"Back! Back!" hissed the page, once more trying to drag Miles down upon his knees.
But he shook him off, though it was at the cost of a rent in his new cloth doublet; and guessing truly who this imperious-looking man was, he fell on one knee as he approached, and held out the packet entrusted to his care. "Pardon me, my lord, if I have transgressed any rule, but I was bidden to seek you with all haste, and deliver into your own hand alone these letters from Master Clark and others."
"Master Clark hath chosen an over-bold messenger," said Wolsey. But the lad's treatment of the page somewhat amused him, for it reminded him of an episode in his own life; and he bade Miles rise, and promised to read the papers at once.
"Where is your lodging if we should need to send back an answer?" asked the Cardinal, looking at Miles critically; "I have not yet received your name as waiting an audience," he added.
"My name is Miles Paton. I am the son of Sir Thomas Paton, of Paton Hall, near Woodstock. But I have only now arrived from Oxford, and my horse is even now at the gate; but my errand brooked no delay, and so I may not have been over courteous to the servants of your Eminence."
"And does this business concern yourself?" asked Wolsey.
Miles shook his head. "Nay, I am but the messenger," he said, as he stepped back for the great Cardinal to pass on.
"Come hither again to-morrow morning at this hour for the answer to thy missive." And, saying this, the Cardinal hastened through the corridor, and disappeared through a door covered with arras, and which was opened by waiting pages at the approach of their master.
That the Cardinal had condescended to speak to Miles, without any of the formalities usually observed before granting anyone an audience, was sufficient to impress the pages and footmen of the importance of the visitor and his errand; and he was bowed out of the series of waiting-rooms in a fashion that rather embarrassed the simple country lad, who, although he was used to a troop of servants at his father's house, had learned to wait upon himself at the University, and especially during the last few months.
He was glad, therefore, when he reached the street, to find that his importance had slowly evaporated during his passage through the inner hall, and that the guard at the door simply remarked that he had not been long on his errand.