"I swore that if there were a rebel you were interested in, he should go
free at your pleading. I am in the humour to-night to listen very
eagerly."
"There is no special person, Judge Marriott, but I would plead for them
all," she answered. "Be merciful, for it is surely in your power. These
people are ignorant countryfolk, led away by smooth tongues, and never
counting the cost. They are men of the plough and the scythe, with
little thought beyond these things, and they have wives and little
children. Be merciful, Judge Marriott. Think of me, if you will, when
the fate of a woman lies in your hands, and to the day of my death you
shall hold a warm corner in my heart."
"I will, I swear it, and you--"
"Lady Bolsover is beckoning to me," said Barbara, and left him.
It was the day after this conversation with Judge Marriott that Martin
Fairley came to see her for the second time since she had left
Aylingford. To Barbara he seemed strangely out of place in town, the air
he assumed of being exactly like other men ill-suited him, and he seemed
at a loss without his bow and fiddle. His dress, too, was strictly
conventional, and it appeared to affect the manner of his conversation.
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