ad belt, which
looked interesting.
'May we see?' said Una, coming forward.
'Surely--sure-ly!' he said, moving up on the window-seat, and returned
to his work with a silver-pointed pencil. Puck sat as though the grin
were fixed for ever on his broad face, while they watched the quick,
certain fingers that copied it. Presently the man took a reed pen from
his satchel, and trimmed it with a little ivory knife, carved in the
semblance of a fish.
'Oh, what a beauty!' cried Dan.
''Ware fingers! That blade is perilous sharp. I made it myself of the
best Low Country cross-bow steel. And so, too, this fish. When his
back-fin travels to his tail--so--he swallows up the blade, even as the
whale swallowed Gaffer Jonah ... Yes, and that's my ink-horn. I made the
four silver saints round it. Press Barnabas's head. It opens, and
then----' He dipped the trimmed pen, and with careful boldness began to
put in the essential lines of Puck's rugged face, that had been but
faintly revealed by the silver-point.
The children gasped, for it fairly leaped from the page.
As he worked, and the rain fell on the tiles, he talked--now clearly,
now muttering, now breaking off to frown or smile at his work. He told
them he was born at Little Lindens Farm, and his father used to beat him
for drawing things instead of doing things, till an old priest called
Father Roger, who drew illuminated letters in rich people's books,
coaxed the parents to let him take the boy as a sort of painter's
apprentice. Then he went with Father Roger to Oxford, where he cleaned
plates and carried cloaks and shoes for the scholars of a College called
Merton.
'Didn't you hate that?' said Dan after a great many other questions.
'I never thought on't. Half Oxford was building new colleges or
beautifying the old, and she had called to her aid the master-craftsmen
of all Christendie--kings in their trade and honoured of Kings. I knew
them. I worked for them: that was enough. No wonder----' He stopped and
laughed.
'You became a great man, Hal,' said Puck.
'They said so, Robin. Even Bramante said so.'
'Why? What did you do?' Dan asked.
The artist looked at him queerly. 'Things in stone and such, up and down
England. You would not have heard of 'em. To come nearer home, I
rebuilded this little St Barnabas' church of ours. It cost me more
trouble and sorrow than aught I've touched in my life. But 'twas a sound
lesson.'
'Um,' said Dan. 'We've had lessons
|