Laurence. He would gladly have purchased his uncle's silence at even
greater price.

"If your lordship pleases," said Laurence, meekly, adding to himself,
"it cannot be such hard work as hammering at the forge, and if I like
it not, why then I can always run away."

"You think you have a call to become a holy clerk?"

"I feel it here," quoth Master Laurence, hypocritically, indicating
correctly, however, the organ whose wants have made clerks of so
many--that is, the stomach.

Earl William smiled yet more broadly, but anxious to be gone he said:
"Mine Uncle, here is the lad's father, Malise MacKim, my master
armourer and right good servant. Ask him concerning his son."

"'Tis all up a rotten tree now," muttered Laurence to himself; "my
father will reveal all."

Malise MacKim smiled grimly, but with a salutation to the dignitary of
the church and near relative of his chief, he said: "Truly, I had
never thought of this my son as worthy to be a holy clerk. But I will
not stand in the way of his advancement nor thwart your favour. Take
him for a year on trial, and if you can make a monk of him, do so and
welcome. I recommend a leathern strap, well hardened in the fire, for
the purpose of encouraging him to make a beginning in the holy life."

"He shall indeed have penance if he need it. For the good of the soul
must the body suffer!" said Abbot William, sententiously.