art. "My honour and my
oath. They bind me. _She_ would weep. My master would deem me
ungrateful, Ambrose break his heart. And yet who knows but I should do
worse if I stayed, I shall break my own heart if I do. I shall not
see--I may forget. No, no, never I but at least I shall never know the
moment when the lubber takes the jewel he knows not how to prize!
Marches--sieges--there shall I quell this wild beating! I may die
there. At least they will allay this present frenzy of my blood."

And he listened when Fulford and Will Marden, a young English man-at-
arms with whom he had made friends, concerted how he should meet them at
an inn--the sign of the Seven Stars--in Gravelines, and there exchange
his prentice's garb for the buff coat and corslet of a Badger, with the
Austrian black and yellow scarf. He listened, but he had not promised.
The sense of duty to his master, the honour to his word, always recurred
like "first thoughts," though the longing to escape, the restlessness of
hopeless love, the youthful eagerness for adventure and freedom, swept
it aside again and again.

He had not seen his uncle since the evening of the comedy, for Hal had
travelled in the Cardinal's suite, and the amusements being all within
doors, jesters were much in request, as indeed Charles the Fifth was
curious in fools, and generally had at least three in attendance.
Stephen, moreover, always shrank from his uncle when acting
professionally. He had learnt to love and esteem the _man_ during his
troubles, but this only rendered the sight of his buffoonery more
distressing, and as Randall had not provided himself with his home suit,
they were the more cut off from one another. Thus there was all the
less to counteract or show the fallacy of Fulford's recruiting
blandishments.

The day had come on the evening of which Stephen was to meet Fulford and
Marden at the Seven Stars and give them his final answer, in time to
allow of their smuggling him out of the city, and sending him away into
the country, since Smallbones would certainly suspect him to be in the
camp, and as he was still an apprentice, it was possible, though not
probable, that the town magistrates might be incited to make search on
inquiry, as they were very jealous of the luring away of their
apprentices by the Free Companies, and moreover his uncle might move the
Cardinal and the King to cause measures to be taken for his recovery.

Ill at ease, Stephen wandere