CHAPTER X.

OF CHRISTOPHER AT THE TOFTS.


Christopher was six weeks ere he could come and go as he was
wont; but it was but a few days ere he was well enough to
tell his tale to Jack of the Tofts and his seven bold sons;
and they cherished him and made much of him, and so
especially did David, the youngest son, to his board-fellow
and troth-brother.

On a day when he was well-nigh whole, as he sat under an
oak-tree nigh the house, in the cool of the evening, Jack of
the Tofts came to him and sat beside him, and made him tell
his tale to him once more, and when he was done he said to
him: "Foster-son, for so I would have thee deem of thyself,
what is the thing that thou rememberest earliest in thy
days?"

Said Christopher: "A cot without the Castle walls at the
Uttermost Marches, and a kind woman therein, big,
sandy-haired, and freckled, and a lad that was white-haired
and sturdy, somewhat bigger than I. And I mind me standing
up against the door-post of the cot and seeing men-at-arms
riding by in white armour, and one of them throwing an apple
to me, and I raised my arm to throw it back at him, but my
nurse (for somehow I knew she was not my mother) caught my
hand and drew me back indoors, and I heard the men laughing