"What am I to do?" "What doth any with love? Take it—enjoy it—return it—do thy little best for Him that giveth it." "But serve him, _how_?" It sounded to Lawrence like telling a serf child lying in the mire to rise and offer the golden cup to a king. Would the great nobles around the throne ever permit him to approach it? A dim idea pervaded his brain that Father Robesart, as a priest, could give him a passport through the ranks of the angels. But the answer brought him back to earth again. "My son, thou servest God when thou servest any whom God loveth." "Doth God love my Lord? I suppose He will, being thus noble." "’Not many noble are called,’" said Mr. Robesart, speaking rather to himself than to Lawrence. "Yet ’I will be a God to thee, and to thy seed after thee.’ Aye, little Lawrence, I cannot doubt it. God teach thee, poor child, better than I can! Remember, my son, that thou servest not God in following thy little Lord into sin and mischief. Thou wilt serve God by keeping him out thereof." "My Lord bade me so keep him—my Lord of March, I would say, not he of Arundel. I misdoubt if he care." "Poor children!" repeated the priest sorrowfully. "Tell me, Lawrence, what would thy little Lord with the Bible?" "Was it wrong to get that, Father?" "Assuredly it was wrong to steal the key." "O Father, we never stole it! We only took it when Sir Gerard left it behind him." Mr. Robesart smiled and shook his head. "Ye stole it, my son. What is it but stealing to take a thing which he that ought[#] it would not yield unto you? But what wanted my Lord with the book?" [#] Owned. "Please, Father, he desired much to read the same, and my old Lady his grandmother had bidden him so to do. And he heard—leastwise I heard, and he asked at me—my Lord of Arundel once to say that he would not have him lay finger thereon; so he was set on it." Another very pitying smile parted the lips of Mr. Robesart. "I marvel whether the bidding or the forbidding were the more tempting bait! Poor little child!" "Please, Father——" "Speak thy will, my son." "Will my Lord get well again?" "I trust, if it be our Lord’s pleasure, he shall do well, my son." "Oh, I am so glad!" And Lawrence’s sparkling eyes by no means belied his words. "Dost thou love thy little Lord, Lawrence?" "Aye, Father—so much! Please, there never was any body else but him and Beattie." Lawrence was very near adding, "and you." A feeling of reverence restrained him, but he might have done it safely. "Who is Beattie?" "Blumond’s Beattie—at the fishmonger’s at Usk." "Oh! I know. A good child." "May I love Beattie, please, Father?" "Thou mayest love who so thou wilt, and as much as ever thou wilt, so long as thou lovest our Lord first and most." "Whoever I will?" "Certainly. Who dost thou think too great to be loved?" "Not great, exactly; but—Father Robesart, might I love you? I never thought I dare, before."