"Pest on thee, scurril knave--be silent!" cried Richmond angrily; "failure
is bad enough without thy taunts."

"If you had only missed the ring, gossip, I should have thought nothing
of it," pursued Will Sommers; "but you lost a golden opportunity of
ingratiating yourself with your lady-love. All your hopes are now at an
end. A word in your ear--the Fair Geraldine will meet Surrey alone this
evening."

"Thou liest, knave!" cried the duke fiercely.

"Your grace will find the contrary, if you will be at Wolsey's tomb-house
at vesper-time," replied the jester.

"I will be there," replied the duke; "but if I am brought on a bootless
errand, not even my royal father shall save thee from chastisement."

"I will bear any chastisement your grace may choose to inflict upon me,
if I prove not the truth of my assertion," replied Sommers. And he
dropped into the rear of the train.

The two friends, as if by mutual consent, avoided each other during the
rest of the day--Surrey feeling he could not unburden his heart to
Richmond, and Richmond brooding jealously over the intelligence he
had received from the jester.

At the appointed hour the duke proceeded to the lower ward, and
stationed himself near Wolsey's tomb-house. Just as he arrived there,
the vesper hymn arose from the adjoining fane, and its solemn strains