"The Bankside—hem!—and as a father!" scoffed the youth, but his eyes glistened. He was wise beyond his opportunities, and knew all about the Bankside, albeit he had never walked through that quarter but in daylight, wondering at the histories behind its house-fronts.
"As a father, I said; and evil be to him who evil thinks."
"I can tell you of one who will think evil; and that is my master. I can tell you of another; and that will be the sheriff, when I am haled before him."
"You said just now—or my hearing played a trick—that your mistress had a liking for you."
"And you said, 'Evil be to him that evil thinks.' She hath a double chin, and owns to fifty-five."
"What, chins!"
"Years, years, master. Like a grandmother she dotes on me and looks after my morals. Nathless when you talk of Bankside——" The apprentice hesitated: in the dusk his shrewd young eyes glistened. "Say that I risk it?" He hesitated again.
"Lads were not so cautious in my young days. I pay the shot, I tell you—a gentleman of Warwickshire and known to the College of Arms."
"It standeth on Paul's Wharf and handy for the ferry to Bankside: but the College closes early on Christmas Eve, and the Heralds be all at holiday. An you think of pawning your coat-of-arms with them to raise the wind, never say that I let you take that long way round without warning."