"And why pshaw at my Lord Mayor, sweetheart? or perhaps you pshaw at
my prophecy; but there is a cross in every one's line of life as well
as in yours, darling. And what though I see a 'prentice's flat cap in
this pretty palm, yet there is a sparking black eye under it, hath not
its match in the Ward of Farringdon-Without."
"Whom do you mean, dame?" said Margaret coldly.
"Whom should I mean," said Dame Ursula, "but the prince of 'prentices,
and king of good company, Jenkin Vincent?"
"Out, woman--Jenkin Vincent?--a clown--a Cockney!" exclaimed the
indignant damsel.
"Ay, sets the wind in that quarter, Beauty!" quoth the dame; "why, it
has changed something since we spoke together last, for then I would
have sworn it blew fairer for poor Jin Vin; and the poor lad dotes on
you too, and would rather see your eyes than the first glimpse of the
sun on the great holiday on May-day."
"I would my eyes had the power of the sun to blind his, then," said
Margaret, "to teach the drudge his place."
"Nay," said Dame Ursula, "there be some who say that Frank Tunstall is
as proper a lad as Jin Vin, and of surety he is third cousin to a
knighthood, and come of a good house; and so mayhap you may be for
northward ho!"
"Maybe I may"--answered Margaret, "but not with my father's 'prentice
--I thank you, Dame Ursula."
"Nay, then, the devil may guess your thoughts for me," said Dame
Ursula; "this comes of trying to shoe a filly that is eternally
wincing and shifting ground!"
"Hear me, then," said Margaret, "and mind what I say.
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