s, and blacksmith's boys, and caught at the leather apron of the
sturdy smith himself.

"Hoo, man, what a dickens!" snorted he, dropping the red-hot shoe on
which he was at work, and staring like a startled ox at the panting
little fugitive.

"Do na leave them take me!" panted Nick. "They ha' stolen me away from
Stratford town and will na leave me go!"

At that Will Hostler bolted in, red-faced and scant of wind, "Thou
young rascal," quoth he, "I have thee now! Come out o' that!" and he
tried to take Nick by the collar.

"So-oftly, so-oftly!" rumbled the smith, tweaking up the glowing shoe in
his great pincers, and sweeping a sputtering half-circle in front of the
cowering lad. "Droive slow through the cro-owd! What hath youngster here
did no-ow?"

"He hath stolen a fortune from his master at the Three Lions--and the
shilling for him's mine!"

"Hath stealed a fortune? Whoy, huttlety-tut!" roared the burly smith,
turning ponderously upon Nick, who was dodging around him like a boy at
tag around a tree. "Whoy, lad," said he, scratching his puzzled head
with his great, grimy fingers, "where hast putten it?"

All the rout and the riot now came plunging into the smithy, breathless
with the chase. Master Carew himself, his ale-can still clutched in his
hand, and bearing himself with a high air of dignity, followed after
them, frowning.

"What?" said he, angrily, "have ye earthed the cub and cannot dig him
out? Hast caught him there, fellow?"

"Ay, master, that I have!" shouted Will Hostler. "Shilling's mine, sir."

"Then fetch him out of this hole!" cried Carew, sniffing disdainfully at
the low, smoky door.

"But he will na be fetched," stammered the doughty Will, keeping a most
respectful distance from the long black pincers and the sputtering shoe
with which the farrier stolidly mowed the air round about Nick Attwood
and himself.

At that the crowd set up a shout.

Carew thrust fiercely into the press, the louts and loafers giving way.
"What, here! Nicholas Attwood," said he, harshly, "come hither."

"Do na leave him take me," begged Nick. "He is not my master; I am not
bound out apprentice--they are stealing me away from my own home, and it
will break my mother's heart."

"Nobody breaks nobody's hearts in old Jo-ohn Smithses sho-op," drawled
the smith, in his deep voice; "nor steals nobody, nother. We be
honest-dealing folk in Albans town, an' makes as good horse-shoes as be
forged in all England"--and