Master Skylark: A Story of Shakspere's Time by John Bennett (top rated books of all time txt) 📕

“Three merry boys, and three merry boys,
   And three merry boys are we,
As ever did sing in a hempen string
   Beneath the gallows-tree!”

And before the bandy-legged man could chance upon a doorway in which to stand out of the rush, they were pressed against the wall flat as cakes by a crowd of bold apprentices in holiday attire going out to a wager of archery to be shot in Finsbury Fields.

At first all Nick could see was legs: red legs, yellow legs, blue legs, green legs, long legs, strong legs—in truth, a very many of all sorts of legs, all stepping out together like a hundred-bladed shears; for these were the Saddlers of Cheapside and the Cutters of Mincing Lane, tall, ruddy-faced fellows, all armed with clubs, which they twirled and tossed and thwacked one another with in sport. Some wore straw hats with steeple-crowns, and some flat caps of green and white, or red and orange-tawny. Some had long yew bows and sheaves of arrows decked with garlands; and they were all exceedingly daubed in the face with dripping cherry-juice and with cheese, which they munched as they strode along.

“What, there, Tom Webster, I say,” cried one, catching sight of Cicely’s face, “here is a Queen o’ the May for thee!”

His broad-shouldered comrade stopped in the way, and with him all the rest. “My faith, Jem Armstrong, ’tis the truth, for once in thy life!” quoth he, and stared at Cicely. Her cheeks were flushed, and her panting red lips were fallen apart so that her little white teeth showed through. Her long, dark lashes cast shadow circles under her eyes. Her curly hair in elfin locks tossed all about her face, and through it was tied a crimson ribbon, mocking the quick color of the blood which came and went beneath her delicate skin. “My faith!” cried Tommy Webster, “her face be as fair as a K in a copy-book! Hey, bullies, what? let’s make her queen!”

“A queen?” “What queen?” “Where is a queen?” “I granny! Tom Webster hath catched a queen!” “Where is she, Tom?” “Up with her, mate, and let a fellow see.”

“Hands off, there!” snarled the bandy-legged man.

“Up with her, Tom!” cried out the strapping fellow at his back. “A queen it is; and a right good smacking toll all round—I have not bussed a maid this day! Up with her, Tom!”

“Stand back, ye rogues, and let us pass!”

But alas and alack for the bandy-legged man! He could not ruffle and swagger it off as Gaston Carew had done of old; a London apprentice was harder nuts than his cowardly heart could crack.

“Stand back, ye rogues!” he cried again.

“Rogues? Rogues? Who calls us rogues? Hi, Martin Allston, crack me his crown!”

“Good masters,” faltered Gregory, seeing that bluster would not serve, “I meant ye no offense. I pr’ythee, do not keep a father and his children from their dying mother’s bed!”

“Nay—is that so?” asked Webster, sobering instantly “Here, lads, give way—their mother be a-dying.”

The crowd fell back. “Ah, sirs,” whined Goole, scarce hiding the joy in his face, “she’ll thank ye with her dying breath. Get on, thou knave!” he muttered fiercely in Nick’s ear.

But Nick stood fast, and caught Tom Webster by the arm. “The fellow lieth in his throat,” said he. “My mother is in Stratford town; and Cicely’s mother is dead.”

“Thou whelp!” cried the bandy-legged man, and aimed a sudden blow at Nick, “I’ll teach thee to hold thy tongue.”

“Oh, no, ye won’t,” quoth Thomas Webster, interposing his long oak staff, and thrusting the fellow away so hard that he thumped against the wall; “there is no school on holidays! Thou’lt teach nobody here to hold his tongue but thine own self—and start at that straightway. Dost take me?—say? Now, Jacky Sprat, what’s all the coil about? Hath this sweet fellow kidnapped thee?”

“Nay, sir, not me, but Cicely; and do na leave him take her, sir, for he treats her very ill!”

“The little rascal lies,” sneered Goole, though his lips were the color of lead; “I am her legal guardian!”

“What! How? Thou wast her father but a moment since!”

“Nay, nay,” Goole stammered, turning a sickly hue; “her father’s nearest friend, I said,—he gave her in my charge.”

“My father’s friend!” cried Cicely. “Thou? Thou? His common groom! Why, he would not give my finger in thy charge.”

“He is the wiser daddy, then!” laughed Jemmy Armstrong, “for the fellow hath a T for Tyburn writ upon his face.”

The eyes of the bandy-legged man began to shift from side to side; but still he put a bold front on. “Stand off,” said he, and tried to thrust Tom Webster back. “Thou’lt pay the piper dear for this! The knave is a lying vagabond. He hath stolen this pack of goods.”

“Why, fie for shame!” cried Cicely, and stamped her little foot. “Nick doth not steal, and thou knowest it, Gregory Goole! It is thou who hast stolen my pretty clothes, and the wine from my father’s house!”

