IT is not, however, in the nature of things that a lad of twenty,with young life glowing in his veins and all the wide worldbefore him, should spend his first hours of freedom in mourningfor what he had left. Long ere Alleyne was out of sound of theBeaulieu bells he was striding sturdily along, swinging his staffand whistling as merrily as the birds in the thicket. It was anevening to raise a man's heart. The sun shining slantwisethrough the trees threw delicate traceries across the road, withbars of golden light between. Away in the distance before andbehind, the green boughs, now turning in places to a copperyredness, shot their broad arches across the track. The stillsummer air was heavy with the resinous smell of the great forest.Here and there a tawny brook prattled out from among theunderwood and lost itself again in the ferns and brambles uponthe further side. Save the dull piping of insects and the soughof the leaves, there was silence everywhere--the sweet restfulsilence of nature.

And yet there was no want of life--the whole wide wood was fullof it. Now it was a lithe, furtive stoat which shot across thepath upon some fell errand of its own; then it was a wild catwhich squatted upon the outlying branch of an oak and peeped atthe traveller with a yellow and dubious eye. Once it was a wildsow which scuttled out of the bracken, with two young sounders ather heels, and once a lordly red staggard walked daintily outfrom among the tree trunks, and looked around him with thefearless gaze of one who lived under the King's own highprotection. Alleyne gave his staff a merry flourish, however,and the red deer bethought him that the King was far off, sostreaked away from whence he came.

The youth had now journeyed considerably beyond the furthestdomains of the Abbey. He was the more surprised therefore when,on coming round a turn in the path, he perceived a man clad inthe familiar garb of the order, and seated in a clump of heatherby the roadside. Alleyne had known every brother well, but thiswas a face which was new to him--a face which was very red andpuffed, working this way and that, as though the man were soreperplexed in his mind. Once he shook both hands furiously in theair, and twice he sprang from his seat and hurried down the road.When he rose, however, Alleyne observed that his robe was muchtoo long and loose for him in every direction, trailing upon theground and bagging about his ankles, so that even with trussed-upskirts he could make little progress. He ran once, but the longgown clogged him so that he slowed down into a shambling walk,and finally plumped into the heather once more.

"Young friend," said he, when Alleyne was abreast of him, "I fearfrom thy garb that thou canst know little of the Abbey ofBeaulieu?"

"Then you are in error, friend," the clerk answered, "for I havespent all my days within its walls."

"Hast so indeed?" cried he. "Then perhaps canst tell me the nameof a great loathly lump of a brother wi' freckled face an' a handlike a spade. His eyes were black an' his hair was red an' hisvoice like the parish bull. I trow that there cannot be twoalike in the same cloisters."

"That surely can be no other than brother John," said Alleyne."I trust he has done you no wrong, that you should be so hotagainst him."

"Wrong, quotha!" cried the other, jumping out of the heather."Wrong! why he hath stolen every plack of clothing off my back,if that be a wrong, and hath left me here in this sorry frock ofwhite falding, so that I have shame to go back to my wife, lestshe think that I have donned her old kirtle. Harrow and alasthat ever I should have met him!"

"But how came this?" asked the young clerk, who could scarce keepfrom laughter at the sight of the hot little man so swathed inthe great white cloak.

"It came in this way," he said, sitting down once more: "I waspassing this way, hoping to reach Lymington ere nightfall when Icame on this red-headed knave seated even where we are sittingnow. I uncovered and louted as I passed thinking that he mightbe a holy man at his orisons, but he called to me and asked me ifI had heard speak of the new indulgence in favor of theCistercians. 'Not I,' I answered. 'Then the worse for thysoul!' said he; and with that he broke into a long tale how thaton account of the virtues of the Abbot Berghersh it had beendecreed by the Pope that whoever should wear the habit of a monkof Beaulieu for as long as he might say the seven psalms of Davidshould be assured of the kingdom of Heaven. When I heard this Iprayed him on my knees that he would give me the use of his gown,which after many contentions he at last agreed to do, on mypaying him three marks towards the regilding of the image ofLaurence the martyr. Having stripped his robe, I had no choicebut to let him have the wearing of my good leathern jerkin andhose, for, as he said, it was chilling to the blood and unseemlyto the eye to stand frockless whilst I made my orisons. He hadscarce got them on, and it was a sore labor, seeing that myinches will scarce match my girth--he had scarce got them on, Isay, and I not yet at the end of the second psalm, when he bademe do honor to my new dress, and with that set off down the roadas fast as feet would carry him. For myself, I could no more runthan if I had been sown in a sack; so here I sit, and here I amlike to sit, before I set eyes upon my clothes again."

"Nay, friend, take it not so sadly," said Alleyne, clapping thedisconsolate one upon the shoulder. "Canst change thy robe for ajerkin once more at the Abbey, unless perchance you have a friendnear at hand."

