"Just then the crowd lapped them up and closed
them in, and I saw no more, being called by my
master, who was in a rage because a joint that the
scrivener had ordered was forgot, though I take all
the saints to witness that to blame me for that mis-
carriage were like holding the unborn babe to judg-
ment for sins com--"

"Out of my sight, idiot! Thy prating drives me
mad! Hold! whither art flying? Canst not bide
still an instant? Went they toward Southwark?"

"Even so, your worship--for, as I said before,
as to that detestable joint, the babe unborn is no
whit more blameless than--"

"Art here yet! And prating still? Vanish, lest
I throttle thee!" The servitor vanished. Hendon
followed after him, passed him, and plunged down
the stairs two steps at a stride, muttering, " 'Tis
that scurvy villain that claimed he was his son. I
have lost thee, my poor little mad master--it is a
bitter thought--and I had come to love thee so!
No! by book and bell, not lost! Not lost, for I
will ransack the land till I find thee again. Poor
child, yonder is his breakfast--and mine, but I
have no hunger now--so, let the rats have it--
speed, speed! that is the word!" As he wormed
his swift way through the noisy multitudes upon the
Bridge, he several times said to himself--clinging
to the thought as if it were a particularly pleasing
one: "He grumbled, but he went--he went, yes,
because he thought Miles Hendon asked it, sweet
lad--he would ne'er have done it for another, I
know it well!"

-96-