prayed longer in the chapel, where a brazier was kept burning for her all
day. When the young are denied their natural pleasures they turn often
enough to religion; and it was a mercy, as my grandmother said, that she,
who had scarce a live sinner to speak to, should take such comfort in a
dead saint.

"My grandmother seldom saw her that winter, for though she showed a brave
front to all she kept more and more to herself, choosing to have only
Nencia about her and dismissing even her when she went to pray. For
her devotion had that mark of true piety, that she wished it not to be
observed; so that Nencia had strict orders, on the chaplain's approach, to
warn her mistress if she happened to be in prayer.

"Well, the winter passed, and spring was well forward, when my grandmother
one evening had a bad fright. That it was her own fault I won't deny, for
she'd been down the lime-walk with Antonio when her aunt fancied her to be
stitching in her chamber; and seeing a sudden light in Nencia's window, she
took fright lest her disobedience be found out, and ran up quickly through
the laurel-grove to the house. Her way lay by the chapel, and as she crept
past it, meaning to slip in through the scullery, and groping her way, for
the dark had fallen and the moon was scarce up, she heard a crash close
behind her, as though someone had dropped from a window of the chapel. The
young fool's heart turned over, but she looked round as she ran, and there,
sure enough, was a man scuttling across the terrace; and as he doubled
the corner of the house my grandmother swore she caught the whisk of the
chaplain's skirts. Now that was a strange thing, certainly; for why should
the chaplain be getting out of the chapel window when he might have passed
through the door? For you may have noticed, sir, there's a door leads from
the chapel into the saloon on the ground floor; the only other way out
being through the Duchess's tribune.