Here Wolsey, impelled by extreme hunger, approached the little worm-eaten table, and took up the morsel of dry bread left from his repast the evening before.
Just as he was raising it to his mouth a man entered, dressed in the most scrupulous manner, and enveloped in an ample cloak of the finest material.
Wolsey was startled, and gazed at him in astonishment.
“What! Arundel,” he exclaimed at last, “what could have brought you to this place?”
“Yourself,” replied Arundel, in a frank, abrupt manner. “You have lost everything, and have never informed me by a word! Do you think, then, I have forgotten all you have done for me?”
“The favors I have conferred on you were so slight,” replied Wolsey, “that it would have been natural you should have no longer remembered them, especially since many who owe their wealth, and perhaps their lives, to me have so completely forgotten it.”
“I have never learned how to flatter nor to wear velvet gloves,” replied Arundel; “but I am still more ignorant of the art of forgetting past favors. No, it has never been my custom to act thus; and you have offended me more than you imagine by proving you believed me capable of such baseness.”
As he said this, Arundel took from his bosom an immense purse of red satin, filled with gold, and laid it on the dilapidated table beside a package of clothing which he had thoughtfully added to his gift.
“There are no acknowledgments to be made,” he remarked; “it is essential first of all that you be made comfortable. You can return this when it suits your convenience. Now let us say no more about it.”
“Alas!” cried Wolsey, “are you not aware, then, that I may never be able to return it? They will divide my ecclesiastical benefices among them. The Duke of Norfolk and the Earl of Wiltshire have already been put in possession of the revenue from my bishopric of Winchester. This is the only food I have had since I came here,” he added, showing him the bread he still held in his hand.