"My boy," said the pilgrim earnestly, "there are always folk who want the best. There are always men who will make only the best, and when the two come together----" He clapped his hollowed palms like a pair of cymbals. "Would you like to make a dish as blue as the sea, with figures of the saints in gold work and jewel-work--a gold cup garlanded in flowers all done in their own color,--a shrine threefold, framing pictures of the saints and studded with orfrey-work of gold and gems, yet so beautiful in the mere work that no one would think of the jewels? Would you?" "Would I!" said Guy with a deep quick breath. "Our jewelers of Limoges make all these, and when kings and their armies come from the Crusades they buy of us thank-offerings,--candlesticks, altar-screens, caskets, chalices, gold and silver and enamel-work of every kind. We sit at the cross-roads of Christendom. The jewels come to us from the mines of East and West. Men come to us with full purses and glad hearts, desiring to give to the Church costly gifts of their treasure, and our best work is none too good for their desire. But here we are at Saint Paul's. I shall see you again, for I have business on the Chepe." Guy headed for home as eagerly as a marmot in harvest time, threading his way through the crowds of the narrow streets without seeing them. He could not imagine who the stranger might be. It was dinner time, and he had to go to the cook-shop and bring home the roast, for families who could afford it patronized the cook-shops on the Thames instead of roasting and baking at home in the narrow quarters of the shops. In the great houses, with their army of servants and roomy kitchens, it was different; and the very poor did what they could, as they do everywhere; but when the wife and daughters of the shopkeeper served in the shop, or worked at embroidery, needle-craft, weaving, or any light work of the trade that they could do, it was an economy to have the cooking done out of the house. When the shadows were growing long and the narrow pavement of Goldsmith's Row was quite dark, someone wearing a gray robe and a broad hat came along the street, slowly, glancing into each shop as he passed. To Guy's amazement, old Gamelyn got to his feet and came forward. "Is it--is it thou indeed, master?" he said, bowing again and again. The pilgrim smiled. "A fine shop you have here," he said, "and a fine young bird in training for the sign of the Gold Finch. He and I scraped acquaintance this morning. Is he the youth of whom you told me when we met at Canterbury?" It was hard on Guy that just at that moment his aunt Joan called him to get some water from the well, but he went, all bursting with eagerness as he was. The pilgrim stayed to supper, and in course of time Guy found out what he had come for.