Page:Stories from Old English Poetry-1899.djvu/131

Rh entrance to you. It is a fellow in a scarlet coat, and wonderful fine otherwise. He declares that he is from Oxford, and will have speech with you. And although I said nobody could enter, he will come in, whether I will or no. At which I, fearing he might be the Evil One himself, took to my heels to tell thee about him.”

“Let him come in,” answered the friar, roused by the servant’s long speech from his deep abstraction. ‘It is Clement, the cardinal, the Pope’s legate to England. Stay, Miles, throw a cloth over the pile of manuscripts yonder. Pull out that curtain straight. Now give me the book of the Gospels. It is enough. Show the cardinal hither.”’

A moment later, and the Cardinal Clement, himself the next successor to the papal throne, entered the apartment.

“Well, friar, at last we have found your secret hiding-place. It is no easy journey hither, and the road is as hard and narrow as that which leads to Paradise.”

“I am sorry for the trouble your lordship took in coming, and should have been happy if it might have been spared you.”

“Which means, so I take it, good friar, that you are not glad at my coming. But, believe me, I come with no evil intent, nor for