ightest have kept it, for all I want of it.
`Tawdry gewgaws,' indeed! I tell thee, Bess; these be three shillings
the pair."

"They may be. I would not pay three half-pence for them."

"Bess, 'tis ten thousand pities thou art not a nun."

"I would rather be what I am, Mistress."

"I rather not be neither," said Amy flippantly. In those days, they
always put two nots together when they meant to speak strongly. They
did not see, as we do now, that the one contradicts the other.

"Well, Mistress Amy, you have no need," said Elizabeth quietly.

"And as to Christian profession--why, Bess, every lady in the land wears
ear-rings, yea, up to the Queen's Grace herself. Prithee who art thou,
to set thee up for better than all the ladies in England, talking of
Christian profession as though thou wert a priest?"

"I am Mistress Clere's servant-maid; but I set not myself up to be
better than any, so far as I know."

"Thee hold thy peace! Whether goeth this lace or the wide one best with
my blue kirtle?"

"The narrower, I would say. Mistress Amy, shall you have need of me
this next Wednesday afternoon?"

"Why? What's like to happen Wednesday afternoon?"

"Saint Chrysostom's like to happen, an't please you; and Mistress
granted me free leave to visit a friend, if so be you lacked me not."

"What fashion of a friend, trow? A jolly one?" Elizabeth looked a
little amused.

"Scarce after your fashion, Mistress Amy."

"What, as sad and sober as thyself?"

"Well-nigh."

"Then I'll not go with thee. I mean to spend Saint Chrysostom with Mary
Boswell and Lucy Cheyne, and their friends: and I promise thee we shall
not have no sadness nor sedateness in the company."

"That's very like," answered Elizabeth.

"As merry as crickets, _we_ shall be. Dost not long to come withal?"

"I were liefer to visit Rose, if it liked you."

"What a shame to call a sad maid by so fair a name! Oh, thou canst go
for all me. Thy company's never so jolly I need shed tears to lose it."

And with this rather uncomplimentary remark, Amy left the room, with the
blue ear-rings in her ears and the yellow ones in her hand. Elizabeth
waited till her piece of work was finished. Then folding it up and
putting it away in a drawer, she ran down to prepare supper,--a task
wherein Amy did not offer to help her, though it was usual then for the
mistress of the house and her daughters to assist in the cooking.

About two o'clock on the aft