

"All know it, it is Cicely Harflete," she answered gently, whereon the
clerk said roughly that she lied, and the old wrangle began again as to
the validity of her marriage, the Abbot maintaining that she was still
Cicely Foterell, the mother of a base-born child.

Into this argument the Bishop entered with some zest, asking many
questions, and seeming more or less to take her side, since, where
matters of religion were not concerned, he was a keen lawyer, and just
enough. At length, however, he swept the thing away, remarking brutally
that if half he had heard were true, soon the name by which she had last
been called in life would not concern her, and bade the clerks write her
down as Cicely Harflete or Foterell.

Then Emlyn gave her name, and Sister Bridge