“Good, sweetheart!” quoth Tom Webster, eying the bandy-legged man with a curious snap in his honest eyes. “So the rascal hath stolen other things than thee? I thought that yellow bow of his was tied tremendous high! Why, mates, the dog is a branded rogue—that ribbon is tied through the hole in his ear!”

Gregory Goole made a dash through the throng where the press was least.

Thump! went Tommy Webster’s club, and a little puff of dust went up from Gregory’s purple cloak. But he was off so sharply, and dodged with such amazing skill, that most of the blows aimed at his head hummed through the empty air, or thwacked some stout apprentice in the ribs as they all went whooping after him. He was out of the press and away like a deer down a covert lane between two shops ere one could say, “Jack, Robin’s son,” and left the stout apprentices at every flying leap. So presently they all gave over the chase, and came back with the bag he had dropped as he ran; and were so well pleased with themselves for what they had done that they gave three cheers for all the Cloth-workers and Saddlers in London, and then three more for Cicely and Nick. They would no doubt have gone right on and given three for the bag likewise, being strongly in the humor of it; but “Hi, Tom Webster!” shouted one who could hardly speak for cherries and cheese and puffing, “what’s gone with the queen we’re to have so fast, and the toll that we’re to take?”

Tom Webster pulled at his yellow beard, for he saw that Cicely was no common child, and of gentler birth than they. “I do not think she’ll bide the toll,” said he, in half apology.

“What! is there anything to pay?” she asked with a rueful quaver in her voice. “Oh, Nick, there is to pay!”

“We have no money, sirs,” said Nick; “I be very sorry.”

“If my father were here,” said Cicely, “he would give thee a handful of silver; but I have not a penny to my name.” She looked up into Tom Webster’s face. “But, sir,” said she, and laid her hand upon his arm, “if ye care, I will kiss thee upon the cheek.”

“Why, marry come up! My faith!” quoth he, and suddenly blushed—to his own surprise the most of all—“why, what? Who’d want a sweeter penny for his pains?” But “Here—nay, nay!” the others cried; “ye’ve left us out. Fair play, fair play!”

All Cicely could see was a forest of legs that filled the lane from wall to wall, and six great fellows towering over her. “Why, sirs,” cried she, confusedly, while her face grew rosy red, “ye all shall kiss my hand—if—if—”

“If what?” they roared.

“If ye will but wipe your faces clean.”

At the shout of laughter they sent up the constable of the cloth-men’s ward awoke from a sudden dream of war and bloody insurrection, and came down Cheapside bawling, “Peace, in the name of the Queen!” But when he found it was only the apprentices of Mincing Lane out Maying, he stole away around a shop, and made as if it were some other fellow.

They took the humor of it like a jolly lot of bears, and all came crowding round about, wiping their mouths on what came first, with a lick and a promise,—kerchief, doublet, as it chanced,—laughing, and shouldering each to be first. “Up with the little maid there, Tom!” they roared lustily.

Cicely gave him both her hands, and—“Upsydaisy!”—she was on the top of the corner post, where she stood with one hand on his brawny shoulder to steady herself, like a flower growing by a wall, bowing gravely all about, and holding out her hand to be kissed with as graceful an air as a princess born, and withal a sweet, quaint dignity that abashed the wildest there.

Some one or two came blustering as if her hand were not enough; but Jemmy Armstrong rapped them so sharply over the pate, with “Soft, ye loons, her hand!” that they dabbed at her little finger-tips, and were out of his reach in a jiffy, rubbing their polls with a sheepish grin; for Jemmy Armstrong’s love-pats would have cracked a hazelnut.

Some came again a second time. One came even a third. But Cicely knew him by his steeple-hat, and tucked her hand behind her, saying, “Fie, sir, thou art greedy!” Whereupon the others laughed and punched him in the ribs with their clubs, until he bellowed, “Quits! We’ll all be late to the archery if we be not trotting on.”

Nick’s face fell at the merry shout of “Finsbury, Finsbury, ho!” “I dare na try to take her home alone,” said he; “that rogue may lie in wait for us.”

“Oh, Nick, he is not coming back?” cried Cicely; and with that she threw her arms around Tom Webster’s neck. “Oh, take us with thee, sir—don’t leave us all alone!”

Webster pulled his yellow beard. “Nay, lass, it would not do,” said he; “we’ll be mad larks by evening. But there, sweetheart, don’t weep no more! That rogue shall not catch thee again, I promise that.”

“Why, Tom,” quoth Armstrong, “what’s the coil? We’ll leave them at the Boar’s Head Inn with sixpence each until their friends can come for them. Hey, mates, up Great East Cheap!” And off they marched to the Boar’s Head Inn.