gaoler's man brought her
supper. It consisted of a flat cake of bread, a bundle of small onions,
and a pint of weak ale. As he set it down, he said--"There'll be
company for you to-morrow."

"I thank you for showing it to me," said Alice courteously; "pray you,
who is it?"

"'Tis a woman from somewhere down your way," he answered, as he went
out; "but her name I know not."

Alice's hopes sprang up. She felt cheered by the prospect of the
company of any human creature, after her long lonely imprisonment; and
it would be a comfort to have somebody who would help her to turn on her
bed, which, unaided, it gave her acute pain to do. Beside, there was
great reason to expect that her new companion would be a fellow-witness
for the truth. Alice earnestly hoped that they would not--whether out
of intended torture or mere carelessness--place a criminal with her.
Deep down in her heart, almost unacknowledged to herself, lay a further
hope. If it should be Rachel Potkin!

Of the apprehension of the batch of prisoners from Staplehurst Alice had
heard nothing. She had therefore no reason to imagine that the woman
"from somewhere down her way" was likely to be a personal friend. The
south-western quarter of Kent was rather too large an area to rouse
expectations of that kind.

It was growing dusk on the following evening before the "company"
arrived. Alice had sung her evening Psalms--a cheering custom which she
had kept up through all the changes and sufferings of her imprisonment--
and was beginning to feel rather drowsy when the sound of footsteps
roused her, stopping at her door.

"Now, Mistress! here you be!" said the not unpleasant voice of the
Castle gaoler.

"Eh, deary me!" answered another voice, which struck Alice's ear as not
altogether strange.

"Good even, friend!" she hastened to say.

"Nay, you'd best say `ill even,' I'm sure," returned the newcomer.
"I've ne'er had a good even these many weeks past."

Alice felt certain now that she recognised the voice of an old
acquaintance, whom she little expected to behold in those circumstances.

"Why, Sens Bradbridge, is that you?"

"Nay, sure, 'tis never Mistress Benden? Well, I'm as glad to see you
again as I can be of aught wi' all these troubles on me. Is't me?
Well, I don't justly know whether it be or no; I keep reckoning I shall
wake up one o' these days, and find me in the blue bed in my own little
chamber at home. Eh deary, Mistress Benden,