He turned into his own room and looked round. He saw that some of his accoutrements had been taken away. There were vacant pegs upon the walls. He sat down upon the small low bed, bent forward, clasped his hands upon his knees, and wondered whether he should speak or not. He wondered very greatly whether he dare make a query, start an investigation, nearer to his heart than anything else in the world.

At Chelmsford he had run out of the Tun Inn and touched the burly man who had killed the maddened stallion on the shoulder. He had brought him into the ordinary, sat him down in a chair, put a great stoup of ale before him, and then begun to talk to him.

"I know who you are," he said, "very well, because I was one of the gentlemen riding from town to Hadley with your late master, Dr. Taylor. I saw you when his Reverence was wishing good-bye outside St. Botolph, his church, and I heard the words your master said—eke that you were the 'faithfullest servant that ever a man had.' What do you here now, John Hull?"

The man had drunk his great stoup of ale very calmly. The daring deed in which he had been engaged had seemed to affect his nerves in no way at all. He was shortish, thick-set, with a broad chest measurement, and a huge thickness between chest and back. His face was tanned to the colour of an old saddle, very keen and alert, and he was clean-shaved, a rather odd and distinguishing feature in a serving-man of that time.

He told Johnnie that, now he knew, he recognised him as one of the company who rode with Dr. Taylor to his death. He had followed the cavalcade almost immediately, and on foot. The way was long, and he had arrived at Chelmsford faint and weary with very little money in his pouch, and been compelled to wait there a time for rest and food. His design was to proceed to Hadley, where he knew he could get work and would be welcome.

Mr. Peter Lacel, he told Johnnie in the inn, would doubtless employ him, for though a Catholic gentleman, he had been a friend of the Rector's in the past.

"You want work, then?" Johnnie had said. "You do not wish to be a masterless man, a hedge-dodger, poacher, or a rogue?"

"Work I must have, sir," John Hull replied, "but it must be with a good master. Mr. Peter Lacel will take me on. Masterless, I should be a very great rogue."

All this happened in the dining-room of the Chelmsford inn, Johnnie sitting in his chair and looking at the thick, brown-faced man with a cool scrutiny which well disguised the throbbing excitement he felt at seeing him—at meeting him in this strange, and surely pre-ordained fashion.

"I'll tell thee who I am," Johnnie had said to the man, naming himself and his state. "That the Doctor spoke of you as he did when going to his death is enough recommendation to me of your fidelity. I need a servant myself, but I would ask you this, John Hull: You are, doubtless, of a certain party. If I took you to my service, how would you square with who and what I am? A led man of mine must be loyal."

Hull had answered but very little. "Ye can but try me, sir," he said, "but I will come with you to London very joyfully. And I well think——"

He stopped, mumbled something, and stood there, his hands stained with the blood of the horse he had killed, rather clumsy, very much tongue-tied, but with something faithful and even hungry in his eyes.

Johnnie's own servant was a man called Thumb, a dissolute London fellow, who had been with him for a month, and who had performed his duties in a very perfunctory way. Life had been so quick and vivid, so full of movement and the newness of Court life, that the Groom of the Body had hardly had time to remember the personal discomfort he endured from the fellow who had been recommended to him by one of the lieutenants of the Queen's Archers. He had always meant to get rid of him at the first opportunity. Now the opportunity presented itself, though it was not for mere convenience that Commendone had engaged his new servitor.

He had not the slightest doubt in his own mind that the man was sent to him—put in his way—by the Power which ruled and controlled the fortunes of men. Living as he did, and had done for many years, in a quiet, fastidious, but very real dream and communion with things that the hand or body do not touch and see, he had always known within himself that the goings-in and goings-out of those who believe depend not at all upon chance. Like all men of that day, Commendone was deeply religious. His religion had not made him bigoted, though he clung to the Church in which he had been brought up. But, nevertheless, it was very real to him. There were good and bad angels in those days, who fought for the souls of men. The powers of good and evil were invoked....

The Esquire was certain that this sturdy John Hull had come into his life with a set purpose.

He was riding back to London with one fixed idea in his mind. One word rang and chimed in his brain—the word was "Elizabeth!"

He had left Chelmsford with John Hull definitely enrolled as his servant, had hired a horse for him from the landlord of the "Tun," and had taken him straight to the Tower. When he had entered within the walls, he had told his man Thumb that he would dismiss him on the morrow, and pay him his wages due. He had told him, moreover, that—just as he was hurrying to the Privy Garden with news for the Queen—he must take John Hull to his quarters and put him into the way of service. For a moment, Thumb had been inclined to be insolent, but one single look from the dark, cool eyes, one hinted flash of anger upon the oval olive-coloured face, had sent the Londoner humbly to what he had to do; while the fellow looked, not without a certain apprehension, at the thick-set quiet man who followed him to be shown his new duties....

Johnnie jumped up from his bed, strode out of the room, walked a yard or two down the corridor, and entered another and larger room, which he shared with three other members of the suite.

It was the place where they kept their armour, their riding-boots, and some of their swords.

As he came in he saw that Hull was sitting upon an overturned barrel, which had held quarels for cross-bows.

The man had tied a piece of sacking round his waist and over his breeches, and was hard at work.

Johnnie's three or four damascened daggers were rubbed bright with hog's lard and sand. His extra set of holster pistols gleamed fresh and new—the rust had been all removed from flint-locks and hammers; while the stocks shone with porpoise oil.

And now the new servant was polishing a high-peaked Spanish saddle, and all the leather trappings of a charger, with an inside crust of barley bread and a piece of apple rind.

Directly the man saw his new master he stood up and made a saluting motion with his hand.

Johnnie looked at him coldly, though inwardly he felt an extreme pleasure at the sight of his new recruit so lately added to him, so swift to get to work, and withal so blithe about it.

"You must not sing the songs I have heard you singing," he said, shortly. "Don't you know where you are?"

"I had forgotten, sir," the man replied. "I have a plaguey knowledge of rhymes. They do run in my head, and must out."

"They must not, I assure you," Johnnie answered, "but I like this well enough. Hast got thee to work at once, then."

"I love it, sir. To handle such stuff as yours is rare for a man like me. Look you here, sir"—he lifted up a small dagger which he withdrew from its sheath of stag's leather, dyed vermilion—"Hear how it ringeth!"

He twanged the supple blade with his forefinger, and the little shivering noise rang out into the room.

The man's keen, brown face was lit up with simple enjoyment. "I love weapons, master," he said, as if in apology.

