s of Castle
Marleigh.

In long strides he paced the chamber, turning the matter over in his
mind. Aye, he would use the lad should the need arise. Why scruple? Had
he ever received aught but disdain and scorn at the hands of Kenneth.

Day was breaking ere he sought his bed, and already the sun was up when
at length he fell into a troubled sleep, vowing that he would mend his
wild ways and seek to gain the boy's favour against the time when he
might have need of him.

When later he restored the papers to Kenneth, explaining to what use he
had put the coat, he refrained from questioning him concerning Gregory
Ashburn. The docility of his mood on that occasion came as a surprise to
Kenneth, who set it down to Sir Crispin's desire to conciliate him into
silence touching the harbouring of Hogan. In that same connexion Crispin
showed him calmly and clearly that he could not now inform without
involving himself to an equally dangerous extent. And partly through
the fear of this, partly won over by Crispin's persuasions, the lad
determined to hold his peace.

Nor had he cause to regret it thereafter, for throughout that tedious
march he found his roystering companion singularly meek and kindly.
Indeed he seemed a different man. His old swagger and roaring bluster
disappeared; he drank less, diced less, blasphemed less, and stormed
less than in the old days before the halt at Penrith; but rode, a
silent, thoughtful figure, so self-contained and of so godly a mien as
would have rejoiced the heart of the sourest Puritan. The wild tantivy
boy had vanished, and the sobriquet of "Tavern Knight" was fast becoming
a misnomer.

Kenneth felt drawn more towards him, deeming him a penitent that had
seen at last the error of his ways. And thus things prevailed until the
almost triumphal entry into the city of Worcester on the twenty-third of
August.

CHAPTER IV. AT THE SIGN OF THE MITRE

For a week after the coming of the King to Worcester, Crispin's
relations with Kenneth steadily improved. By an evil chance, however,
there befell on the eve of the battle that which renewed with heightened
intensity the enmity which the lad had fostered for him, but which
lately he had almost overcome.

The scene of this happening--leastways of that which led to it--was The
Mitre Inn, in the High Street of Worcester.

In the common-room one day sat as merry a company of carousers as ever
gladdened the soul of an old tantivy boy. Youthfu