Emlyn took Cicely by the hand, led her to a room that was shown to them,
and there made her ready for her bridal as best she might. She had no
fine dress in which to clothe her, nor, indeed, would there have been
time to don it. But she combed out her beautiful brown hair, and,
opening that box of Eastern jewels which were the great pride of
the Foterells--being the rarest and the most ancient in all the
countryside--she decked her with them. On her broad brow she set a
circlet from which hung sparkling diamonds that had been brought, the
story said, by her mother's ancestor, a Carfax, from the Holy Land,
where once they were the peculiar treasure of a paynim queen, and upon
her bosom a necklet of large pearls. Brooches and rings also she found
for her breast and fingers, and for her waist a jewelled girdle with
a golden clasp, while to her ears she hung the finest gems of all--two
great pearls pink like the hawthorn-bloom when it begins to turn. Lastly
she flung over her head a veil of lace most curiously wrought, and stood
back with pride to look at her.

Now Cicely, who all this while had been silent and unresisting, spoke
for the first time, saying--

"How came this here, Nurse?"

"Your mother wore it at her bridal, and her mother too, so I have been
told. Also once before I wrapped it about you--when you were christened,
sweet."

"Mayhap; but how came it here?"

"In the bosom of my robe. Not knowing when we should get home again, I