“It was there I first saw thee,” she said, “and my mother pointed thee out, and said thou wast as strong as Edulf.”
“Who was Edulf?” asked Hugh of Wat, under his breath.
“The strongest man that ever lived. He came to Exeter in a rage, and broke the iron gate with his two hands,” expounded Wat, stuffing a large piece of pasty into his mouth.
“The strongest man that ever lived was Samson,” said Hugh, dogmatically.
“Samson! Nobody ever heard of him, and I tell thee Edulf was the strongest.”
The quarrel might have grown, but that Franklyn growled at them to hush their unmannerly prating; and Joan announced in her clear, decided voice that Agrippa should have his special Twelfth-night spice-cake. For in spite of her mother’s loud remonstrances, the monkey had been taken into Joan’s heart of hearts, and, it was certain, was secure from any sentence of banishment.
Franklyn had been a good deal shocked by Hugh’s flight and illness, but, as was natural, the impression passed away as the little apprentice regained his health, and Elyas saw that he was not inclined to change his treatment. For the reasons already given, the master had no thought of interfering, it was for the boy now to prove what stuff he had in him. It was a sort of ordeal through which he had to pass; an ordeal which might develop patience, resolution, and the humility of a true artist, and though Gervase told himself that he would be on the watch, ready with words of encouragement when they were needed, he held back from more. Hugh had the same rough, uninteresting work to toil upon—indeed the stone had been set aside for his return; the same careful explanations of how to handle his tools and make his strokes, which he took to be a reflection on his father’s teaching; the same lack of praise. But now he brought to it a more cheerful spirit, hope was astir; he felt sure that the master was watching his efforts, and that it rested with himself and his own perseverance to make his way. It was not easy. Often he grew hot and angry; often he was tempted into careless work; but he would not give up trying, and upon the whole held on very fairly.
Then, in spite of his awkwardnesses and a dense stupidity about his work, Wat was a good-natured companion, ready to take any trouble and to carry any blame. He had been so often told by Franklyn that he would never rise to more than a mason, that he had grown to accept the verdict against which Hugh was always trying to make him rebel.
“He knows best,” he would say, hammering loosely at the stone.
“What an oaf thou art, Wat! It all rests with thyself. Franklyn should never make me a mason.”