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Updated: May 17, 2025
In the field appeared Sir John Oxon, who for a brief visit was at Eldershawe. He rode close to my lady, though she had naught to say to him after her first greetings of civility. He looked not as fresh and glowing with youth as had been his wont only a year ago. His reckless wildness of life and his town debaucheries had at last touched his bloom, perhaps.
'Twas heard once that he had gone to France, and at the French Court was making as great a figure as he had made at the English one, but of this even his kinsman Lord Eldershawe could speak no more certainly than he could of the first matter. The suit of my Lord of Dunstanwolde if suit it was during these months appeared to advance somewhat.
"They hate thee," said Eldershawe, with a chuckle, "and will hate thee worse when thou wearest brocades and a farthingale." "I have watched them," proceeded Mistress Clo. "They cannot keep their mouths shut. If they have a secret they must tell it, whether 'tis their own or another's.
"What is't, Jeoff?" old Eldershawe cried, touching his shoulder with a shaking hand. "What's the man staring at, as if he had gone mad?" "Jack," cried Sir Jeoffry, his eyes still farther starting from their sockets. "Jack! what say you? I cannot hear." The next instant he sprang up, shrieking, and thrusting with his hands as if warding something off. "Keep back!" he yelled.
"Eldershawe and me have just been saying," broke forth one of them, chuckling, "how this bringeth back old times, though 'tis little like them. We three were of the birthnight party Eldershawe, Chris, and me. Thou dost not forget old friends, Clo, and would not, wert thou ten times a Duchess." "Nay, not I," answered her Grace. "Not I."
She cast her eyes upon him and returned it with a grace and condescension which struck the beholders dumb with admiring awe. To some of the people of a commoner sort he was a stranger, but all connected with the gentry knew he was Sir John Oxon, who was staying at Eldershawe Park with his relative, whose estate it was.
"Had she a secret to keep, child though she is," said Eldershawe, "there is none man or woman who could scare or surprise it from her; and 'tis a strange quality to note so early in a female creature." She spent her days with her father and his dissolute friends, treated half like a boy, half a fantastical queen, until she was fourteen.
"Yes, they are like him," she answered, gravely. "The two thou show'dst me playing 'neath the trees?" said Eldershawe. "Ay, they are like enough." "And but for her Grace would have been brought up a hang-dog thief and a poor drab, with all their beauty," went on Sir Christopher. "Ecod, thou hast done well, Clo, the task 'twas thy whim to take upon thyself."
'Twas good even to see her eat, she did it with such healthy pleasure, as a young horse might have taken his oats or a young setter his supper after a day in the cover. "Thou'rt not tired, Clo!" cries Eldershawe, laughing, as she fell upon her russet apple, biting into it crisply, and plainly with the pleasure of a hungry child. "Not I, good Lord!" she answered.
It was, however, still his way to accept frequent hospitalities from his kinsman Eldershawe, and Sir Jeoffry was always rejoiced enough to secure him as his companion for a few days when he could lure him from the dissipation of the town. At such times it never failed that Mistress Wimpole and poor Anne kept their guard.
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