“Why, that I will, sir,” choked Nick, brokenly; “he was wondrous kind to me, except that he would na leave me go.”

“After that,” continued Master Shakspere, “he made known to me a sliding panel in the wainscot of his house, wherein was hidden all he had on earth to leave to those he loved the best, and who, he hoped, loved him.”

“Everybody loves my father,” said Cicely, smiling and nodding again.  Master Jonson put his arm around the back of her chair, and she leaned her head upon it.

“Carew said that he had marked upon the bags which were within the panel the names of the persons to whom they were to go, and had me swear, upon my faith as a Christian man, that I would see them safely delivered according to his wish.  This being done, and the end come, he kissed me on both cheeks, and standing bravely up, spoke to them all, saying that for a man such as he had been it was easier to end even so than to go on.  I never saw him again.”

The great writer of plays paused a moment, and his lips moved as if he were saying a prayer.  Master Burbage crossed himself.

“The bags were found within the wall, as he had said, and were sealed by Ben Jonson and myself until we should find the legatees—­for they had disappeared as utterly as if the earth had gaped and swallowed them.  But, by the Father’s grace, we have found them safe and sound at last; and all’s well that ends well!”

Here he turned the buckskin bags around.

On one, in Master Carew’s school-boy scrawl, was printed, “For myne
Onelie Beeloved Doghter, Cicely Carew”; on the other, “For Nicholas
Attewode, alias Mastre Skie-lark, whom I, Gaston Carew, Player, Stole
Away from Stratford Toune, Anno Domini 1596.”

Nick stared; Cicely clapped her hands; and Simon Attwood sat down dizzily.

“There,” said Master Shakspere, pointing to the second bag, “are one hundred and fifty gold rose-nobles.  In the other just three hundred more.  Neighbor Attwood, we shall have no paupers here.”

Everybody laughed then and clapped their hands, and the London players gave a rousing cheer.  Master Ben Jonson’s shout might have been heard in Market Square.

At this tremendous uproar the servants peeped at the doors and windows; and Tom Boteler, peering in from the buttery hall, and seeing the two round money-bags plumping on the table, crept away with such a look of amazement upon his face that Mollikins, the scullery-maid, thought he had seen a ghost, and fled precipitately into the pantry.

“And what’s more, Neighbor Tanner,” said Master Richard Burbage, “had Carew’s daughter not sixpence to her name, we vagabond players, as ye have had the scanty grace to dub us, would have cared for her for the honour of the craft, and reared her gently in some quiet place where there never falls even the shadow of such evil things as have been the end of many a right good fellow beside old Kit Marlowe and Gaston Carew.”