and your lord, Lady, and let this be; it were the better for
you.' The great Devil, to whom he 'longeth, be _his_ aid in the like
case!"

"Truly, he may be in the like case one day," said Maude.

"And that were at undern [Eleven o'clock a.m.] this morrow, an' I were
King!" cried Bertram wrathfully.

"But what had Master Calverley done?" Bertram dared only whisper the
name of the horrible crime of which alone poor Calverley stood accused.
"He was a Lollard--a Gospeller."

"Be they such ill fawtors?" asked Maude in a shocked tone.

"Judge for yourself what manner of men they be," said Bertram
indignantly, "when the King's Highness and the Queen, and our own Lady's
Grace, and the Lady Princess that was, and the Duke of Lancaster, be of
them. Ay, and many another could I name beyond these."

"I will never crede any ill of our Lady's Grace!" said Maude warmly.

"Good morrow, Bertram, my son," said a voice behind them--a voice
strange to Maude, but familiar to Bertram.

"Father Wilfred! Christ save you, right heartily! You be here in the
nick of time. You are come--"

"I am come, by ordainment of the Lord Prior, to receive certain commands
of my Lord Duke touching a book that he desireth to have written and
ourned [ornamented] with painting in the Priory," said Wilfred in his
quiet manner. "But what aileth yonder young master?--for he seemeth me
in trouble."

What ailed poor Hugh was soon told; and Wilfred, after a critical look
at him, went up and spoke to him.

"So thou hast a quarrel with God, my son?"

"Nay! Who may quarrel with God?" answered Hugh drearily.

"Only men and devils," said Wilfred. "Such as be God's enemies be alway
quarrelling with Him; but such as be His own dear children--should they
so?"

"Dealeth He thus with His children?" was the bitter answer.

"Ay, oftentimes; so oft, that He aredeth [tells] us, that they which be
alway out of chastising be no sons of His."

Hugh could take no comfort. "You know not what it is!" he said, with
the impatience of pain.

"Know I not?" said Wilfred, very tenderly, laying his hand upon Hugh's
shoulder. "Youngling, my father fell in fight with the Saracens, and my
mother--my blessed mother--was brent for Christ's sake at Cologne."

Hugh looked up at last. The words, the tone, the fellowship of
suffering, touched the wrung heart through its own sorrow.

"You know, then!" he said, his voice softer and less bitter.

"`Bithenke ghe on him t