Dinah knocked lightly at the door, and entered, the two girls following her out of sheer curiosity.
"Heyday! and who are these ?" cried Lady Scrope.
That redoubtable old dame was sitting up in bed, her great frilled nightcap tied beneath her chin, her hawk's eyes full of life and fire, although her face was very pinched and blue, and there were lines about her brow and lips which told the experienced eyes of the sick nurse that she was suffering considerable pain.
Dinah explained their sudden appearance, and asked if they could be of any service.

The old lady gazed at them all in turn, and her face relaxed as she broke into rather a grim laugh.
"Plague nurses, by all the powers! Certes, this is very pretty company! If all that is said be true, ye be the worst harpies of all.

I had better have my own minions to rob me than be left to your tender mercies.

Three of you, too! Verily, 'wheresoever the carcase is, there will the eagles be gathered together,'" and the patient laughed again, as though tickled at her own grim pleasantry.
Dorcas would have expostulated and explained and apologized, but her mistress cut her short with a sharp tap of her fan.
"Little fool, hold thy peace! as though I didn't know an honest face when I see it! "Come, good people, look me well over, and you'll soon see I have none of the tokens.

It is but a colic, such as I am well used to at this season of the year; but in these days let a body's finger but ache, and all the world runs helter skelter this way and that, calling out, 'The plague! the plague!' The plague, forsooth! as though I had not lived through a score of such scares of plague.