Johnnie knew at once that here was the man he had been looking for for weeks. The man who cared, the faithful man; but he knew also, or thought he knew, that it was but poor policy to praise a servant unduly.

"Well, well," he said, "you can get on with your work. To-morrow morning, I will see you fitted out as becometh my body servant. To-night you will go below with the other men. I have spoken to the intendant that I have a new servant, and you will have your evening-meat and a place to lie in."

He turned to go.

With all his soul he was longing to ask this man certain questions. He believed that he had been sent to him to tell him of the whereabouts of the girl to whom, so strangely, at such a dreadful hour, he had vowed his life. But the long control over temperament and emotion which old Father Chilches had imposed upon him—the very qualities which made him, already, a successful courtier—stood him in good stead now. The dominant desire of his heart was to be repressed. He knew very well, he realised perfectly clearly, how intimate a member of Dr. Taylor's household this faithful servant—"the faithfullest servant that ever man had"—must have been. And knowing it, he felt sure that the time was not yet come to ask John Hull any questions. He must arouse no suspicions within the man's mind. Hull had entered his service gladly, and promised to be more than adequate and worthy of any trust that could be reposed in him. But he had seen Johnnie riding away with his beloved master, one of those who had taken him to torture and death. The very shrewdness and cleverness imprinted upon the fellow's face were enough to say that he would at once take alarm at any questioning about Dr. Taylor's family, at this moment.

John Hull scraped with his foot and made a clumsy bow as his new master turned away. Then, suddenly, he seemed to remember something. His face changed in expression.

"God forgive me, sir," he said, "indeed, I had near forgot it. When I went into your chamber and took this harness for cleaning, there was a letter lying there for you. I can read, sir; Dr. Taylor taught me to read somewhat. I took the letter, fearing that it might be overlooked or e'en taken away, for there are a plaguey lot of serving-men in this passage. 'Tis here, sir, and I crave you pardon me for forgetting of it till now."

He handed Johnnie a missive of thick yellow-brown paper—such as was woven from linen rags at Arches Smithfield Factory of that day. The letter was folded four-square and tied round with a cord of green silk, and where the threads intersected at the back was a broad seal of dull red wax, bearing the sign of a lamb in its centre.

Johnnie pulled off the cord, the wax cracked, and the thick yellow paper rustled as he pulled it open.

This was the letter:

"Honoured Sir,—This from my house in Chepe. Thy honoured father who hath lately left the City hath left with me a sum of money which remaineth here at your charges, and for your disposal thereof as you may think fit. This shall be sent to you upon your letter and signature, to-morrow an you so wish.

"Natheless, should you come to my house to-night I will hand it into your keeping in gold coin. I will say that Sir Henry expressed hope that you might care to come to my poor house which has long been the agency for Commendone. For your father's son, sir, there will be very open welcome.

"Your obt. svt.,
and good friend,
Robert Cressemer,
Alderman of ye City of London."

Commendone read the letter through with care.

His father had been most generous since Johnnie had arrived at Court, and the young man was in no need of money. Sir Henry had, indeed, hinted that further supplies would be sent shortly, and he must have arranged it with the Alderman ere he left the City.

Johnnie sighed. His father had always been good to him. No desire of his had ever been left ungratified. Many sons of noblemen at Court had neither such a generous allowance nor perfect equipment as he had. He never thought of his father and the old house in Kent without a little pang of regret. Was it worth it all? Were not the silent woods of Commendone, with their shy forest creatures, better far than this stately citadel and home of kings?

His life had been so tranquil in the past. The happy days had gone by with the regularity of some slow-turning wheel. Now all was stress and turmoil. Dark and dreadful doings encompassed him. He was afloat upon strange waters, and there was no pilot aboard, nor did he know what port he should make, what unknown coast-line should greet his troubled eyes when dawn should come.

These thoughts were but fleeting, as he sat in his bedroom, where he had taken the letter from Mr. Cressemer. He sent them away with an effort of will. The past life was definitely over; now he must gather himself together and consider the immediate future without vain regrets.

As he mounted the stairs from the Common Room he had it in mind to change from his riding costume and sleep. He needed sleep. He wanted to enter that mysterious country so close to the frontiers of death, to be alone that he might think of Elizabeth. He knew now how men dreamed and meditated of their loves, why lovers loved to be alone.

He held the letter in his hand, looking down at the firm, clear writing with lack-lustre eyes. What should he do? sleep, lose himself in happy fancies, or go to the house of the Alderman? He had no Court duties that night.

He knew Robert Cressemer's name well. Every one knew it in London, but Commendone had heard it mentioned at home for many years. Mr. Cressemer, who would be the next Lord Mayor, was one of those merchant princes who, ever since the time of that great commercial genius, Henry VII, had become such an important factor in the national life.

For many years the Alderman, the foundation of whose fortune had been the export of English wool, had been in intimate relations, both of business and friendship, with Sir Henry Commendone. The knight's wool all went to the warehouses in Chepe. He had shares in the fleet of trading vessels belonging to Cressemer, which supplied the wool-fairs of Holland and the Netherlands. The childlike and absolutely uneconomic act of Edward VI which endeavoured to make all interest illegal, and enacted that "whoever shall henceforth lend any sum of money for any manner of usury, increase, lucre, gain or interest to be had, received, or hoped for, over and above the sum so lent," should suffer serious penalties, had been repealed.

Banking had received a tremendous impetus, Robert Cressemer had adventured largely in it, and Sir Henry Commendone was a partner with him in more than one enterprise.

Of all this Johnnie knew nothing. He had not the slightest idea how rich his father was, and knew nothing of the fortune that would one day be his.

He did know, however, that Mr. Cressemer was a very important person indeed, the admired and trusted confidant of Sir Henry, and a man of enormous influence. Such a letter, coming from such a man, was hardly to be neglected by a young courtier. Johnnie knew how, if one of his colleagues had received it, it would have been shown about in the Common Room, what rosy visions of fortune and paid bills it would invoke!

He read the letter again. There was no need to go to Mr. Cressemer's house that night if he did not wish to do so. He was weary, he wanted to be alone to taste and savour this new thing within him that was called love. Yet something kept urging him to go, nevertheless. He could not quite have said what it was, though again the sense that he stood very much alone and friends were good—especially such a powerful one as this—crossed his mind. And, as an instance of the quite unconscious but very real revolution that had taken place in his thoughts during the last forty hours, it is to be noted that he did feel the need of friends and supporters.

