He noticed presently that Christopher was eyeing him, and put his hand in friendly fashion on the young man’s knee.
“Yes,” he said, smiling, “yours is ready too. Dom Franklin looked it out to-day, and asked me whether it would be the right size. But of the boots I am not so sure.”
There was a clink and a footstep outside, and the monk glanced out.
“Supper is here,” he said, and stood up to look at the table—the polished clothless top laid ready with a couple of wooden plates and knives, a pewter tankard, salt-cellar and bread. There was a plain chair with arms drawn up to it. The rest of the room, which Christopher had scarcely noticed before, was furnished plainly and efficiently, and had just that touch of ornament that was intended to distinguish it from a cell. The floor was strewn with clean rushes; a couple of iron candlesticks stood on the mantelpiece, and the white walls had one or two religious objects hanging on them—a wooden crucifix opposite the table, a framed card bearing an “Image of Pity” with an indulgenced prayer illuminated beneath, a little statue of St. Pancras on a bracket over the fire, and a clear-written copy of rules for guests hung by the low oak door.
Dom Anthony nodded approvingly at the table, took up a knife and rubbed it delicately on the napkin, and turned round.
“We will look here,” he said, and went towards the second door by the fire. Christopher followed him, and found himself in the bedroom, furnished with the same simplicity as the other; but with an iron bedstead in the corner, a kneeling stool beside it, with a little French silver image of St. Mary over it, and a sprig of dried yew tucked in behind. A thin leather-bound copy of the Little Office of Our Lady lay on the sloping desk, with another book or two on the upper slab. Dom Anthony went to the window and threw that open too.
“Your luggage is unpacked, I see,” he said, nodding to the press beside which lay the two trunks, emptied now by Mr. Morris’s careful hands.
“There are some hares, too,” said Christopher. “Ralph has sent them to my Lord Prior.”
“The porter has them,” said the monk, “they look strangely like a bribe.” And he nodded again with a beaming face, and his eyes grew little and bright at his own humour.
He examined the bed before he left the room again, turned back the sheets and pressed them down, and the straw rustled drily beneath; glanced into the sweating earthenware jug, refolded the coarse towel on its wooden peg, and then smiled again at the young man.