The Armourer's Prentices. Charlotte M. Yonge

It was reckoned effeminate to require more than two meals a day, though, just as in the verdurer’s lodge at home, there was a barrel of ale on tap with drinking horns beside it in the hall, and on a small round table in the window a loaf of bread, to which city luxury added a cheese, and a jug containing sack, with some silver cups beside it, and a pitcher of fair water. Master Headley, with his mother and daughter, was taking a morsel of these refections, standing, and in out-door garments, when the brothers appeared at about seven o’clock in the morning.

      “Ha! that’s well,” quoth he, greeting them. “No slugabeds, I see. Will ye come with us to hear mass at Saint Faith’s?” They agreed, and Master Headley then told them that if they would tarry till the next day in searching out their uncle, they could have the company of Tibble Steelman, who had to see one of the captains of the guard about an alteration of his corslet, and thus would have every opportunity of facilitating their inquiries for their uncle.

      The mass was an ornate one, though not more so than they were accustomed to at Beaulieu. Ambrose had his book of devotions, supplied by the good monks who had brought him up, and old Mrs. Headley carried something of the same kind; but these did not necessarily follow the ritual, and neither quiet nor attention was regarded as requisite in “hearing mass.” Dennet, unchecked, was exchanging flowers from her Sunday posy with another little girl, and with hooded fingers carrying on in all innocence the satirical pantomime of Father Francis and Sister Catharine; and even Master Headley himself exchanged remarks with his friends, and returned greetings from burgesses and their wives while the celebrant priest’s voice droned on, and the choir responded—the peals of the organ in the Minster above coming in at inappropriate moments, for there they were in a different part of High Mass using the Liturgy peculiar to Saint Paul’s.

      Thinking of last week at Beaulieu, Ambrose knelt meantime with his head buried in his hands, in an absorption of feeling that was not perhaps wholly devout, but which at any rate looked more like devotion than the demeanour of any one around. When the Ite missa est was pronounced, and all rose up, Stephen touched him and he rose, looking about, bewildered.

      “So please you, young sir, I can show you another sort of thing by and by,” said in his ear Tibble Steelman, who had come in late, and marked his attitude.

      They went up from Saint Faith’s in a flood of talk, with all manner of people welcoming Master Headley after his journey, and thence came back to dinner which was set out in the hall very soon after their return from church. Quite guests enough were there on this occasion to fill all the chairs, and Master Headley intimated to Giles that he must begin his duties at table as an apprentice, under the tuition of the senior, a tall young fellow of nineteen, by name Edmund Burgess. He looked greatly injured and discomfited, above all when he saw his two travelling companions seated at the table—though far lower than the night before; nor would he stir from where he was standing against the wall to do the slightest service, although Edmund admonished him sharply that unless he bestirred himself it would be the worse for him.

      When the meal was over, and grace had been said, the boards were removed from their trestles, and the elders drew round the small table in the window with a flagon of sack and a plate of wastel bread in their midst to continue their discussion of weighty Town Council matters. Every one was free to make holiday, and Edmund Burgess good-naturedly invited the strangers to come to Mile End, where there was to be shooting at the butts, and a match at single-stick was to come off between Kit Smallbones and another giant, who was regarded as the champion of the brewer’s craft.

      Stephen was nothing loth, especially if he might take his own crossbow; but Ambrose never had much turn for these pastimes and was in no mood for them. The familiar associations of the mass had brought the grief of orphanhood, homelessness, and uncertainty upon him with the more force. His spirit yearned after his father, and his heart was sick for his forest home. Moreover, there was the duty incumbent on a good son of saying his prayers for the repose of his hither’s soul. He hinted as much to Stephen, who, boy-like, answered, “Oh, we’ll see to that when we get into my Lord of York’s house. Masses must be plenty there. And I must see Smallbones floor the brewer.”

      Ambrose could trust his brother under the care of Edmund Burgess, and resolved on a double amount of repetitions of the appointed intercessions for the departed.

      He was watching the party of youths set off, all except Giles Headley, who sulkily refused the invitations, betook himself to a window and sat drumming on the glass, while Ambrose stood leaning on the dragon balustrade, with his eyes dreamily following the merry lads out at the gateway.

      “You are not for such gear, sir,” said a voice at his ear, and he saw the scathed face of Tibble Steelman beside him.

      “Never greatly so, Tibble,” answered Ambrose. “And my heart is too heavy for it now.”

      “Ay, ay, sir. So I thought when I saw you in Saint Faith’s. I have known what it was to lose a good father in my time.”

      Ambrose held out his hand. It was the first really sympathetic word he had heard since he had left Nurse Joan.

      “ ’Tis the week’s mind of his burial,” he said, half choked with tears. “Where shall I find a quiet church where I may say his de profundis in peace?”

      “Mayhap,” returned Tibble, “the chapel in the Pardon churchyard would serve your turn. ’Tis not greatly resorted to when mass time is over, when there’s no funeral in hand, and I oft go there to read my book in quiet on a Sunday afternoon. And then, if ’tis your will, I will take you to what to my mind is the best healing for a sore heart.”

      “Nurse Joan was wont to say the best for that was a sight of the true Cross, as she once beheld it at Holy Rood church at Southampton,” said Ambrose.

      “And so it is, lad, so it is,” said Tibble, with a strange light on his distorted features.

      So they went forth together, while Giles again hugged himself in his doleful conceit, marvelling how a youth of birth and nurture could walk the streets on a Sunday with a scarecrow such as that!

      The hour was still early, there was a whole summer afternoon before them; and Tibble, seeing how much his young companion was struck with the grand vista of church towers and spires, gave him their names as they stood, though coupling them with short dry comments on the way in which their priests too often perverted them.

      The Cheap was then still in great part an open space, where boys were playing, and a tumbler was attracting many spectators; while the ballad-singer of yesterday had again a large audience, who laughed loudly at every coarse jest broken upon mass-priests and friars.

      Ambrose was horrified at the stave that met his ears, and asked how such profanity could be allowed. Tibble shrugged his shoulders, and cited the old saying, “The nearer the church,”—adding, “Truth hath a voice, and will out.”

      “But surely this is not the truth?”

      “ ’Tis mighty like it, sir, though it might be spoken in a more seemly fashion.”

      “What’s this?” demanded Ambrose. “ ’Tis a noble house.”

      “That’s the Bishop’s palace, sir—a man that hath much to answer for.”

      “Liveth he so ill a life then?”

      “Not so. He is no scandalous liver, but he would fain stifle all the voices that call for better things. Ay, you look back at yon ballad-monger! Great folk despise the like of him, never guessing at the power there may be in such ribald stuff; while they would fain silence that which might turn men from their evil ways while yet there is time.”

      Tibble muttered this to himself, unheeded by Ambrose, and then presently crossing the churchyard, where a grave was being filled up, with numerous idle children around it, he conducted the youth into a curious little chapel, empty now, but with the Host enthroned above the altar, and the trestles on which the bier had rested still standing in the narrow nave.

      It was intensely still and cool, a fit place indeed for Ambrose’s filial devotions,