Thus William got his thirty crowns upon his bond, but upon such hard conditions were they lent that within six months (since employment still remained scarce) he began woefully to perceive that presently the Twelve Apostles would enter upon his house and shop, and confiscate the very tools wherewith he earned his bread and meat, so that in the future he might look not only for an empty purse but also for an empty belly. Without doubt this would have come to pass, had not old Abbot Absalom at this time taken it into his head to glorify the Blessed Mother of God by enlarging and beautifying the Abbey Church. This enterprise he conceived in no mean spirit, extending the nave forty feet or more, and the aisles in proportion, and ornamenting the whole church, both old and new, with many choice sculptures, wherein he made much use of William, both for his excellent advice and his skill with his hands. For which work William received many rich and generous gifts from the Abbot, and with these he was able at length to redeem his bond from the usurers, although only at three times the price he had received for it. Whereat he cursed Master Matthew and his friends right shrewdly, so that it made people rejoice to hear him, and he swore that he would yet be avenged upon the whole pack of them. Yea, he said he would fain be a Devil in Hell, if only for the pleasure of tormenting Master Matthew in the Lake of Fire. II When Abbot Absalom was on his way from Rome, from seeing our Father the Pope, he had been shown in a certain place in France a church porch of such exquisite proportions and workmanship as filled him with admiration. When, therefore, he enlarged the Abbey Church, he determined to build the great West door in a similar fashion, and while the work was yet in hand he sent for William and asked him to carve some religious figures for ornament upon the upper projection of the porch. William gladly agreed to do all that he wished, and hied him joyfully home and set straightway to work. He laboured diligently and without remission for very many weeks, and with such secrecy, covering up and removing each piece of sculpture as he finished it, as folk had never seen in him before, so that no one knew what subjects he had chosen to illustrate in his work. A few days before Easter Sunday, together with his men Abel and Geoffrey, he took the great stones he had carved, all swathed in old cloths so that none should see them, and fitted them in their places upon the porch, giving out to all that his work should be seen for the first time fully unveiled on Easter Sunday.