Knowing nothing of the escape of their old enemy, Hugo and Humphrey arose the next morning and, after paying their reckoning, departed without having incurred the suspicion of any one in the town.

"This cometh of leaving the inn of the Shorn Lamb in good season," observed Humphrey, with satisfaction.

"I did think we were put out of the inn," said Hugo, demurely.

"Ay, lad," agreed Humphrey; "thou art right. If all who go to the Shorn Lamb were thus put out, and so did leave in good season, there would be fewer lambs abroad without their fleece. Didst see Walter Skinner in the guise of the scullion?"

"Yea," answered Hugo.

"If I be so good a priest as he is a scullion, I fear detection from no man. Why, he doth look to be a good scullion, whereas when he is clad as the king's spy, he looketh a very poor spy; and he doth act the part moreover very lamentably. We had come badly off had he been as good a spy as he is a scullion."

"Ay, and had he been less drunken," said Hugo.

"Thou hast well said, lad," agreed Humphrey. "Let a man that would have ill success in what he undertaketh but befuddle his wit with drink, and ill success he will have, and that in good measure. And the scorn and contempt of his fellows, moreover, even as hath this little spy."

"And yet," observed Hugo, thoughtfully, "it were hard to find a man who is not at some time drunken."

"Hadst thou that from thine uncle, the prior?" asked Humphrey, quickly.
"Or didst thou gain it from thine own very ancient experience?"

"Now I have angered thee," said Hugo, frankly.

"Yea, lad, thou hast. This is a time of great drinking, that I know; but never have I seen my lord drunken. And never hath any man seen me drunken, nor my father, nor my grandsire. There be ever enough sober ones in the worst of times to keep the world right side uppermost. And that thou wilt find when thou hast lived to be forty years old. But thou art but fourteen, and I am foolish to be angered with thee for what is, after all, but lack of experience. How soon come we to this St. Albans?"

"Why, it is but thirteen miles from Dunstable," answered Hugo, pleasantly.

"Then may we pass it by without stopping," cried Humphrey, joyfully.
"And how much farther on lieth London?"

"Twenty miles," replied Hugo.

"Then do we rest in London to-night, if we may," said Humphrey. "Our horses be not of the best, but neither are they of the worst; and it were an ill beast that could not go thirty-three miles before sunset on the Watling Street."

"Ay," agreed Hugo. "But we may not ride too fast, else shall we arouse wonder."

Humphrey sighed. "Thou art right, lad," he said. "And wonder might lead to questions, and questions to a stopping of our journey. For how know I what answer to make to questions that I be not looking for? I will therefore go more slowly."

The road was now by no means empty of passengers. Trains of packhorses were going down to London. And just as they reached St. Albans came a nobleman with his retinue, going down to his town house in London. "So might my lord ride, but for the wicked king," said Humphrey, in a low tone, as they stood aside. Then passing into the city of St. Albans, they at once sought an inn and made the early hour suit them for dinner that so they might journey on the sooner.

They had entered St. Albans in the rear of the nobleman's party. They passed out of it an hour later unnoticed in a throng of people. "And now," said Humphrey, looking back at the town on the slope, "let the priest at Oundle play us false if he like; we be safely through the town."

"It was near here that the Saxon pope, Adrian IV, was born," observed
Hugo.

"Ay, lad," answered Humphrey, indifferently. "But I be nearing the place where I be a priest no longer. If we may not make too much haste, let us turn aside in the wood and find a hut where they will take us in for the night, and where, perchance, I may get a dream. 'Tis a mighty place, this London, and I would fain see what 'twere best to do."

Hugo made no objection, and when they were within ten miles of the great city they turned their horses to the left and sought shelter in Epping Forest.

"I like the wood," observed Humphrey, with satisfaction. "It seemeth a safer place than the Watling Street; for who knoweth what rascals ride thereon, and who be no more what they seem than we be ourselves?"

"Why, so they be no worse than we, we need not fear," returned Hugo, with a smile.

But Humphrey was not to be convinced. "I be forty years old," he said, "and what be safer than a tree but many trees? And the grass is under foot, and the sky above, and naught worse than robbers and wardens to be feared in the wood."

Hugo laughed. "And what worse than robbers on the Watling Street?" he asked.

"King's men, lad, king's men. A good honest robber of the woods will take but thy purse or other goods; but the king's man will take thee, and the king will take, perchance, thy life. I like not the Watling Street, nor care to see it more."

They were now going slowly through the wood in a bridle-path, one behind the other. Presently they came out into a glade, and across it, peeping from amid the trees, they descried a hut. "That be our inn for the night, if they will take us," said Humphrey, decisively. And, crossing the glade, he rode boldly up to the door and knocked.

The hut was very small and was made of wattle and daub. A faint line of smoke was coming from a hole in the roof. The knock with the end of Humphrey's stick was a vigorous one. Nevertheless it went so long without answer that he knocked again, and this time with better success. The door opened slowly a little way, and through the aperture thus made an old and withered face looked out.

"What wilt thou?" asked a cracked, high voice.

"Entrance and shelter for the night," replied Humphrey, promptly and concisely.

The door opened a little wider and the man within stepping outside, his person was revealed. He was of medium height and spare, and he wore a long gray tunic of wool reaching to his knees. Beneath this garment his lean legs were bare, while on his feet he wore shoes of skin which reached to the ankle, and which were secured by thongs. Such as he Hugo and Humphrey had often seen, but never before a face like his, in which craftiness and credulity were strangely mingled. For several minutes he stood there, first scrutinizing Humphrey and then Hugo.

At last Humphrey grew impatient. "Do we come in, or do we stay out?" he demanded.

"Why, that I hardly know," was the slow answer. "There be many rogues about; some in priests' robes and some not."

