had been chilly and the nostrils of the hard-ridden beasts
made a steam among the lights we held, while above us the upper frontage
of the house stood out clear between the growing daylight and the waning
moon poised above the courtlege-wall in the south-west.

"Hey! Is that Paschal?" My Master turned as one stiff with riding.
His face was ghastly pale, yet full of a sort of happiness: and I saw
that his clothes were disordered and his boots mired to their tops.
"Good luck!" cried he, handing the lady down. "We can have supper at
once."

"Supper?" I repeated it after him.

"Or breakfast--which you choose. Have the lights lit in the hall, and a
table spread. My lady will eat and drink before going to her room."

"'My lady'?" was my echo again.

"Just so--my lady, and my wife, and henceforward your Mistress.
Lead the way, if you please! Afterwards I will talk."

I did as I was ordered: lit the lights about the dais, spread the cloth
with my own hands, fetched forth the cold meats and--for he would have
no servants aroused--waited upon them in silence and poured the wine,
all in a whirl of mind. My Mistress (as I must now call her) showed no
fatigue, though her skirts were soiled as if they had been dragged
through a sea of mud. Her eyes sparkled and her bosom heaved as she
watched my Master, who ate greedily. But beyond the gallant words with
which he pledged her welcome home to Pengersick nothing was said until,
his hunger put away, he pushed back his chair and commanded me to tell
what had happened at Clowance: which I did, pointing out the ticklish
posture of affairs, and that for a certainty the Commissioner might be
looked for in within a few hours.

"Well," said my Master, "I see no harm in his coming, nor any profit.
The goods are not with us: never were with us: and there's the end of
it."

But I was looking from him to my Mistress, who with bent brows sat
studying the table before her.

"Master Paschal," said she after a while, as one awaking from thought,
"has done his business zealously and well. I will go to my room now and
rest: but let me be aroused when this visitor comes, for I believe that
I can deal with him." And she rose and walked away to the stair, with
the hound at her heels.

A little later I saw my Master to his room: and after that had some
hours of leisure in which to fret my mind as well over what had happened
as what was likely to. It was hard on noon when the Commissi