Yet he was high in favour with the King and Queen, envied by every one, certain of rapid advancement.

But he no longer thought anything of this. Those great ones were on one side of a great something which he would not or could not define. He was on the other, he and the girl with eyes of crushed sapphire and a red mouth of sorrow.

It would be politic to go.... "I'll put it to chance," he said to himself at length. "How doth Ovid have it?...

I remember Father Chilches' translation:

Here goes!"

He opened his purse to find a coin with which to settle the matter, and poured out the contents into his palm. There were eight or nine gold sovereigns of Henry VIII, beautiful coins with "Hiberniæ Rex" among the other titles, which were still known as "double ryals," three gold ducats, coined in that year, with the Queen and King Consort vis-à-vis and one crown above the heads of both, and one little silver half testoon.

He put the gold back in his purse and held out the small coin upon his hand. "What is't to be, little testoon?" he said whimsically, looking at the big M and crown, "bed and thoughts of her, or the worshipful Master Cressemer and, I don't doubt, a better supper than I'm likely to get in the Tower? 'M,' I go."

He spun the coin, and it came down with the initial uppermost. He laughed and flung it on to a shelf, calling John Hull to help him change his dress.

Nothing told him that in that spin he had decided—or let it better be said there was decided for him—the whole course of his life. At that actual moment!

Thus the intrusion of the little testoon.

CHAPTER V

The sky was a faint primrose above the spires of the town. The sun, that tempest of fire, had sunk, but still left long lines in the sky, lines which looked as if they had been drawn by a vermilion pencil; while, here and there, were locks, friths, and islands of gold and purple floating in the sky, billowed and upheaved into an infinity of distant glory.

They went through the narrow streets beneath the hundreds of coloured signs which hung from shop and warehouse.

At a time when the ordinary porter, prentice, and messenger could hardly read, each place of business must signify and locate itself by a sign. A merchant of those days did not send a letter by hand to a business house, naming it to the messenger. He told the man to go to the sign of the Three Cranes, the Gold Pig on a black ground, the Tower and Dragon in such and such a street.

London was not lit on a summer night at this hour. In the winter, up to half-past eight or so the costers' barrows with their torches provided the only illumination. After that all was dark, and in summer there was no artificial light at all when the day had gone.

They came up to the cross standing to the east of Wood Street, which was silhouetted against the last gleams of day in the sky. Its hexagonal form of three sculptured tiers, which rose from one another like the divisions of a telescope, cut out a black pattern against the coloured background. The niches with their statues, representing many of the Sovereigns of England, were all in grey shadow, but the large gilt cross which surmounted it still caught something of the evening fires.

To the east there was the smaller tower of octagonal form, which was the Conduit, and here also the top was bathed in light—a figure standing upon a gilded cone and blowing a horn.

The gutters in the streets were dry now, for the rain storm of two days ago had not lasted long, and they were sticky and odorous with vegetable and animal filth.

The two men walked in the centre of the street, as was wiser in those days, for—as still happens in the narrow quarters of old French towns to-day—garret windows were open, and pails were emptied with but little regard for those who were passing by.

When they came into Chepe itself, things were a little less congested, for great houses were built there, and Johnnie walked more quickly. Many of the houses of the merchant princes were but little if at all inferior to the mansions of the nobility at that time. They stood often enough in gloomy and unfrequented courts, and were accessible only by inconvenient passages, but once arrived at, their interiors were of extraordinary comfort and magnificence.

Johnnie knew that Mr. Cressemer's house was hereabouts, but was not certain of the precise location. He looked up through the endless succession of Saracens' heads, Tudor roses, blue bears, and golden lambs, but could see nothing in the growing dark. He turned round and beckoned to John Hull.

"You know the City?" he said.

"Very well, master," the man answered, looking at him, so Johnnie thought, with a very strange expression.

"Then, certes, you can tell me the house of Master Robert Cressemer, the Alderman," said Johnnie.

Hull gave a sudden, violent start. His eyes, always keen and alert, now grew wide.

"Sir," he said, "I know that house very well, but what do you there?"

Johnnie stared at him in amazement for a moment. Then the blood mantled in his cheeks.

"Sirrah," he said, "what mean you by this? What is it to you where I go or what I do?"

There was nobody in their immediate vicinity at the moment, and the thick-set serving-man, by a quick movement, placed himself in front of his master, his right hand upon the newly-provided sword, his left playing with the hilt of the long knife which had served him so well at Chelmsford.

"I said I would be loyal to ye, master," the fellow growled, "but I see now that it cannot be. I will be no servant of those who do burn and slay innocent folk, and shalt not to the Alderman's if thou goest with evil intent."

An enormous surprise almost robbed the young man of his anger.

Was this man, this "faithfullest servant," some brigand or robber, or assassin, in disguise? What could it mean? His hand was upon his sword in a moment, it was ready to flash out, and the accomplished fencer who had been trained in every art and trick of sword-play, knew well that the strength of the thick-set man before him would avail nothing. But he waited a moment, really more interested and surprised than angered or alarmed.

"I don't want to kill you, my good man," he said, "and so I will give you leave to speak. But by the Mass! this is too much; an you don't explain yourself, in the kennel and carrion you lie."

"I beg your pardon, sir," Hull answered, his face taking into it a note of apology, "but you come from the Court; you rode with those bloody villains that did take my dear master that was to his death. Are you not now going with a like intent to the house of Mr. Cressemer?"

"I don't know," Johnnie answered, "why I should explain to you the reason for my visit to His Worship, but despite this gross impudence, I will give you a chance, for I have learnt to know that there is often an explanation behind what seemeth most foul. The Alderman is one of the oldest and best friends my father, the Knight of Kent, hath ever had. The letter thou gavest me two hours agone was from His Worship bidding me to supper. And now, John Hull, what hast to say before I slit you?"

For answer, John Hull suddenly fell upon his knees, and held out his hands in supplication.

"Sir," he said, in a humble voice, "I crave that of your mercy and gentleness you will forgive me, and let this pass. Sure, I knew you for a gallant gentleman, and no enemy to my people when first I saw you. I marked you outside St. Botolph's Church, and knew you again at Chelmsford. But I thought you meant harm...."

His voice died away in an inarticulate mumble. He seemed enormously sincere and penitent, and dreadfully embarrassed also by some knowledge or thought at the back of his mind, something which he feared, or was unable to disclose.

Johnnie's heart was beating strangely, though he did not know why. He seemed to tread into something strange and unexpected. Life was full of surprises now.

