If she could go stealing to your room--"
"No, no," broke out a weeping, frightened voice. "It was I, Lady
Aunt. You bade me never tell her how her poor face looked, and when
she begged and prayed me, I did not say, but I fetched the mirror.
Oh! oh! It has not been the death of her."
"Nay, nay, by God's blessing! Take away the glass, Margaret. Go and
tell thy beads, child; thou hast done much scathe unwittingly! Ah,
Master Miles, come to the poor maid's aid. Canst do aught for her?"
"These humours must be drawn off, my lady," said the barber-surgeon,
who advanced to the bed, and felt the pulse of the poor little
patient. "I must let her blood."
Maudlin, whose charge she was, came to his help, and Countess Alice
still held her up, while, after the practice of those days, he bled
the already almost unconscious child, till she fainted and was laid
down again on her pillows, under the keeping of Maudlin, while the
clanging of the great bell called the family down to the meal which
broke fast, whether to be called breakfast or dinner.
It was plain that Grisell was in no state to be taken on a journey,
and her mother went grumbling down the stair at the unchancy bairn
always doing scathe.
Lord Salisbury, beside whom she sat, courteously, though perhaps
hardly willingly, invited her to remain till her daughter was ready
to move.
"Nay, my Lord, I am beholden to you, but I may scarce do that.
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