I do not think I reasoned at all as to her dangers there; but I was as
one who sees a flower on a dunghill. One does not argue about the
matter, or question whether it be smirched or not, nor how it got there.
Neither did I consider at all how my cousin came to be at Court, nor
whether any evil had yet come to her. I did not even consider that I did
not know whether she were but just come, or had been there a great
while. I considered only that she must be got out of it--and how to set
about it.

I might have stood and paced there till midnight, had not one of the
sentinels at the water-gate--placed there I suppose, as Mr. Chiffinch
had told me just now, as an additional security, after nightfall--stepped
out from his place and challenged me. I had had the word, of course, as I
came in; and I gave it him, and he was contented. But I was not. Here,
thought I, is my opportunity.

"Here," said I, "can you tell me where Mistress Dorothy Jermyn is
lodged?"

He was a young fellow, plainly from the country, as I saw, by his look
in the light of the lantern he had.

"No, sir," he said.

"Think again," I said. "She is under the protection of Her Grace of
Portsmouth. She is one of the Queen's ladies."

"Is she a little lady, sir--from the country--that came last month?"

"Yes," I said, feigning that I knew all about it, and trying to control