"I should think so," the girl said. "This will be nothing to it. Then you would have been going out of our lives; now we shall have an interest in all you do, and you will often be coming back to us; there will be that to look forward to. Well, you won't hear me say another word of grumbling until you have gone. And when are you to go?" "To-morrow or next day," her father said. "Mynheer Van Voorden says, 'I am about to start,' which may mean three days or six. It will need a whole day for your mother and the maids to see to Albert's clothes, and that all is decent and in order. To-day is Monday, and I think that if we say that Albert will arrive there on Thursday by noon it will do very well. Will you be ready by that time, Edgar?" "Easily enough, Sir Ralph; for, indeed, as we have no maid, my clothes need but little preparation. I wear them until they are worn out, and then get new ones; and I doubt not that I shall be able to replenish my wardrobe to-morrow at Dartford." Well pleased to find that Albert was to accompany him, Edgar rode home. As he passed in at the gates, Hal Carter ran up to him. "Master tells me that you are going away, Master Edgar. Are you going to take me with you?" "Not this time, Hal. I am going to Flanders as a guest of a Flemish gentleman, and I could not therefore take a man-at-arms with me; besides, as you know naught of the language, you would be altogether useless there. But do not think that I shall not fulfil my promise. This is but a short absence, and when I return I shall enter the train of some warlike knight or other, and then you shall go with me, never fear." "Thank you, sir. 'Tis strange to me to be pent up here; not that I have aught in the world to complain of; your father is most kind to me, and I do hope that I am of some use to him." "Yes, my father has told me several times how useful you were to him in washing out his apparatus and cleaning his crucibles and getting his fires going in readiness. He wonders now how he got on so long without a helper, and will be sorry when the time comes for you to go with me. Indeed he said, but two days ago, that when you went he should certainly look for someone to fill your place." "So long as he feels that, Master Edgar, I shall be willing enough to stay, but it seemed to me that I was doing but small service in return for meat and drink and shelter. I should feel that I was getting fat and lazy, were it not that I swing a battle-axe every day for an hour, as you bade me."