"Yea, verily," responded Humphrey, fervently; "but we be not of the number. Pax vobiscum," he added, hastily. "I had well nigh forgot that," he said in an aside to Hugo.

But the old man's ears were keen, and he caught the aside meant for Hugo's ears alone. "Thou be but a sorry priest to forget thy pax vobiscum," he said with a crafty look. "Perchance thou art no priest," he added, coming closer and peering into Humphrey's face.

He looked so long that Humphrey again grew impatient. "What seest thou on my face?" he asked.

"Why, I do see a mole on thy nose. It is a very small one, and of scant size, but because thou hast it thou mayest come down from thy horse, thou and the lad with thee, and I will give thee lodging for the night."

Instinctively Humphrey raised his hand and touched a tiny mole on the side and near the end of his nose. The man of the hut watched him. "I see thou knowest that a mole near the end of the nose is lucky," he said.

"Not I," declared Humphrey. "I had not before heard of such a thing."

The man of the hut regarded him pityingly. Then he said: "Come down from thy horse, thou unwitting lucky one, and come thou and the lad within while I do hide thy horses in a thick, for I would share thy luck. Dost not know that to show kindness to a lucky one is to share his fortune? Thou hadst not come within the hut but for thy mole, I warrant thee. For I do know that thou art the false priest and the young lord from Oundle that stopped not at St. Albans as ye were bid."

Hugo and Humphrey looked at each other. Then Humphrey said, "I know not, after all, whether to come in or not."

"Come in! come in!" cried the old man, eagerly. "I must share thy luck, and that could I not do if I played thee false. Come in!"

Still hesitating, Humphrey glanced about him. He knew not who might be on his track. And then he decided to go in.

"No matter who knocketh while I be gone," said the old man, earnestly, "give heed to none. Only when I come and knock four times: one for thee, one time for the lad, and two times for the two horses, which signifieth that I know ye; listen close. And when I say 'mole,' open the door softly and not over wide."

Humphrey, who with Hugo was now within the hut, promised to obey, and the old man, closing the door after him, departed with the horses.

At once Humphrey put out the smoking embers of the fire burning on the earthen floor in the centre of the hut. "If any knock and see the smoke and hear no answer, will they not break in the door?" he said.

The old man had been gone but a short time when a tramp of horses was heard. The riders paused before the door of the hut as Humphrey had done, and one of them knocked heavily upon it with his stick. But there was no answer. Again there came a knock and a cry, "Open, old Bartlemy!"

Meanwhile, old Bartlemy had come creeping cautiously back, and from behind a screen of vines which hung from an oak beheld them. "Ay, ye may knock and cry," he muttered craftily; "but which one of ye hath a mole near the end of his nose? Not one of ye. Therefore I will have none of ye. And ye may be gone."

"The old rascal groweth deaf," said one of the riders.

"Nay," answered the second. "There cometh no smoke out of the roof. He is doubtless from home for the night."

Old Bartlemy hastily glanced toward the roof of the hut. He had left a smouldering fire, and now no fire was there. "The false priest hath put it out," he said joyfully. "Now know I that he hath luck with him, and I will serve him faithfully. Ay, knock!" he continued. "Knock thy fill. I did but now hear thee call me 'old rascal,' though I have helped thee to thy desires many times, for which thou didst pay me by ever threatening to bring the ranger upon me for the game I take to keep me alive. Thou wantest naught of old Bartlemy but to further thine own schemes."

There was silence a moment, and then the first speaker said, "The priest of Oundle hath cheaply bought his altar cloth if we find not these two. We know they be between St. Albans and London. And we do know they be, for the present, gone from the Watling Street, for the carter from London whom we did meet did tell us that he had met them not on the way. Therefore go thou to London by way of the Ermine Street, while I go down by the Watling Street. They may be now straying about in the wood, but we shall have them on one road or the other as they go into the city. The false priest rideth a gray, and the young lord a black. We shall have them without Bartlemy's aid, fear not."

Then the riders withdrew, each going his way, and Bartlemy a few moments later knocked on the door of the hut and was admitted by Humphrey. At once the old man made up the fire in the centre of the hut again.

"What doest thou?" demanded Humphrey. "Wouldst have other visitors?"

"Do not thou fear," responded Bartlemy. "Am I not here? And can I not hide thee and the lad beneath yon heap of rushes if a stranger come? No man will look for thee here. They that seek thee think that Bartlemy will aid them; and so he would but for thy mole. I be an old man, and never yet hath fortune come my way, and all because I did not before meet thee. For it hath been foretold me that a man having a mole near the end of his nose would bring me fortune. Wherefore I cleave to thee, and will protect thee with my life, if need be." So saying, he threw another fagot on the fire and, from a hidden cupboard, brought out a substantial meal of venison and bread. When the meal was finished he commanded: "Lie down and rest now, thou and the lad, while I keep watch. Thou wilt need thy wits on the morrow."

Humphrey reflected. Then he turned to Hugo. "Lie down, lad," he said kindly. "The old man is crazed when he talketh of moles, but he is right when he saith we have need of our wits on the morrow. And that meaneth we must rest in faith to-night."

The old man smiled triumphantly. "I be not so crazed as thou thinkest, neither," he said. "Thy mole is not only thy good fortune, but mine also." With that he put the remains of the meal back in the cupboard, shut the door, and replenished the fire. He then threw himself down on the earthen floor beside it, and lay there grinning and grimacing at the flames till Hugo and Humphrey fell asleep. A dozen times before dawn old Bartlemy rose to bend over the two, grinning and grimacing as he did so, and clasping his hands in ecstasy. But when the two awoke he was gone.

Humphrey, when he discovered Bartlemy's absence, started up in alarm. "I did get no dream, lad," he said to Hugo, whom his movements had aroused; "and the old man is gone. I know not what to do."