THE SIGN OF THE RED CROSS

A Tale of Old London

by

EVELYN EVERETT-GREEN







CHAPTER I. A WARNING WHISPER.


"I don't believe a word of it!" cried the Master Builder, with some
heat of manner. "It is just an old scare, the like of which I have
heard a hundred times ere now. Some poor wretch dies of the
sweating sickness, or, at worst, of the spotted fever, and in a
moment all men's mouths are full of the plague! I don't believe a
word of it!"

"Heaven send you may be right, good friend," quoth Rachel Harmer, as
she sat beside her spinning wheel, and spoke to the accompaniment of
its pleasant hum. "And yet, methinks, the vice and profligacy of this
great city, and the lewdness and wanton wickedness of the Court, are
enough to draw down upon us the judgments of Almighty God. The sin
and the shame of it must be rising up before Him day and night."