"Do you mean little Master Ranulph Chanticleer and Luke Hempen? Why, of course I saw them! It was they who told me to come along here ... and very grateful I am to them, for I have found something well worth looking at."
A look of indescribable relief flitted over Hazel's face.
"Oh ... oh! I'm so glad you saw them," she faltered.
"Aha! My friend Luke has evidently been making good use of his time—the young dog!" thought Master Nathaniel; and he proceeded to retail a great many imaginary sayings and doings of Luke at his new abode.
Hazel was soon quite at home with the jovial, facetious old cheesemonger. She always preferred elderly men to young ones, and was soon chatting away with the abandon sometimes observable when naturally confiding people, whom circumstances have made suspicious, find someone whom they think they can trust; and Master Nathaniel was, of course, drinking in every word and longing to be in her shoes.
"But, missy, it seems all work and no play!" he cried at last. "Do you get no frolics and junketings?"
"Sometimes we dance of an evening, when old Portunus is here," she answered.
"Portunus?" he cried sharply, "Who's he?"
But this question froze her back into reserve. "An old weaver with a fiddle," she answered stiffly.
"A bit doited?"