He rang the bell and called in the abbot's confessor.
Father Anselmo was a gaunt, severe man, of more than the average height, with black hair streaked with grey, and fixed and stony eyes. With him there appeared a younger and more jovial monk, with small eyes that perpetually twinkled, and a smile that seemed to catch itself up as with a click each time that the stern gaze of Father Anselmo turned his way. This monk was evidently only a novice, or a lay brother on his probation, for he wore the lesser habit and carried in his hand a great bunch of keys, which he tinkled freely, as if in that silent place he took a certain pleasure in the sound.
Father Anselmo gazed with severe disapproval upon the rich appointments of the abbot's table, and austerely refused for himself and his companion any refreshment beyond a glass of cold water.
But on the other hand the eyes of the keybearer perused with evident longing every salver and decanter. Whereupon the wild Scot, being restrained by no scruples, religious or otherwise, passed him first of all a glass of wine behind his superior's back, which he drank at a gulp without a sound, his eyes all the while on the lean rounded shoulders of the father confessor.
A full bottle of wine followed and was instantly concealed beneath the novice's long robe. A plate of grapes, half a dozen pears, a loaf of wheaten bread, all were passed to him one by one, and as swiftly and silently disappeared, none being bold enough to guess whither.
"By the Lord, I'll try him with a whole melon," muttered Rollo; "I believe that, swollen as he is, he could stow away a keg of butter quite comfortably."
But before he could put this jovial son of Peter the keybearer to the test, Father Anselmo had gathered his robes ascetically about him, and signed to the abbot's guests to follow him to the reliquary chamber.