"That have I," he answered, "and close; but I care not to go nighhim in this plight, for his wife hath a gibing tongue, and willspread the tale until I could not show my face in any market fromFordingbridge to Southampton. But if you, fair sir, out of yourkind charity would be pleased to go a matter of two bow-shots outof your way, you would do me such a service as I could scarcerepay."

"With all my heart," said Alleyne readily.

"Then take this pathway on the left, I pray thee, and then thedeer-track which passes on the right. You will then see under agreat beech-tree the hut of a charcoal-burner. Give him my name,good sir, the name of Peter the fuller, of Lymington, and ask himfor a change of raiment, that I may pursue my journey withoutdelay. There are reasons why he would be loth to refuse me."

Alleyne started off along the path indicated, and soon found thelog-hut where the burner dwelt. He was away faggot-cutting inthe forest, but his wife, a ruddy bustling dame, found theneedful garments and tied them into a bundle. While she busiedherself in finding and folding them, Alleyne Edricson stood bythe open door looking in at her with much interest and somedistrust, for he had never been so nigh to a woman before. Shehad round red arms, a dress of some sober woollen stuff, and abrass brooch the size of a cheese-cake stuck in the front of it.

"Peter the fuller!" she kept repeating. "Marry come up! if Iwere Peter the fuller's wife I would teach him better than togive his clothes to the first knave who asks for them. But hewas always a poor, fond, silly creature, was Peter, though we arebeholden to him for helping to bury our second son Wat, who was a'prentice to him at Lymington in the year of the Black Death.But who are you, young sir?"

"I am a clerk on my road from Beaulieu to Minstead."

"Aye, indeed! Hast been brought up at the Abbey then. I couldread it from thy reddened cheek and downcast eye, Hast learnedfrom the monks, I trow, to fear a woman as thou wouldst a lazar-house. Out upon them! that they should dishonor their ownmothers by such teaching. A pretty world it would be with allthe women out of it."

"Heaven forfend that such a thing should come to pass!" saidAlleyne.

"Amen and amen! But thou art a pretty lad, and the prettier forthy modest ways. It is easy to see from thy cheek that thou hastnot spent thy days in the rain and the heat and the wind, as mypoor Wat hath been forced to do."

"I have indeed seen little of life, good dame."

"Wilt find nothing in it to pay for the loss of thy ownfreshness. Here are the clothes, and Peter can leave them whennext he comes this way. Holy Virgin! see the dust upon thydoublet! It were easy to see that there is no woman to tend tothee. So!--that is better. Now buss me, boy."

Alleyne stooped and kissed her, for the kiss was the commonsalutation of the age, and, as Erasmus long afterwards remarked,more used in England than in any other country. Yet it sent theblood to his temples again, and he wondered, as he turned away,what the Abbot Berghersh would have answered to so frank aninvitation. He was still tingling from this new experience whenhe came out upon the high-road and saw a sight which drove allother thoughts from his mind.

Some way down from where he had left him the unfortunate Peterwas stamping and raving tenfold worse than before. Now, however,instead of the great white cloak, he had no clothes on at all,save a short woollen shirt and a pair of leather shoes. Far downthe road a long-legged figure was running, with a bundle underone arm and the other hand to his side, like a man who laughsuntil he is sore.

"See him!" yelled Peter. "Look to him! You shall be my witness.He shall see Winchester jail for this. See where he goes with mycloak under his arm!"

"Who then?" cried Alleyne.

"Who but that cursed brother John. He hath not left me clothesenough to make a gallybagger. The double thief hath cozened meout of my gown."

"Stay though, my friend, it was his gown," objected Alleyne.

"It boots not. He hath them all--gown, jerkin, hosen and all.Gramercy to him that he left me the shirt and the shoon. I doubtnot that he will be back for them anon."

"But how came this?" asked Alleyne, open-eyed with astonishment.

"Are those the clothes? For dear charity's sake give them to me.Not the Pope himself shall have these from me, though he sent thewhole college of cardinals to ask it. How came it? Why, you hadscarce gone ere this loathly John came running back again, and,when I oped mouth to reproach him, he asked me whether it wasindeed likely that a man of prayer would leave his own godlyraiment in order to take a layman's jerkin. He had, he said, butgone for a while that I might be the freer for my devotions. Onthis I plucked off the gown, and he with much show of haste didbegin to undo his points; but when I threw his frock down heclipped it up and ran off all untrussed, leaving me in this sorryplight. He laughed so the while, like a great croaking frog,that I might have caught him had my breath not been as short ashis legs were long."

The young man listened to this tale of wrong with all theseriousness that he could maintain; but at the sight of the pursyred-faced man and the dignity with which he bore him, thelaughter came so thick upon him that he had to lean up against atree-trunk. The fuller looked sadly and gravely at him; butfinding that he still laughed, he bowed with much mock politenessand stalked onwards in his borrowed clothes. Alleyne watched himuntil he was small in the distance, and then, wiping the tearsfrom his eyes, he set off briskly once more upon his journey.