eye caught by the countenance of a pretty,
frightened-looking girl, who seemed to be loitering about watching, as if
curious or anxious. Seeing her near each time he passed, and observing
that she wished to speak, but was too timid, he addressed her--

"Would you know aught, mistress?" he said.

She drew nearer gratefully, and then he saw her eyes were red as if with
weeping.

"Think you her ladyship would let a poor girl speak a word with her?" she
said. "Think you I dare ask so much of a servant--or would they flout me
and turn me from the door? Have you seen her? Does she look like a
hard, shrewish lady?"

"That she does not, though all stand in awe of her," he answered, pleased
to talk with so pretty a creature. "I but caught a glimpse of her when
she gave orders concerning the closing with brick of a passage-way below.
She is a tall lady, and grand and stately, but she hath a soft pair of
eyes as ever man would wish to look into, be he duke or ditcher."

The tears began to run down the girl's cheeks.

"Ay!" she said; "all men love her, they say. Many a poor girl's
sweetheart has been false through her--and I thought she was cruel and
ill-natured. Know you the servants that wait on her? Would you dare to
ask one for me, if he thinks she would deign to see a poor girl who would
crave the favour to be allowed to speak to her of--of a gentleman she
knows?"

"They are but lacqueys, and I would dare to ask what was in my mind," he
answered; "but she is near her wedding-day, and little as I know of
brides' ways, I am of the mind that she will not like to be troubled."

"That I stand in fear of," she said; "but, oh! I pray you, ask some one
of them--a kindly one."

The young man looked aside. "Luck is with you," he said. "Here comes
one now to air himself in the sun, having naught else to do. Here is a
young woman who would speak with her ladyship," he said to the strapping
powdered fellow.

"She had best begone," the lacquey answered, striding towards the
applicant. "Think you my lady has time to receive traipsing wenches."

"'Twas only for a moment I asked," the girl said. "I come from--I would
speak to her of--of Sir John Oxon--whom she knows."

The man's face changed. It was Jenfry.

"Sir John Oxon," he said. "Then I will ask her. Had you said any other
name I would not have gone near her to-day."

Her ladyship was in her new closet with Mistress Anne, and there the
lacquey came to her