When the service was over, he stepped up to her as she was crossing the churchyard, and asked her to come into the Rectory garden to rest.
'For,' he added, 'you look a-weary, Mistress Gifford, and need refreshment ere you climb the hill again.'
The Rectory garden was an Eden of delight to little Ambrose. His mother let him wander away in the winding paths, intersecting the close-cut yew hedges, with no fear of lurking danger, while, at the Rector's invitation, she sat with him in a bower, over which a tangle of early roses and honeysuckle hung, and filled the air with fragrance. A rosy-cheeked maiden with bare arms, in a blue kirtle scarcely reaching below the knees, which displayed a pair of sturdy legs cased in leather boots, brought a wooden trencher of bread and cheese, with a large mug of spiced ale, and set them down on the table, fixed to the floor of the summer bower, with a broad smile.
As Ambrose ran past, chasing a pair of white butterflies, the Rector said,—
'That is a fine boy, Mistress Gifford. I doubt not, doubly precious, as the only son of his mother, who is a widow. I hear Master Philip Sidney looks at him with favour; and, no doubt, he will see that he is well trained in service which will stand him in good stead in life.'
'Ambrose is my only joy, sir,' Mary replied. 'All that is left to me of earthly joy, I would say. I pray to be helped to bring him up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. But it is a great charge.'
'Take heart, Mistress Gifford; there are many childless folk who would envy you your charge, but, methinks, you have the air of one who is burdened with a hidden grief. Now, if I can, by hearing it, assuage it, and you would fain bring it to me, I would do what in me lies as a minister of Christ to give you counsel.'
'You are very good, kind sir, but there are griefs which no human hand can touch.'
'I know it, I know it, for I have had experience therein. There was one I loved beyond all words, and God gave her to me. I fell under heavy displeasure for daring to break through the old custom of the Church—before she was purged of many abuses, which forbids the marriage of her priests—and my beloved was snatched from me by ruthless hands, even as we stood before the altar of God.
'She died broken-hearted. It is forty years come Michaelmas, but the wound is fresh; and I yet need to go to the Physician of Souls for healing.