cson, I would have a word with you, for I would fain that you should
take service under me. And here in good time comes my lady, without
whose counsel it is not my wont to decide aught of import; but, indeed,
it was her own thought that you should come."

"For I have formed a good opinion of you, and can see that you are one
who may be trusted," said the Lady Loring. "And in good sooth my dear
lord hath need of such a one by his side, for he recks so little of
himself that there should be one there to look to his needs and meet his
wants. You have seen the cloisters; it were well that you should see the
world too, ere you make choice for life between them."

"It was for that very reason that my father willed that I should come
forth into the world at my twentieth year," said Alleyne.

"Then your father was a man of good counsel," said she, "and you cannot
carry out his will better than by going on this path, where all that is
noble and gallant in England will be your companions."

"You can ride?" asked Sir Nigel, looking at the youth with puckered
eyes.

"Yes, I have ridden much at the abbey."

"Yet there is a difference betwixt a friar's hack and a warrior's
destrier. You can sing and play?"

"On citole, flute and rebeck."

"Good! You can read blazonry?"

"Indifferent well."

"Then read this," quoth Sir Nigel, pointing upwards to one of the many
quarterings which adorned the wall over the fireplace.

"Argent," Alleyne answered, "a fess azure charged with three lozenges
dividing three mullets sable. Over all, on an escutcheon of the first, a
jambe gules."

"A jambe gules erased," said Sir Nigel, shaking his head solemnly. "Yet
it is not amiss for a monk-bred man. I trust that you are lowly and
serviceable?"

"I have served all my life, my lord."

"Canst carve too?"

"I have carved two days a week for the brethren."

"A model truly! Wilt make a squire of squires. But tell me, I pray,
canst curl hair?"

"No, my lord, but I could learn."

"It is of import," said he, "for I love to keep my hair well ordered,
seeing that the weight of my helmet for thirty years hath in some degree
frayed it upon the top." He pulled off his velvet cap of maintenance as
he spoke, and displayed a pate which was as bald as an egg, and shone
bravely in the firelight. "You see," said he, whisking round, and
showing one little strip where a line of scattered hairs, like the last
survivors in some fatal field, still barely he