All he said was: "Make a fool of thyself no longer, John Hull; get up and lead me to His Worship's. I forgive thee. But mark you, I shall require the truth from you anon."

The man scrambled up, made a clumsy bow, and hurried on for a few yards, until a narrow opening between two great stacks of houses disclosed itself. He walked down it, his shoes echoing upon a pavement stone. Johnnie followed him, and they came out into a dark courtyard in which a single lantern of glass and iron hung over a massive door studded with nails.

"This is His Worship's house," said John Hull.

Johnnie went up to the door and beat upon it with the handle of his dagger, standing on the single step before it. In less than half a minute, the door was opened and a serving-man in livery of yellow stood before him.

"Mr. John Commendone," Johnnie said, "to see His Worship the Alderman upon an invitation."

The man bowed, opened the door still wider, and invited Johnnie into a large flagged hall, lit by three silver lamps.

"Worshipful sir," he said, "my master told me that perchance you would be a-coming this night, and he awaits you in the parlour."

"This is my servant," Johnnie said to the man, and even as he did so, he saw a look of immense surprise, mingled with welcome, upon the fellow's face.

"I will take him to the kitchen, Your Worship," the man said, and as he spoke, a footman came out of a door on the opposite side of the hall, bowed low to Johnnie, and led him up a broad flight of stairs.

Commendone shrugged his shoulders. There were mysteries here, it seemed, but so far they were none of his, and at any rate he was within the house of a friend.

At first there was no evidence of any particular luxury, and Johnnie was surprised. Though he had little idea how wealthy his own father had become, the great house of Commendone was a very stately, well-found place. He knew, moreover, that Mr. Robert Cressemer was one of the richest citizens of London, and he had heard his friends talking at Court of the state and splendour of some of those hidden mansions which clustered in the environs of Chepeside, Wood Street, and Basinghall Street.

He had not gone much farther in his progress when he knew. He passed through a pair of folding doors, inlaid with rare woods—a novelty to him at that time, for he had never travelled in Italy or France. He walked down a broad corridor, the walls hung with pictures and the floor tesselated with wood, and was shown by another footman who was standing at a door at the end of the corridor into a superb room, wainscoted with cedar up to half of its height, and above it adorned with battles of gods and giants in fresco. The room was brilliantly lit by candles, at frequent intervals all round the panelled walls, and close to the gilded beading which divided them from the frescoes above, were arms of some black wood or stone, which they were he could not have said, stretched out, and holding silver sconces in which the candles were set.

It was as though gigantic Moors or Nubians had thrown their arms through the wall to hold up the light which illuminated this large and splendid place. At one end of the room was a high carved fire-place, and though it was summer, some logs of green elm smouldered and crackled upon the hearth, though the place was cool enough.

Seated by the fireside was a stout, short, elderly man, with a pointed grey beard, and heavy black eyebrows from beneath which large, slightly prominent, and very alert eyes looked out. His hair was white, and apparently he was bald, because a skull cap of black velvet covered his head. He wore a ruff and a long surtout of wool dyed crimson, and pointed here and there with braid of dark green and thin lace of gold. A belt of white leather was round his middle, and from it hung a chatelaine of silver by his right side, from which depended a pen case and some ivory tablets. On his left side, Johnnie noticed that a short serviceable dagger was worn. His trunk hose were of black, his shoes easy ones of Spanish leather with crimson rosettes upon the instep.

"Mr. John Commendone," said the footman.

Mr. Cressemer rose from his seat, his shrewd, capable face lighting up with welcome.

"Ah," he said, "so thou hast come to see me, Mr. Commendone. 'Tis very good of thee, and a welcome sight to eyes which have looked upon your father so often."

He went up to the slim young man as the footman closed the door, and shook him warmly by the hand, looking him in the face meanwhile with a keen wise scrutiny, which made Johnnie feel young, inexperienced, a little embarrassed.

He felt he was being summed up, judged and weighed, appraised in the most kindly fashion, but by one who did not easily make a mistake in his estimate of men.

At Court, King Philip had regarded him with cold interest, the Queen herself with piercing and more lively regard. Since his arrival in London, Johnnie had been used to scrutinies. But this was different from any other he had known. It was eminently human and kindly first of all, but in the second place it was more searching, more real, than any other he had hitherto undergone. In short, a king or queen looked at a courtier from a certain point of view. Would he serve their ends? Was he the right man in the right place? Had they chosen well?

There was nothing of this now. It was all kindliness mingled with a grave curiosity, almost with hope.

Johnnie, who was much taller than Mr. Cressemer, could not help smiling a little, as the bearded man looked at him so earnestly, and it was his smile that broke the silence, and made them friends from that very moment.

The Alderman put his left hand upon Johnnie's shoulder.

"Lad," he said, and his voice was the voice of a leader of men, "lad, I am right glad to see thee in my poor house. Art thy father's son, and that is enough for me. Come, sit you down t'other side of the fire. Come, come."

With kindly geniality the merchant bustled his guest to a chair opposite his own, and made him sit. Then he stood upon a big hearthrug of bear-skin, rubbed his hands, and chuckled.

"When I heard ye announced," he said, "I thought to myself, 'Here's another young gallant of the Court keen on his money; he hath lost no time in calling for it.' But now I see thee, and know thee for what thou art—for it is my boast, and a true one, that I was never deceived in man yet—I see my apprehensions were quite unfounded."

Johnnie bowed. For a moment or two he could hardly speak. There was something so homelike, so truly kind, in this welcome that his nerves, terribly unstrung by all he had gone through of late, were almost upon the point of breakdown.

This was like home. This was the real thing. This was not the Court—and here before him he knew very well was a man not only good and kindly, but resolute and great.

"Now, I'll tell thee what we'll do, Master Johnnie, sith thou hast come to me so kindly. We will sip a little water of Holland—I'll wager you've tasted nothing like it, for it cometh straight from the English Exchange house at Antwerp—and then we will to supper, where you will meet my dear sister, Mistress Catherine Cressemer, who hath been the long companion of my widowerhood, and ordereth this my house for me."

He turned to where a square sheet of copper hung from a peg upon a cord of twisted purple silk. Taking up the massive silver pen case at the end of his chatelaine, he beat upon the gong, and the copper thunder echoed through the big room.

A man entered immediately, to whom Mr. Cressemer gave orders, and then sat himself down upon the other side of the fire.

