ou to God, I must
hasten home to think over the comedy which the king has commanded me to
write."

"But you do not so much as tell me from whom this message comes?" said
Earl Sudley, retaining him. "You invite me to a meeting and give me a
key, and I know not who will await me there in that tower."

"Oh, you do not know? There is then more than one who might await you
there? Well, then, it is the youngest and smallest of the two doves who
sends you the key."

"Princess Elizabeth?"

"You have named her, not I!" said John Heywood, as he disengaged himself
from the earl's grasp and hurried across the courtyard to betake himself
to his lodgings.

Thomas Seymour watched him with a scowl, and then slowly directed his
eyes to the key that Heywood had given him.

"The princess then awaits me," whispered he, softly. "Ah, who can
read it in the stars? who can know whither the crown will roll when it
tumbles from King Henry's head? I love Catharine, but I love ambition
still more; and if it is demanded, to ambition must I sacrifice my
heart."

CHAPTER XVII. GAMMER GUETON'S NEEDLE.

Slowly and lost in gloomy thought, John Heywood walked toward his
lodgings. These lodgings were situated in the second or inner court of
the vast palace of Whitehall, in that wing of the castle which contained
the apartments of all the higher officers of the royal household, and so
those of the court-jesters also; for the king's fool was at that period
a very important and respectable personage, who occupied a rank equal to
that of a gentleman of the royal bed-chamber.

John Heywood had just crossed this second courtyard, when all at once
loud, wrangling voices, and the clear, peculiar ring of a box on the
ear, startled him out of his meditations. He stopped and listened. His
face, before so serious, had now reassumed its usual merry and shrewd
expression; his large eyes again glittered with humor and mischief.
"There again verily is my sweet, charming housekeeper, Gammer Gurton,"
said John Heywood, laughing; "and she no doubt is quarrelling again with
my excellent servant, that poor, long-legged, blear-eyed Hodge. Ah! ha!
Yesterday I surprised her as she applied a kiss to him, at which he made
as doleful a face as if a bee had stung him. To-day I hear how she is
boxing his ears. He is perhaps now laughing at it, and thinks it is a
rose-leaf which cools his cheek. That Hodge is such a queer bird! But we
will at once see what there is