By the light of a couple of candles in silver sconces John Gore amused himself in my lord’s bedroom, with the boy Sparkin to act as a self-constituted judge of fashions. Mr. Richards, who had accompanied them, indulged in a few polite and irrelevant directions, and then departed, as though he found the boy’s company incompatible with his own. Every corner of the bedroom soon had its selection of satins, camlets, and cloths, for Sparkin appeared possessed by an exuberant desire to see and handle everything.
My lord’s wardrobe was the wardrobe of a gentleman who had a fancy for every color and for every combination of shades. His stockings were to be numbered by the dozen, and Sparkin, half hidden in a chest, baled the stuffs out as though he were baling water out of a boat.
“Easy, there, you young hound. What manner of tangle do you think you are making?”
The boy turned a hot and happy face to him.
“Take your choice, captain. What would some of the Greenwich girls give for a picking! How does crushed strawberry please you?”
John Gore was standing in front of a mirror trying on a coat.
“That’s a sweet thing, captain. Just look at the lace. Here’s a chest we haven’t opened yet.”
“Leave it alone, then. You have tumbled enough shirts to give Tom Richards work for a week.”
Sparkin had been fumbling with the keys. He found the right one as John Gore spoke, and lifted the chest’s lid as though there was no disobedience in looking.
“What have you got there?”