"Your father," he said confidentially, "came to me after he left you in the Tower the morning before this. He was very pleased with what he saw of you, Master Johnnie, and what he heard of you also. Art going to be a big man in affairs without doubt. I wish I had met ye before. I have been twice to Commendone Park. Once when thou wert a little rosy thing of two year old or less, and the Señora—Holy Mary give her grace!—had thee upon her knee. I was staying with the Knight. And then again when Father Chilches was thy tutor, and thou must have been fourteen year or more. I was at the Park for three days. But thou wert away with thy aunt, Miss Commendone, of Wanstone Court, and I saw nothing of thee."

"So you knew my mother," Johnnie said eagerly.

"Aye, that I did, and a very gracious lady she was, Master Commendone. I will tell thee of her, and thy house in those days, at supper. My sister will be well pleased to hear it also. Meanwhile"—he sipped at the white liqueur which the servant had brought, and motioned Johnnie towards his own thin green glass with little golden spirals running through it—"meanwhile, tell me how like you the Court life?"

Johnnie started. They were the exact words of his father. "I am getting on very well," he said in reply.

"So I hear, and am well pleased," the Alderman answered. "You have everything in your favour—a knowledge of Spanish, a pleasant presence, and trained to the usage of good society. But, though you may not think it, I have influence, even at Court, though it is in no ways apparent. Tell me something of your aims, and your views, and I shall doubtless be able to help your advancement. There are ticklish times coming, be certain of that, and my experience may be of great service to you. Her Grace, God bless her! is, I fear—I speak to you as man to man, Mr. Commendone—too keen set and determined upon the Papal Supremacy for the true welfare of this realm. I am Catholic. I have always been Catholic. But doctrine, and a purely political dominion from Rome, aye, or from Spain either, is not what we of the City, and who control the finances of the kingdom much more than less, desire or wish to see. After all, Mr. Commendone, I trust I make myself clearly understood to you, and that you are of the same temper and mind as your father and myself; after all is loudly set and perchance badly done, we have to look to the upholding of the realm, inside and out, rather than to be fine upon points of doctrine."

He leant forward in his seat with great earnestness, clasped his right hand, upon the little finger of which was a great ring, with a cut seal of emerald, and brought it down heavily upon the table by his side.

"I believe," he said, "in the Mass, and if I were asked to die for my belief, that would I do. I would do it very reluctantly, Master John. I would evade the necessity for doing it in every way I knew. But if I were set down in front of judges or eke inquisitors, and asked to say that when the priest hath said the words of consecration, the elements are not the very true body of Our Lord Jesus, then I would die for that belief. And of the Invocation of Saints, and of the greatest saint of all—Our Lady—I see no harm in it, but a very right and pleasant practice. For, look you, if these are indeed, as we believe and know clustering around the throne of God, which is the Holy Trinity, then indeed they must hear our prayers, if we believe truly in the Communion of Saints; and hearing them, being in high favour in heaven, their troubles past and they glorified, certes, we down here may well think their voices will be heard around the Throne. That is true Catholic doctrine as I see it. But of the power of the Bishop of Rome to direct and interfere in the honest internal affairs of a country—well, I snap my fingers at it. And of the power of the priesthood, which is but part of the machinery by which His Holiness endeavoureth to accrue to himself all earthly power, at that also I spit. From my standpoint, a priest is an ordained man of God; his function is to say Mass, to consecrate the elements, and so to bring God near to us upon the altar. But of your confessions, your pryings into family life, your temporal dominion, I have the deepest mistrust. And also, I think, that the cause of Holy Church would be much better served if its priests were allowed—for such of them as wished it—to be married men. A man is a man, and God hath given him his natural attributes. I am not really learned, nor am I well read in the history of the world, but I have looked into it enough, Master Commendone, to know that God hath ordained that men should take women in marriage and rear up children for the glory of the Lord and the welfare of the State. Mark you"—his face became striated with lines of contempt and dislike—"mark you, this celibacy is to be the thing which will destroy the power of the sacrificing priest in the eyes of all before many hundred years have passed. I shall not see it, thou wilt not see it. We are good Church of England men now, but what I say will come to pass, and then God himself only knoweth what anarchs and deniers, what blasphemers and runagates will hold the world.

"Her Grace," he went on, "believeth that as Moses ordered blasphemers to be put to death, so she thinketh it the duty of a Christian prince to eradicate the cockle from the fold of God's Church, to cut out the gangrene that it may not spread to the sounder parts. But Her Grace is a woman that hath been much sequestered all her life till now. She cometh to the throne, and is but—I trust I speak no treason, Mr. Commendone—a tool and instrument of the priests from Spain, and the man from Spain also who is her lord. Why! if only the Church in this realm could go on as King Henry started it—not a new Church, mind you, but a Church which hath thrown off an unnecessary dominion from Italy—if it could go on as under the reign of the little King Edward was set out and promised very well, 'twould be truly Catholic still, and the priests of the Church would be all married men and citizens within the State, with a stake in civil affairs, and so by reason of their spiritual power and civil obligations, the very bulwark of society."

Johnnie listened intently, nodding now and then as the Alderman made a point, and as he himself realised the value of it.

"Look you, Master Commendone," His Worship continued, "look you, only yesterday a worthy clergyman, whom I knew and loved, a man of his inches, a shrewd and clever gentleman of good birth, was haled from the City down to his own parish and burnt as a heretic. Heretic doubtless the good man was. He would be living now if he had not denied the blessed and comforting truth of Transubstantiation before that blood-stained wolf, the Bishop of London. The man I speak of was a good man, and though he was mistaken on that issue, he would, under kindlier auspices, doubtless have returned to the central truth of our religion. He was married, and had lived in honourable wedlock with his wife for many years. She was a lady from Wales, and a sweet woman. But it was his marriage as much as any other thing about him that brought him to his death."

The Alderman's voice sank into something very like a whisper. "One of my men," he said, "was riding down with the Sheriff of London to Hadley, where Dr. Taylor, he of whom I speak, suffered this very morning. At five this afternoon my man was back, and told me how the good doctor died. He died with great constancy, very much, Mr. Commendone, as one of the old saints that the Romans did use so cruelly in the early years of Our Lord's Church. Yet, as something of a student of affairs—and Dr. Taylor is not the first good heretic who hath died rather than recant—I see that the married clergy suffer with the most alacrity. And why? Because, as I see it, they are bearing testimony to the validity and sanctity of their marriage. The honour of their wives and children is at stake; the desire of leaving them an unsullied name and a virtuous example, combined with a sense of religious duty. And thus the heart derives strength from the very ties which in other circumstances might well tend to weaken it.

