“Landlord, bring us some mulled sack,” said one who appeared to be their leader, “and tell us, have you seen that fox the Abbot of Glastonbury pass this way to-day on his road home?” “He has not yet returned from London?” “Nay, but he is on his way,--we have no listening ears have we?” The boys were separated by a partition. “Are you for Abbot or King?” “I am a friend to the King.” “Well said, so should every good Englishman be; and we have charge to arrest this wily Abbot on his return, as a foe to King Harry, and take him to Wells to be tried for his life.” “Has he not been tried and acquitted?” “He has been solemnly condemned in a Court where Thomas Cromwell sat as prosecutor, jury and judge: but that is not quite the law, so he has been dismissed home, and we have been sent by an after thought to take him to Wells for a _regular trial_.”[16] “On what charge?” “Robbing the Abbey Church.” “Good heavens!” “Why, I thought thee a friend of the King.” “So I am, but what can all this mean?” “That he hid the Abbey plate, so that the King’s visitors could not find it, when they wanted to make an inventory, and confiscate patens and chalices for the King’s use.” “But it was his own.” “Only in trust, you see.” “Still he might hide it in trust for the Abbey, that would not be robbery.” “Friend, I should advise thee to _consider_ it robbery in these days; it is better for all men who do not want their necks stretched to think as the King and his minister, Thomas Cromwell, think; don’t fear but we shall find men to bring him in guilty.” The poor inn-keeper was silent; perhaps he remembered that one of his predecessors had been hanged for saying he would make his son heir to the “Crown,” meaning the “Crown Inn.” The boys stole out unobserved. “What shall we do?” “Go and meet the Abbot and warn him, he will pass Headly Cross.” “But then we may but share his fate,” said several. “I shall go if I go alone,” said Cuthbert. “And so shall I,” said Gregory Bell. “Well, two are as good as the lot of us, and better; more likely to pass unobserved,” said Adam Banister; “the rest of us had better get home, and tell the monks all we have heard and seen.” * * * * * It was a wild place, Headly Cross, where two woodland roads crossed each other. Report said that a cruel murder had been committed there years agone, and that the place was haunted; every one believed in haunted places then. But as there was a choice of routes, and the Abbot might come _either_ way, it was the right thing to await him where the roads converged. And there Cuthbert and Gregory waited all alone, as the dark hours rolled away, until they heard the “Angelus” ring from a distant tower, and knew it was nine o’clock, when decent people, in those days, went to bed.