g in her eyes. "You come even
as I was despairing--nay, when already I had despaired."

Sir Crispin was no longer puzzled by the readiness of her acquiescence.
Here was the explanation of it. Forced by the honesty of her pure soul
to abandon the house of a father she knew at last for what he was, the
refuge Crispin now offered her was very welcome. She had determined
before he came to quit Castle Marleigh, and timely indeed was his offer
of the means of escape from a life that was grown impossible. A great
pity filled his heart. She was selling herself, he thought; accepting
the proposal which, on his son's behalf, he made, and from which at any
other season, he feared, she would have shrunk in detestation.

That pity was reflected on his countenance now, and noting its
solemnity, and misconstruing it, she laughed outright, despite herself.
He did not ask her why she laughed, he did not notice it; his thoughts
were busy already upon another matter.

When next he spoke, it was to describe to her the hollow of the road
where on the night of his departure from the castle he had been flung
from his horse. She knew the spot, she told him, and there at dusk upon
the following day she would come to him. Her woman must accompany her,
and for all that he feared such an addition to the party might retard
their flight, yet he could not gainsay her resolution. Her uncle, he
learnt from her, was absent from Sheringham; he had set out four days
ago for London. For her father she would leave a letter, and in this
matter Crispin urged her to observe circumspection, giving no indication
of the direction of her journey.

In all he said, now that matters were arranged he was calm, practical,
and unloverlike, and for all that she would he had been less
self-possessed, her faith in him caused her, upon reflection, even to
admire this which she conceived to be restraint. Yet, when at parting he
did no more than courteously bend before her, and kiss her hand as any
simpering gallant might have done, she was all but vexed, and not to be
outdone in coldness, she grew frigid. But it was lost upon him. He had
not a lover's discernment, quickened by anxious eyes that watch for each
flitting change upon his mistress's face.

They parted thus, and into the heart of Mistress Cynthia there crept
that night a doubt that banished sleep. Was she wise in entrusting
herself so utterly to a man of whom she knew but little, and that learnt
from rumours