and gipsies? Mistress Fleming, Mistress Fleming, I have much against thee! What induced thee the second time to run away from such a home as this?'

But Deborah only hung her head and smiled.

Then quoth Charlie sturdily, glowering with his red-brown eyes: 'She loves the gipsies, like to me.'

'Charles, Charles!' said the vicar, 'I will not bandy words with thee. Forsake such evil company, and stick to thy Latin more.'

'I don't love Latin, Master Vicar, an' never shall.'

'Goodsooth, thou wilt and shall. What wouldst thou be? Wouldst idle here all thy days?'

'I'd be a soldier.'

'A soldier? An ungodly set!'

'Father says the priests are the ungodly ones.'

At this the vicar held his peace in despair.

'I'd be a gipsy queen,' chimed in Deborah's treble voice. 'Dost not love the gipsies, Master Vicar? When I am a woman grown I'll run off and travel over the world—I will! Charlie does not love Latin; no more do I love Dame Marjory's lessons.' And forgetting her fear, she nestled up to the vicar's side and gazed up with her laughing dauntless eyes. At that moment the clank of horse's hoofs resounded on the stones of the court-yard.