wedding guests, in the parlor, and left him there aston-
ished at this strange treatment, and implacably embit-
tered against both bride and groom. The said lord
being cramped for dungeon-room had asked the queen
to accommodate his two criminals, and here in her
bastile they had been ever since; hither, indeed, they
had come before their crime was an hour old, and had
never seen each other since. Here they were, ken-
neled like toads in the same rock; they had passed
nine pitch dark years within fifty feet of each other,
yet neither knew whether the other was alive or not.
All the first years, their only question had been --
asked with beseechings and tears that might have
moved stones, in time, perhaps, but hearts are not
stones: "Is he alive?" "Is she alive?" But they