seas tomorrow to join the army, and it may be long ere he return. I shall
have plenty of time to consider how I had best shape my conduct towards him
on his return; but assuredly he shall never be friendly with me again, or
frighten Edith with his kisses."

"Well, Walter, has it been such a dreadful business as you expected?" the
armourer asked the lad when he re-entered the shop. "The great folks have
not eaten you at any rate."

"It has not been dreadful," Walter replied with a smile, "though I own that
it was not pleasant when I first arrived at the great mansion; but the lady
put me quite at my ease, and she talked to me for some time, and finally
she bestowed on me this chain, which our lady, the queen, had herself given
her."

"It is a knight's chain and a heavy one," Geoffrey said, examining it, "of
Genoese work, I reckon, and worth a large sum. It will buy you harness when
you go to the wars."

"I would rather fight in the thickest melee in a cloth doublet," Walter
said indignantly, "than part with a single link of it."

"I did but jest, Walter," Geoffrey said laughing; "but as you will not sell
it, and you cannot wear it, you had best give it me to put aside in my
strong coffer until you get of knightly rank."

"Lady Vernon said," the lad replied, "that she hoped one day it might again
belong to a knight; and if I live," he added firmly, "it shall."

"Oh! she has been putting these ideas into your head; nice notions truly