Audrey

"'Sixteen thousand pounds of sweet-scented, at ten shillings the

hundredweight; for marriage by banns, five shillings; for the preaching of

a funeral sermon, forty shillings; for christening'"--began Darden for the

Bishop's information. Audrey took her pen and wrote; but before the list

of the minister's perquisites had come to an end the door flew open, and a

woman with the face of a vixen came hurriedly into the room. With her

entered the breeze from the river, driving before it the smoke wreaths,

and blowing the papers from the table to the floor.

Darden stamped his foot. "Woman, I have business, I tell ye,--business

with the Bishop of London! I've kept his Lordship at the door this

se'nnight, and if I give him not audience Blair will presently be down uon

me with tooth and nail and his ancient threat of a visitation. Begone and

keep the house! Audrey, where are you, child?"

"Audrey, leave the room!" commanded the woman. "I have something to say

that's not for your ears. Let her go, Darden. There's news, I tell you."

The minister glanced at his wife; then knocked the ashes from his pipe and

nodded dismissal to Audrey. His late secretary slipped from her seat and

left the room, not without alacrity.

"Well?" demanded Darden, when the sound of the quick young feet had died

away. "Open your budget, Deborah. There's naught in it, I'll swear, but

some fal-lal about your flowered gown or an old woman's black cat and

corner broomstick."

Mistress Deborah Darden pressed her thin lips together, and eyed her lord

and master with scant measure of conjugal fondness. "It's about some one

nearer home than your bishops and commissaries," she said. "Hide passed by

this morning, going to the river field. I was in the garden, and he

stopped to speak to me. Mr. Haward is home from England. He came to the

great house last night, and he ordered his horse for ten o'clock this

morning, and asked the nearest way through the fields to the parsonage."

Darden whistled, and put down his drink untasted.

"Enter the most powerful gentleman of my vestry!" he exclaimed. "He'll be

that in a month's time. A member of the Council, too, no doubt, and with

the Governor's ear. He's a scholar and fine gentleman. Deborah, clear away

this trash. Lay out my books, fetch a bottle of Canary, and give me my

Sunday coat. Put flowers on the table, and a dish of bonchrétiens, and get

on your tabby gown. Make your curtsy at the door; then leave him to me."