“Sir Kit?” queried the youth, taking off a hat, still adorned with a broken feather, and bowing with a grace which was evidently a recent acquirement, for it savored of a contact with people far removed from a service in which he must have acquired his rough field boots.
“‘Sir,’ if so you will have it, but ‘Kit’ without doubt,” answered the man addressed, smiling at the youth’s appearance, and at the same time taking an interest in the jolly face of its owner. The latter feeling caused him to inquire:
“Hast thou any matter of concern to communicate to me?”
“You do not recognize me,” returned the stranger, as though the matter of his identity was first necessary to be established.
The gentleman studied the other for a moment, and then said:
“I have seen thy face before, but can not place thee. Where was it and who are you?”
“You saw me in Deptford, and my name is Tabbard. I come now from Sayes Court, where I have lately entered into better service than that of an attendant upon gentle folk in a wayside inn. The duke took a fancy to me.”
“And gave you a new doublet, and his old hat, eh?”
“True,” said Tabbard, “and the promise of long service, good wages and promotion.”
“Your star is in the ascendant,” laughed the other, and then added, “but what do you want to tell me?”