ositions should be reversed; and who could say how
near it was at hand? Then the proud Christian noble would be the slave
of the despised Jew pedlar, and--thought Delecresse, grinding his
teeth--he at least would take care that the Christian slave should
indulge no mistakes on that point.

To both the youths Satan was whispering, and by both he was obeyed. And
each of them was positively convinced that he was serving God.

The vengeful words of Delecresse made no impression whatever on the
young Earl of Gloucester. He would have laughed with scorn at the mere
idea that such an insect as that could have any power to hurt him. He
danced back to Margaret's bower, where, in a few minutes, he, she,
Marie, and Eva were engaged in a merry round game.

Beside the three girls who were in the care of the Countess, Earl Hubert
had also three boy-wards--Richard de Clare, heir of the earldom of
Gloucester; Roger de Mowbray, heir of the barony of Mowbray, now about
fifteen years old; and John de Averenches (or Avranches), the son of a
knight. With these six, the Earl's two sons, his daughter, and his
daughter-in-law, there was no lack of young people in the Castle, of
whom Sir John de Burgh, the eldest, was only twenty-nine.

The promise made by Abraham of Norwich was faithfully kept. A week had
not quite elapsed when Levina announced to the Countess that the Jew
pedlar and the maiden his daughter awaited her pleasure in the court.
The Countess desired her to bring them up immediately to Margaret's
bower, whither she would go herself to meet them.

Margaret and Doucebelle had just come in from a walk upon the leads--the
usual way in which ladies took airings in the thirteenth century.
Indeed, the leads were the only safe and proper place for a young girl's
out-door recreation. The courtyard was always filled by the household
servants and soldiers of the garrison: and the idea of taking a walk
outside the precincts of the Castle, would never have occurred to
anybody, unless it were to a very ignorant child indeed. There were no
safe highroads, nor quiet lanes, in those days, where a maiden might
wander without fear of molestation. Old ballads are full of accounts of
the perils incurred by rash and self-sufficient girls who ventured alone
out of doors in their innocent ignorance or imprudent bravado. The
roadless wastes gave harbour to abundance of fierce small animals and
deadly vipers, and to men worse than any of them.