Mist Over Pendle Read Online Free PDF

street. She had waited for this moment since she had first set eyes on the orange-tawny, and here she was in the glittering sunlight, mounted as she had never thought to be mounted, and squired by a cousin who had already made himself a lodestone for her thoughts. The grey mare seemed happy to be away, and Margery was happy with her.
    But soon, when they had cleared the town and put its cobbled streets a mile or two behind them, she began to have some different thoughts. They were descending a long steep slope to an arm of the Ribble which flowed southward at its foot. The track was rough and getting rougher; the mare was lively and getting livelier, and was not at all like the placid palfrey she had once ridden with her Huguenot instructor. Soon she was asking herself whether a side-saddle was a safe seat on such a mount and on such a track; nor did the heavy and extravagantly pleated safeguard seem quite so desirable now as it had done in the Angel an hour before. She became anxious, and from being anxious she became acutely fearful lest at any moment she leave the saddle altogether. She was grateful when the watchful Roger saw her troubles and leaned over to reduce both horses to a walk. So they came without mishap to the river, crossed it, and began to climb the opposite slope, Margery’s confidence was returning, and soon she was able to look about her with interest.
    “Salmesbury,” said Roger suddenly, waving to his left. “Home of Southworth, the recusant.”
    “Recusant?”
    “Aye. Old Sir John, I mean, though he’s dead now. The recusant of all recusants. Do you have papists in your ken at home?”
    “Papists!” Margery was startled, for papists, as she had always heard, were vile treacherous rogues, false to God and King alike; and recusants were the worst and stiffest-necked of papists.
    “Aye, papists,” said Roger again. “Do you have none at your home?”
    “Why no, sir. Not within my knowing.”
    “They’ll be within your knowing here. We’ve good store of them in this County.” He spoke casually, as if this were no great matter, and Margery stared in astonishment.
    “But surely, sir, the Justices....“
    Her cousin laughed heartily.
    “The Justices? Not they! And I speak with knowledge, for I’m one myself.”
    “You!” She almost lost her saddle in the shock of that. “You sir? A papist?”
    “God’s Grace no!” He was shaking with laughter. “Not a papist, little cousin. Merely one of the King’s Justices within this County.” Then suddenly his laughter died and he spoke more gravely. “From whom did you learn of papists?”
    “Why sir, from my brothers, and my mother. And from some others too.”
    “Aye.” He nodded as though understanding had come to him. “I’d some letters from your brothers....“
    He lapsed into silence as the horses went slowly up the long ascent, and Margery was glad enough to be silent while she gave her mind to this. . She had not known that he was a Justice, but she did know that that was a dignity coveted by many country gentlemen and achieved by very few; there must be some, and in high places, who held him in esteem if he were in the Commission. And then she came back to what perplexed her.
    “Touching these papists sir....“
    “Oh, the papists?” His light humour returned instantly. “Touching these papists, little cousin, they’re men and women like the rest of us, and are therefore good, bad and indifferent--mostly indifferent. And for us Justices, we have duties enough without scenting a Jesuit behind every chimney-breast. If we truly scented treason, we’d truly serve the King--even Scotch Jimmy. But as it is....“
    He broke off with a shrug of his shoulders. But Margery was not satisfied.
    “Aye sir,” she answered. “As it is. But how is it?”
    She was at a loss, and she genuinely wanted to know. Roger seemed to sense this, for he answered her soberly.
    “If my neighbour be an honest gentleman,” he said, “then, papist