Page:Milady at Arms (1937).pdf/42

 "Fool, mistress?" repeated young Lawrence. His tone was puzzled.

"George the Third!" Sally tossed her head daringly. "George the Third and his weak-minded Parliament!"

"Careful, mistress!" The boy half raised himself angrily from the settle, only to utter a little groan and sink back with a pale face. Sally forgot her indignation and ran to stand anxiously beside him. "It hurts!" he said pathetically, in a moment, pointing at his bandaged arm.

"I know!" Sally looked down at him with sympathetic eyes. "Once I ran a great thorn into my foot," she confessed. Twas dreadful, the pain was!"

"Did your mother bind it for ye as well as she did my arm?" he asked. "Her fingers be light and dextrous!"

Sally shook her head, the brightness fading from her face. "Mistress Todd be not my mother," she told him, low-voiced.

"Not your mother!" echoed the boy. "Ah, I see!" he smiled. "She is your aunt!"

"Nay." The girl shook her curls. "She is no relative at all, sir. She is my mistress. I have been bound out to her for seven years."

"A bond servant! You!" The boy looked at her in shocked amazement. "How happens that?" he inquired curiously, a moment later. "Ye do not look—look like—a—a"