the crowded city, and many, whose business brought them to town, found it
cheaper to take up their abode in the quiet hostels of Southwark rather
than to stay in the more expensive inns within the walls. The lights came
out brightly from many of the casements, with sounds of boisterous songs
and laughter. The woman passed these without a pause. Presently she
stopped before a cottage, from which a feeble light alone showed that it
was tenanted.

She knocked at the door. It was opened by a pleasant-faced man of some
thirty years old.

"What is it?" he asked.

"I am a wayfarer," the woman answered feebly. "Canst take me and my child
in for the night?"

"You have made a mistake," the man said; "this is no inn. Further up the
road there are plenty of places where you can find such accommodation as
you lack."

"I have passed them," the woman said, "but all seemed full of roisterers. I
am wet and weary, and my strength is nigh spent. I can pay thee, good
fellow, and I pray you as a Christian to let me come in and sleep before
your fire for the night. When the gates are open in the morning I will go;
for I have a friend within the city who will, methinks, receive me.

The tone of voice, and the addressing of himself as good fellow, at once
convinced the man that the woman before him was no common wayfarer.

"Come in," he said; "Geoffrey Ward is not a man to shut his doors in a