Every week, on a Friday, Mistress Tomlinson rode over on the old white horse to Arncastor to buy necessaries for the house. Master Tomlinson never went with her, nor did she take the boy. Her husband's work was to lounge beside the door and wait for travellers, be polite to them if it seemed worth while, protesting he was all for the King to the Cavaliers, and all for the Parliament to the Puritans. He would carry the dishes and wait upon the officers, and drink, at their expense, confusion to the King to-day and to his enemies to-morrow. The boy's duties were manifold: to rise at four, to go to his bed--a heap of straw--when Master Tomlinson had done with him, to make the fire and sweep the kitchens, to feed the pigs and clean the stables, to carry wood and wash the dishes, to hold and water tired horses, to draw the ale and wait on the common soldiers and low-class travellers, to turn the spits and dodge the blows, to bear burdens and get kicks and buffets, to eat his food where and when it could be found, to hear foul language, to see all things ugly and unpleasant, and to be always alert, always ready to obey. This was the business of the boy at the Seven Thorns, under the stick of the host, and the open hand of Dame Joan, and the promiscuous compliments of everybody else--a belt to-day from the trooper whose ale did not suit him, a switch to-morrow from the Cavalier whose stirrup he forgot to hold, the flat of an irritable officer's sword or a boot at his head from another, the shrill recriminations of some woman on whose dress he had spilled, or long exhortations from some Puritan preacher. Always ill-clothed, badly shod, in the bitterest weather, with work always to be done, and eyes swollen with crying, with bruises and wheals generally fresh and aching somewhere, Dick Chester served for six months as the boy of the inn. Master Purvis never came. There was nothing else to hope for. The Cavaliers were his constant dread, lest, recognizing him, they should hale him back to exhibit him as a liar, and disgrace him. His spirit was broken. Had he thought of flight, whither could he fly? He had neither friend nor hope anywhere in the world. Giles was dead, or he would not have deserted him and covered him with dishonour. He was an outcast, one who lived under a ban. He never asked for pity after the first month, or looked for any mercy; Master Tomlinson cured him of that. If he ever dreamed of escaping he was checked by that fear of detection, for, child-like, he never thought that the world would have forgotten him completely in a week. Surely the Cavaliers all knew of him! He turned pale and trembled under their indifferent glances, for might not one of them recognize him, as the gentleman on the road had done? And he might not be suddenly turned to mercy, as that one had been, and then--!