"I am in mourning to-night, mourning in my heart, Mr. Commendone, for a good, mistaken friend who hath suffered death."

As his voice fell, the Alderman was looking sadly into the red embers of the fire with the music of a deep sadness and regret in his voice. He wasn't an emotional man at all—by nature that is—Johnnie saw it at once. But he saw also that his host was very deeply moved. Johnnie rose from his chair.

"You are telling me no news at all, Mr. Alderman," he said. "I had orders, and I was one of those who rode with Sir John Shelton and the Sheriff to take Dr. Taylor to the stake at Aldham Common."

Mr. Cressemer started violently.

"Mother of God!" he said, "did you see that done?"

Johnnie nodded. He could not trust himself to speak.

The Alderman's cry of horror brought home to him almost for the first time not the terror of what he had seen—that he had realised long ago—but a sense of personal guilt, a disgust with himself that he should have been a participator in such a deed, a spectator, however pitying.

He felt unclean.

Then he said in a low voice: "What I tell you, Mr. Cressemer, will, I know, remain as a secret between us. I feel I am not betraying any trust in telling you. I am, as you know, attached to the person of His Majesty, and I have been admitted into great confidence both by him and Her Grace the Queen. The King rode to Hadley disguised as a simple cavalier, and I was with him as his attendant."

He stopped short, feeling that the explanation was bald and unsufficing.

The Alderman stepped up to Johnnie and put his hand upon his arm. "Poor lad, poor lad," he said in tones of deepest pity. "I grieve in that thou hadst to witness such a thing in the following of thy duty."

"I had thought," the young man faltered, his assurance deserting him for a moment at the words of this reverend and broad-souled man, "I thought you would think me stained in some wise, Mr. Cressemer. I...."

"Whist!" the elder man answered impatiently. "Have no such foolish thoughts. Am I not a man of affairs? Do I not know what discipline means? But this gives me great cause for thought. You have confided in me, Mr. Commendone, and so likewise will I in you. This morning the Doctor's wife, his little son, and little daughter Mary, set off for the Marches of Wales with a party of my men and their baggage. Mistress Taylor was born a Rhyader, of a good family in Conway town. Her brother liveth there, and all her friends are of Wales. It was as well that the dame should leave the City at once, for none knoweth what will be done to the relations of heretics at this time——Why, man! Thou art white as linen, thy hand shakes. What meaneth it?"

Johnnie, in truth, was a strange sight as he stood in front of his host. All his composure was gone. His eyes burnt in a white face, his lips were dry and parted, there was an almost terrible inquiry in his whole aspect and manner.

"'Tis nothing," he managed to say in a hoarse voice, which he hardly knew for his own. "Pr'ythee continue, sir."

Mr. Cressemer gave the young man a keen, questioning glance before he went on speaking. Then he said:

"As I tell you, these members of the good Doctor's family are now safely on their way, and God grant them rest and peace in their new life. They will want for nothing. But the Doctor's other daughter, Mistress Elizabeth, was not his own daughter, but was adopted by him when she was but a little child. The girl is a very sweet and good girl, and my sister, Mistress Catherine, has long loved her. And as this is a childless house, alas! the maid hath come to live with us and she will be as my own daughter, if God wills it."

"She is well?" Johnnie asked, in a hoarse whisper.

The Alderman shook his head sadly. "She is the bravest maiden I have ever met," he said. "She hath stuff in her which recalls the ladies of old Rome, so calm and steadfast is she. There is in her at this time some divine illumination, Mr. Commendone, that keepeth her strong and unafraid. Ah, but she is sore stricken! She knew some hours agone of the doings at Hadley, for as I told you, one of my men brought the news. She hath been in prayer a long time, poor lamb, and now my sister is with her to hearten her and give her such comfort as may be. God's ways are very strange, Mr. John. Who would have thought now that you should come to this house to-night from that butchery?" He sighed deeply.

Johnnie made the sign of the cross. "God moveth in a mysterious way," he said, "to perform His wonders. He rides upon the tempest, and eke directs the storm, and leadeth pigmy men and women with a sure hand and a certain purpose."

"Say not 'pigmy,' Mr. John," the Alderman answered, "we are not small in His eyes, though it is well that we should be in our own. But you speak with a certain meaning. You grew pale just now. I think you may justly confide in me. I am of thy father's age, and a friend of thy father's. What is it, lad?"

Speaking with great difficulty, looking downwards at the floor, Johnnie told him. He told him how he had met John Hull and taken him into his service, how that even now the man was in the kitchen among the servants of the Alderman. He told of the fellow's menace in Chepe, and how inexplicable it had seemed to him. Then he hesitated, and his voice sunk into silence.

"Ye saw the poor lamb?" Mr. Cressemer said in a low voice, which nevertheless trembled with excitement. "Ye saw her weeping as good Dr. Taylor was borne away? Ye took this good varlet Hull into thy service? And now thou art in my house. It seemeth indeed that God's finger is writing in the book of thy life; but I must hear more from thee, Mr. Commendone. Tell me, if thou wilt, what it may mean."

Johnnie straightened himself. He put his hand upon the pummel of his sword. He looked his host full in the eyes.

"It means this, sir," he said, in a quiet and resolute voice. "All my life I have kept myself from those pleasures and peccadilloes that young gentlemen of my station are wont to use. I have never looked upon a maiden with eyes of love—or worse. Before God His Throne, Our Lady the Blessed Virgin, and all the crowned saints I say it. But yester morn, when I saw her weeping in the grey, my heart went out from me, and is no more mine. I vowed then that by God's grace I would be her knight and lover for ever and a day. My employment hath not to-day given me the opportunity to go to Mass, but I have promised myself to-morrow morn that in the chapel of St. John I will vow myself to her with all fealty, and indeed nor man, nor power, nor obstacle of any sort shall keep me from her, if God allows. Wife she shall be to me, and so I can make her love me. All this I swear to you, by my honour"—here he pulled his sword from the scabbard and reverently kissed the hilt—"and to the Blessed Trinity." And now he pulled his crucifix from his doublet, and kissed it.

Then he turned away from the Alderman, took a few steps to the fire-place, and leant against the carving, his head bowed upon his arms.

There was a dead silence in the big room. Tears were gathering in the eyes of the grave elderly man, while his mind worked furiously. He saw in all this the direct hand of Providence working towards a definite and certain end.

