Our Little Lady | Page 8

on the spit to the Bishop,
who cut from it with his own knife the part he preferred; then she
served the chaplain and Muriel in the same way, and lastly cut some off
for herself and Avice. Finally, when little was left beside the carcase,
she opened the back door, and bestowed the remains on Manikin the
turnspit dog, a little wiry, shaggy cur, which, released from his labours,
had sat on the hearth licking his lips while the process of helping went
on, knowing that his reward would come at last. Manikin trotted off
into the yard with his treasure, and Agnes came back to the table and

the subject.
"Truly, holy Father, I know not how to thank you. But indeed I will do
my best to deserve your good word, should it please God so to order
the same."
"I doubt not thou wilt do well, my daughter. Bear thou in mind that
Christ our Lord is thy Master, and thy service must be good enough to
be laid at His feet. Then shalt thou well serve the Queen."
Agnes was a very ignorant woman. Bishop Grosteste, being himself a
wise man, could not at all realise how ignorant she was. She knew very
little how to serve God, but she did really wish to do it. And that, after
all, is the great thing. Those who have the will can surely, sooner or
later, find out how.
When the guests were gone, Agnes threw another log of wood upon the
fire, and came and stood before it. "Well, Mother, what must we do
touching this matter? Verily I am all of a tumblement. What think
you?"
"I think, my daughter," said old Muriel calmly from the
chimney-corner, "that we are not going to set forth for London within
this next half-hour."
"Nay, truly; yet we must think well on it."
"We shall do well to sleep on it, and yet better to ask counsel of the
Lord."
"But we must go, Mother! It would never do to offend the holy
Bishop!"
"Bishop Robert my brother is not he that should be angered because we
preferred God's counsel to his. But it may be that we shall find, after
prayer and thought, that his counsel is God's."
It was to that conclusion they came the next day.

After the Bishop's departure, for a long time all was bustle and
confusion. Agnes declared that she did not know where her head was,
nor sometimes whether she had any. Avice was at the height of
enjoyment. Old Muriel went quietly about her work, keeping at it,
"doing the next thing," and got through more work than either.
The Bishop did all he could to help them. He found them a tenant for
the house, lent them money--all his money not spent on real necessaries
was either lent or given to such as needed it more than he did; and at
last he sent them southwards on his own horses, and in charge of three
of his servants. From Lincoln to Windsor was a five days' journey of
rather long stages; and when at last they reached the royal borough,
simple--minded Agnes had begun to feel as if no further power of
astonishment were left in her mind.
"Dear, I never thought the world was so big!" she had said before they
left Grantham; and when they arrived at Aylesbury, her cry was--"Eh,
what a power of folks be in this world!"
Old Muriel took her journey, as she did everything, calmly. She, like
Bishop Grosteste himself, lived too much with God to be easily startled
or overawed by the grandeur of man. Avice was in a state of excitement
and delight through the whole time.
They slept at a small inn; and the next morning, one of the Bishop's
servants, who had received his orders beforehand, took up to the Castle
a letter from his master, and waited to hear when it would please the
Queen to see them. He came back in an hour, with the news that the
Queen would receive them that afternoon.
Agnes was in a condition of restless flutter till the time came. Then
they dressed themselves in their very best, and Luke, the Bishop's
servant, took them up to the Castle.
If Agnes had felt confused at the mere idea of her interview, she found
the reality still more overwhelming than she expected. The first thing
she realised was that she stood in an immense hall, surrounded by what
seemed to her a crowd of very smart gentlemen. Then they were led

through passages and galleries, upstairs and downstairs, till Agnes felt
as though she could never hope to find her way back; and at last, in a
very handsome room, where the walls were