CHAPTER V
Not on a May but on a June morning—five days in fact after his supper at the house of Morgen Fay—Master Thomas Bettany found himself some miles up the Wander, and with him, riding the gray mare, a bale of sample cloths strapped to saddle, John Cobb the apprentice, with whom, when he did not think to be stiff, he was upon the best of terms. He was up the Wander upon business for his father, that rich merchant who would one day leave him house and gear and trade. Then would he himself, Thomas Bettany, be Middle Forest merchant,—who wanted only to sail for the New World that one Columbus had recently discovered!
He rode absorbed in discontent. Finally he again took up speech with John Cobb.
“It’s a dull life! I wish something would happen—anything!”
“There be the miracles.”
“I haven’t any hand in them. You can’t be interested unless you’re doing something yourself.—I’d rather be a robber than just trotting from shop and trotting back again.—Hist, John! What’s behind yon tree?”
“Where?”
“There! A big, black man! Two—four, five! Draw your weapon, man!”