He had loved the slim and gracious lad directly he saw him. His heart had gone out to one so gallant and one so debonair, the son of his old and trusted friend. He had long loved the Rector of Hadley's sweet daughter, who was so idolised also by Mistress Catherine Cressemer, his sister. During the reign of Edward VI the girl had often come up to London to spend some months with her wealthy and influential friends. She had a great part in the heart of the childless widower.

Now this strange and wonderful thing had happened.

These thoughts passed through the old man's mind in a few seconds, while the silence was not broken. Then, as he was about to turn and speak to Johnnie, the door of the room opened quickly, and a short, elderly woman hurried in.

She was very simply dressed in grey woollen stuff, though the bodice and skirt were edged with costly fur. The white lace of Bruges upon her head framed a face of great sweetness, and now it was alive with excitement.

She was a little woman, fifty years of age, with a flat wrinkled face; but her eyes were full of kindness, and, indeed, so was her whole face, although her lips were drawn in by the loss of her front teeth, and this gave her a rather witch-like mouth.

"Robert! Robert!" she said in a high, excited voice. "John Hull, that was servant to our dear Doctor, is in this house. The men have him in the kitchen—word has just been sent up to me. What shall we do? Dear Lizzie—she is more tranquil now, and bearing her cross very bravely—dear Lizzie had thought not to see him again. Will it be well that we should have him up? Think you the child can bear seeing him?"

The lady had piped this out in a rush of excited words. Then suddenly she saw Johnnie, who had turned round and stood by the fire, bowing. His face was drawn and white, and he was trembling.

"Catherine," Mr. Cressemer said, "strange things are happening to-night, of which I must speak with you anon. But this is Mr. John Commendone, son of our dear Knight of Kent, who hath come to see me, and who haply or by design of God was forced to witness the death of Dr. Rowland this morning."

Johnnie made a low bow, the little lady a lower curtsey.

Then, heedless of all etiquette, with the tears streaming down her cheeks, she trotted up to the young man and caught hold of both his hands, looking up at him with the saddest, kindest face he had ever seen.

"Oh, boy, boy," she said, "thou hast come at the right time. We know with what constancy the Doctor died, but our lamb will be well content to hear of it from kindly lips, for she is very strong and stedfast, the pretty dear! And thou hast a good face, and surely art a true son of thy father, Sir Henry of Commendone."

CHAPTER VI

The six movements of the Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, Benedictus, and Agnus Dei were of a superlative technical excellence. The trained ear, the musical mind, were alike enthralled by them. Tinel, Waddington, and Christopher Tye had written no music then, and the mellow angelic harmonies of Messer Palestrina were all new and fresh in their inspiration of dignity, grandeur, and devotion, most precious incense, as it were, about the feet of the Lord.

The Bishop of London was celebrant, and Father Deza deacon. The Queen and King received in the one Kind, while two of the re-established Carthusians from Sheen, and two Brigittine monks from Sion, held a white cloth before Their Graces.

This was not liked by many there—it had always been the privilege of peers.

But of this Commendone knew nothing. The hour was for him one of the deepest devotion and solemnity. He had not slept all the night long. For a few moments he had seen Elizabeth, had spoken with her, had held her by the hand. His life was utterly and absolutely changed. His mind, excited with want of sleep, irrevocably stamped and impressed by the occupation of the last two days, was caught up by the exquisite music into a passionate surrender of self as he vowed his life to God and his lady.

Earth and all it held—save only her—was utterly dissolved and swept away. An unspeakable peace and stillness was in his heart.

Much, we read, is required from those to whom much is given, and Johnnie was to go through places far more terrible than the Valley of the Shadow of Death ever is to most men before he saw the Dawn.

When the Mass was said—the final "Missa est" was to ring in the young man's ears for many a long day—he went to breakfast. He took nothing in the Common Room, however, but John Hull brought him food in his own chamber.

The man's brown, keen face beamed with happiness. He was like some faithful dog that had lost one master and found another. He could not do enough for Johnnie now—after the visit to Mr. Cressemer's house. He took charge of him as if he had been his man for years. There was a quiet assumption which secretly delighted Commendone. There they were, master and man, a relationship fixed and settled.

On that afternoon there was to be a tournament in the tilting yard, and Johnnie meant to ride—he had nearly carried away the ring at the last joust. Hull knew of it—in a few hours the fellow seemed to have fallen into his place in an extraordinary fashion—and he had been busy with his master's armour since early dawn.

While Johnnie was making his breakfast, though he would very willingly have been alone, and indeed had retired for that very purpose, Hull came bustling in and out of the armour-room his face a brown wedge of pleasure and excitement. The volante pièce, the mentonnière, the grande-garde of his master's exquisite suite of light Milan armour shone like a newly-minted coin. The black and lacquered cuirasse, with a line of light blue enamel where it would meet the gorget, was oiled and polished—he had somehow found the little box of bandrols with the Commendone colour and cypher which were to be tied above the coronels of Johnnie's lances.

And all the time John Hull chattered and worked, perfectly happy, perfectly at home. Already, to Commendone's intense amusement, the man had become dictatorial—as old and trusted servants are. He had got some powder of resin, and was about to pour it into the jointed steel gauntlet of the lance hand.

"It gives the grip, master," he said. "By this means the hand fitteth better to the joints of the steel."

"But 'tis never used that I know of. 'Tis not like the grip of a bare hand on the ash stave of a pike...."

There was a technical discussion, which ended in Johnnie's defeat—at least, John Hull calmly powdered the inside of the glaive.

He was got rid of at last, sent to his meal with the other serving-men, and Commendone was left alone. He had an hour to himself, an hour in which to recall the brief but perfect joy of the night before.

They had taken him to Elizabeth after supper, his good host and hostess. There was something piteously sweet in the tall slim girl in her black dress—the dear young mouth trembling, the blue eyes full of a mist of unshed tears, the hair ripest wheat or brownest barley.

She had taken his hand—hers was like cool white ivory—and listened to him as a sister might.

He had sat beside her, and told her of her father's glorious death. His dark and always rather melancholy face had been lit with sympathy and tenderness. Quite unconscious of his own grace and grave young dignity, he had dwelt upon the Martyr's joy at setting out upon his last journey, with an incomparable delicacy and perfection of phrase.

His voice, though he knew it not, was full of music. His extreme good looks, the refinement and purity of his face, came to the poor child with a wonderful message of consolation.

When he told her how a brutal yeoman had thrown a faggot at the Archdeacon, she shuddered and moaned a little.

Mr. Cressemer and his sister looked at Johnnie with reproach.

