blood run cold by the stories she tells of it in other lands, and
during other outbreaks which she can remember. Methinks sometimes
the very hair on my head is standing up in the affright her words
bring me. But she only laughs and mocks, and calls me a little
poltroon. I trow that she would never fly; it would not be like
her."

"Men and women do many things unlike themselves in stress of
particular and deadly peril," said the Master Builder. "Lady Scrope
would do well to consider leaving whilst the city has so good a
bill of health; it may be less easy by-and-by, should the distemper
spread."

"Thou canst speak to her of this thing, Reuben, when thou dost see
her on the morrow," observed his father. "Perchance she has not
considered the peril of being detained if she puts off flight too
long."

Reuben said he would name the matter to the lady; and when Dorcas
set forth upon the morrow for her daily walk, her brother
accompanied her, and told her in confidence what he had not told to
his family--how Frederick Mason had been served by the irate old
lady, and what a sorry spectacle he had presented afterwards.

Dorcas laughed heartily at the story. She had no love for
Frederick, and she told her brother that she suspected he had been
the half-tipsy gallant who had striven to kiss her in the streets,
and had partially succeeded. This put Reuben into a great wrath,
and he promised whenever he could do so to come and escort his
sister home from the house in Allhallowes. True, the distance was