ser--thine aunt now, the wife of thine uncle of Kent."

"Oh!" responded Anne, with a long-drawn sigh of relief. The tone said,
"How delightful!"

"I thought you were a ghost."

"Well, so I am, but within the body," whispered Constance with a little
laugh.

"That makes all the difference," said Anne, whose response did not go
beyond a faint smile. "Has your Ladyship then won allowance to visit
us?"

Her voice expressed some surprise, for certainly the middle of the night
was a singular time for a visitor to choose for a call.

"Nay, sweet heart. I come without allowance--hush!--to bear you all
away hence. Wake thy sister, and arise both, and busk [dress] you
quickly. Where be thy brothers?"

"In the inner cowche," [bedroom].

Constance desired Maude to hasten the girls in dressing, which must be
done by the fitful moonlight, as best it could, and went herself into
the inner chamber. Both the boys were asleep. They were Edmund, the
young Earl, whose age was nearly thirteen, and his little brother Roger,
who was not yet eight. Constance laid her hand lightly on the shoulder
of the future King.

"Nym!" she said. "Hush! make no bruit."

The boy was sleeping too heavily to be roused at once; but his little
brother Roger awoke, and looked up with two very bright, intelligent
eyes.

"Are we to be killed?" he wanted to know; but his query was not put in
the frightened tone of his sister.

"Not so, little one. Wake thy brother, and rise quickly."

"'Tis no light gear to wake Nym," said little Roger. "You must shake
him."

Constance put the advice in practice, but Edmund only gave a grunt and
turned over.

"Nym!" said his little brother in a loud whisper. "Nym! wake up."

Edmund growled an inarticulate request to be "let be."

"Then you must pinch him," said little Roger. "Nip him well--be not
afeard."

Constance, extremely amused, acted on this recommendation also. Edmund
gave another growl.

"Nay, then you must needs slap him!" was the third piece of advice
given.

Constance laughingly suggested that the child should do it for her.
Little Roger jumped up, boxed his brother's ears in a decided manner,
and finally, burying his small hands in Edmund's light curly hair, gave
him a dose of sensation which would have roused a dormouse.

"Is he in this wise every morrow?" asked Constance.

"Master Gaoler bringeth alway a wet mop," said little Roger
confidentially. "Wake up, Nym! If thou fa