Chapter IV. Of the Love of Gerard’s Sons and of Jacobus for Birdalone

Now dwelt Birdalone in rest and peace when she had been taken into the guild along with her mother, and they had taken the due apprentices to them; and they began to gather much of goods to them, for of fine broidery there was little done in the Five Crafts, and none at all that could be put beside their work, either for beauty of the draught of it, or for skill of handiwork. She declared unto all folk how that the poor-wife (who had to name Audrey) was her very mother, from whom she had been stolen in her youngest days; but she told none any tale of how she was stolen. And the twain dwelt together in the greatest loving-kindness; and it was with Audrey as she had forecast, that now her days were happy, and she living in all ease and content, that the goodliness of her youth came back to her, and she became a fair woman as for her years; and therewith it grew to be clear that the two were so much alike one to the other, that all might see that they were mother and daughter.

Gerard and his two sons she maintained yet as her men; and not only were they of much use to her in fetching and carrying, but also true it is that her beauty was so manifest, that she whiles needed a stout lad weaponed at her back when she was in the streets or amidst the throng of the market; and many were they, and whiles of the highest, who craved love of her, some with honour, and some with lack of it.

Of these, forsooth, were but two that anywise troubled her; and the most trouble was this, that she might not fail to see that the love of her had entered into the hearts of the two Gerardsons, Robert and Giles; so that times were when she deemed she must even send them away, but when it came to the point she had not the heart thereto; though none other remedy there seemed, so sorely as their souls were wounded by longing for her. It is not to be said that they ever spake to her thereof, or wittingly wearied her with signs of love; but they could not so easily cover it up but that it was ever before her eyes. But she suffered it all for friendship’s sake and for their true service, and in all friendliness did what she might to solace their grief. Forsooth so good and true she found that father-kind, and the young men so goodly and kind, that she said to herself, had she not another man lying in her heart, she might well have chosen one of those twain for her very speech-friend and true lover.

The second wooer that troubled her was the master, Jacobus, who, when but three months were worn of her dwelling in her house, did all openly crave her love and offer her marriage, he being a man unwedded. Sore was her heart that she must needs gainsay him, so kind and courteous as he had been to her at their first coming together; though this indeed is sooth, that straightway, so soon as he saw her, he fell into the captivity of her love. Howsoever, gainsay him she needs must, and he took the naysay so hardly that he was scarce like a man before her, and wept and prayed and lamented many times over, till ............