countryside--she decked her with them. On her broad brow she set a
circlet from which hung sparkling diamonds that had been brought, the
story said, by her mother's ancestor, a Carfax, from the Holy Land,
where once they were the peculiar treasure of a paynim queen, and upon
her bosom a necklet of large pearls. Brooches and rings also she found
for her breast and fingers, and for her waist a jewelled girdle with
a golden clasp, while to her ears she hung the finest gems of all--two
great pearls pink like the hawthorn-bloom when it begins to turn. Lastly
she flung over her head a veil of lace most curiously wrought, and stood
back with pride to look at her.

Now Cicely, who all this while had been silent and unresisting, spoke
for the first time, saying--

"How came this here, Nurse?"

"Your mother wore it at her bridal, and her mother too, so I have been
told. Also once before I wrapped it about you--when you were christened,
sweet."

"Mayhap; but how came it here?"

"In the bosom of my robe. Not knowing when we should get home again, I
brought it, thinking that perhaps one day you might marry, when it would
be useful. And now, strangely enough, the marriage has come."

"Emlyn, Emlyn, I believe that you planned all this business, whereof God
alone knows the end."

"That is why He makes a beginning, dear, that His end may be fulfilled
in due season."

"Aye, but what is that end? Mayhap this is my shroud you wrap about me.
In truth, I feel as though death were near."

"He is ever that," replied Emlyn unconcernedly. "But so long as he
doesn't touch, what does it matter? Now hark you, sweetest, I've
Spanish and gypsy blood in me with which go gifts, and so I'll tell you
something for your comfort. However oft he snatches, Death will not lay
his bony hand on you for many a long year--not till you are well-nigh
as thin with age as he is. Oh! you'll have your troubles like all of us,
worse than many, mayhap, but you are Luck's own child, who lived when
the rest were taken, and you'll win through and take others on your
back, as a whale does barnacles. So snap your fingers at death, as I
do," and she suited the action to the word, "and be happy while you may,
and when you're not happy, wait till your turn comes round again. Now
follow me and, though your father is murdered, smile as you should in
such an hour, for what man wants a sad-faced bride?"

They walked down the broad oaken stairs into the hall where Christo