“Take these horses to the stable and treat them as though they were my own.  Unload the pack beast, and when it has been cleaned, set the mail and the other gear upon it in the room that has been made ready for this young master, Hubert of Hastings, my nephew.”

Without a word the man led off the horses.

“Be not afraid,” chuckled John Grimmer, “for though I am a knave, dog does not eat dog and what is yours is safe with me and those who serve me.  Now enter,” and he led the way into the house, opening the iron-studded oak door with a key from his pouch.

Within was a shop where I saw precious things such as furs and gold ornaments lying about.

“The crumbs to catch the birds, especially the ladybirds,” he said with a sweep of his hand, then took me through the shop into a passage and thence to a room on the right.  It was not a large room but more wonderfully furnished than any I had ever seen.  In the centre was a table of black oak with cunningly carved legs, on which stood cups of silver and a noble centre piece that seemed to be of gold.  From the ceiling, too, hung silver lamps that already had been lit, for the evening was closing in, and gave a sweet smell.  There was a hearth also with what was rare, a chimney, upon which burned a little fire of logs, while the walls were hung with tapestries and broidered silks.

Whilst I stared about me, my uncle took off his cloak beneath which he was clothed in some rich but rather threadbare stuff, only retaining the velvet skullcap that he wore.  Then he bade me do the same, and when I had laid my outer garment aside, looked me all over in the lamplight.

“A proper young man,” he muttered to himself, “and I’d give all I have to be his age and like him.  I suppose those limbs and sinews of his came from his father, for I was ever thin and spare, as was my father before me.  Nephew Hubert, I have heard all the tale of your dealings with the Frenchmen, on whom be God’s curse, at Hastings yonder; and I say that I am proud of you, though whether I shall stay so is another matter.  Come hither.”

I obeyed, and taking me by my curling hair with his delicate hand, he drew down my head and kissed me on the brow, muttering, “Neither chick nor child for me and only this one left of the ancient blood.  May he do it honour.”

Then he motioned to me to be seated and rang a little silver bell that stood upon the table.  As in the case of the man without, it was answered instantly from which I judged that Master Grimmer was well served.  Before the echoes of the bell died away a door opened, the tapestry swung aside, and there appeared two most comely serving maids, tall and well-shaped both of them, bearing food.

“Pretty women, Nephew, no wonder that you look at them,” he said when they had gone away to fetch other things, “such as I like to have about me although I am old.  Women for within and men for without, that is Nature’s law, and ill will be the day when it is changed.  Yet beware of pretty women, Nephew, and I pray you kiss not those as you did the lady Blanche Aleys at Hastings, lest it should upset my household and turn servants into mistresses.”