But he had done it of set purpose. "And then, Mistress Elizabeth," he continued, "the Doctor said, 'Friend, I have harm enough. What needeth that?'"

His hand had been upon his knee. She caught it up between her own—innocent, as to a brother, unutterably sweet.

"Oh, dear Father!" she cried. "It is just what he would have said. It is so like him!"

"It is liker Christ our Lord," Robert Cressemer broke in, his deep voice shaking with sorrow. "For what, indeed, said He at His cruel nailing? '[Greek: Pater, aphes autois ou gar oidasi ti poiusi.]'"

... And then they had sent Johnnie away, marvelling at the goodness, shrewdness, and knowledge of the Alderman, with his whole being one sob of love, pity, and protection for his dear simple mourner—so crystal clear, so sisterlike and sweet!

It was time to go upon duty.

Johnnie looked at his thick oval watch—a "Nuremberg Egg," as it was called in those days—cut short his reverie of sweet remembrance, and went straight to the King Consort's wing of the Palace.

When he was come into the King's room he found him alone with Torromé, his valet, sitting in a big leather-covered arm-chair, his ruff and doublet taken off, and wearing a long dressing-gown of brown stuff, a friar's gown it almost seemed.

The melancholy yellow face brightened somewhat as the Esquire came in.

"I am home again, Señor," he said in Spanish, though "en casa" was the word he used for home, and that had a certain pathos in it. "There is a torneo, a justa, after dinner, so they tell me. I had wished to ride myself, but I am weary from our viajero into the country. I shall sit with the Queen, and you, Señor, will attend me."

He must have seen a slight, fleeting look of disappointment upon Commendone's face.

Himself, as the envoy Suriano said of him in 1548, "deficient in that energy which becometh a man, sluggish in body and timid in martial enterprise," he nevertheless affected an exaggerated interest in manly sports. He had, it is true, mingled in some tournaments at Brussels in the past, and Calvera says that he broke his lances, "very much to the satisfaction of his father and aunts." But in England, at any rate, he had done nothing of the sort, and his voice to Commendone was almost apologetic.

"We will break a lance together some day," he said, "but you must forego the lists this afternoon."

Johnnie bowed very low. This was extraordinary favour. He knew, of course, that the King would never tilt with him, but he recognised the compliment.

He knew, again, that his star was high in the ascendant. The son of the great Charles V was reserved, cautious, suspicious of all men—except when, in private, he would unbend to buffoons and vulgar rascals like Sir John Shelton—and the icy gravity of his deportment to courtiers seldom varied.

Commendone was quite aware that the King did not class him with men of Shelton's stamp. He was the more signally honoured therefore.

"This night," His Grace continued, "after the jousts, your attendance will be excused, Señor. I retire early to rest."

The Esquire bowed, but he had caught a certain gleam in the King's small eyes. "Duck Lane or Bankside!" he thought to himself. "Thank God he hath not commanded me to be with him."

Johnnie was beginning to understand, more than he had hitherto done, something of his sudden rise to favour and almost intimacy. The King Consort was trying him, testing him in every way, hoping to find at length a companion less dangerous and drunken, a reputation less blown upon, a servant more discreet....

He could have spat in his disgust. What he had tolerated in others before, though loftily repudiated for himself, now became utterly loathsome—in King or commoner, black and most foul.

The King wore a mask; Johnnie wore one also—there was finesse in the game between master and servant. And to-night the King would wear a literal mask, the "maschera," which Badovardo speaks of when he set down the frailties of this monarch for after generations to read of: "Nelle piaceri delle donnè è incontinente, predendo dilletatione d'andare in maschera la notte et nei tempi de negotii gravi."

Then and there Johnnie made a resolution, one which had been nascent in his mind for many hours. He would have done with the Court as soon as may be. Ambition, so new a child of his brain, was already dead. He would marry, retire from pageant and splendour even as his father had done years and years ago. With Elizabeth by his side he would once more live happily among the woods and wolds of Commendone.

Torromé, the criado or valet, came into the room again from the bed-chamber. His Highness was to change his clothes once more—at high noon he must be with the Queen upon State affairs. The Chancellor and Lord Wharton were coming, and with them Brookes, the Bishop of Gloucester, the papal sub-delegate, and the Royal Proctors, Mr. Martin and Mr. Storey.

The prelates, Ridley and Latimer, were lying in prison—their ultimate fate was to be discussed on that morning.

The King had but hardly gone into his bed-chamber when the door of the Closet opened and Don Diego Deza entered, unannounced, and with the manner of habitude and use.

He greeted Commendone heartily, shaking him by the hand with considerable warmth, his clear-cut, inscrutable face wearing an expression of fixed kindliness—put on for the occasion, meant to appear sincere, there for a purpose.

"I will await His Grace here," the priest said, glancing at the door leading to the bedroom, which was closed. "I am to attend him to the Council Chamber, where there is much business to be done. So next week, Mr. Commendone, you'll be at Whitehall! The Court will be gayer there—more suited to you young gallants."

"For my part," Johnnie answered, "I like the Tower well enough."

"Hast a contented mind, Señor," the priest answered brightly. "But I hap to know that the Queen will be glad to be gone from the City. This hath been a necessary visit, one of ceremony, but Her Grace liketh the Palace of Westminster better, and her Castle of Windsor best of all. I shall meet you at Windsor in the new year, and hope to see you more advanced. Wilt be wearing the gold spurs then, I believe, and there will be two knights of the honoured name of Commendone!"

Johnnie answered: "I think not, Father," he said, turning over his own secret resolve in his mind with an inward smile. "But why at Windsor? Doubtless we shall meet near every day."

"Say nothing, Mr. Commendone," the priest answered in a low voice. "There can be no harm in telling you—who are privy to so much—but I sail for Spain to-morrow morn, and shall be some months absent upon His Most Catholic Majesty's affairs."

Shortly after this, the King came out of his room, three of his Spanish gentlemen were shown in, and with Johnnie, the Dominican, and his escort, His Highness walked to the Council Chamber, round the tower of which stood a company of the Queen's Archers, showing that Her Grace had already arrived.

Then for two hours Johnnie kicked his heels in the Ante-room, watching this or that great man pass in and out of the Council Chamber, chatting with the members of the Spanish suite—bored to death.

At half-past one the Council was over, and Their Majesties went to dinner, as did also Johnnie in the Common Room.

At half-past three of the clock the Esquire was standing in the Royal box behind the King and Queen, among a group of other courtiers, and looking down on the great tilting yard, where he longed himself to be.