CHAPTER IX.
I Mrs.Manners was still abed when her daughter came in to see her.

She lay in the great chamber that gave upon the gallery above the hall whence, on either side, she could hear whether or no the maids were at their business--which was a comfort to her if a discomfort to them.

And now that her lord was in Derby, she lay here all alone.
The first that she knew of her daughter's coming was a light in her eyes; and the next was a face, as of a stranger, looking at her with great eyes, exalted by joy and pain.

The light, held below, cast shadows upwards from chin and cheek, and the eyes shone in hollows.

Then, as she sat up, she saw that it was her daughter, and that the maid held a paper in her hands; she was in her night-linen, and a wrap lay over her shoulders and shrouded her hair.
"He is to be a priest," she whispered sharply.