Martin laughed and then grew grave again.
“Maybe he comes who will teach thee both, and yet I would fain find thee a kinder master. Well, well, lad, get thee to St Alban’s an it be possible; thou art best in a cloister, methinks, for all thy wise Prior Stephen may say.”
And he went off singing—
“Three felons hung from a roadside tree,
One black and one white and one grey;
And the ravens plucked their eyes away
From one and two and three,
That honest men might see
And thievish knaves should pay;
Lest these might be
As blind as they.
Ah, well-a-day, well-a-day!
One—two—three! On the gallows-tree hung they.”
Hilarius listened with a smile until the last notes of Martin’s voice had died away, and then fell a-musing of hunger and love, the dancer and the Prior.
Suddenly, as if his thought had taken speech, he heard a voice say:
“I hunger, I hunger, feed me most sweet Manna, for I hunger—I hunger, and I love.”
He sprang to his feet, but there was no one in sight. Again the shrill quavering voice called:
“Love of God, I hunger, Love of God, I die. Blessed Peter, pray for me! Blessed Michael, defend me!”
Hilarius knew now; it was the Ankret, that holy man who for sixty years had fasted and prayed in his living tomb at the corner of the cloister. He was held a saint above all the ankrets before him, and wondrous wise; the King himself had sought his counsel, and the Convent held him in high esteem.