William, with the young blood still in him, gaining to himself by force
of will chief power upon the mainland, was already spreading his wings
like a young falcon for another more terrible flight. And lately
Maugher, his uncle, and his bitterest foe though out of his own
household, he had banished, archbishop though he was, from Rouen, to our
small Isle of Guernsey, where there was scarce footing for the tread of
so great and dark a schemer in high matters. And already the Conqueror
had himself appeared at Edward's Court in England, and prepared his way
thither.

I was near sixteen years old, and I stood tall for my years, some five
foot and a half, and for a lad I was well made, if yet lacking my full
strength and girth round the chest, such a lad as in two years more
Geoffrey my grandson will grow to, if God will. Fair I should have been
if I were not burnt black with the hot sun pouring through the salt air,
and my fair hair clustered crisp and neat round my temples and neck. So
stood I, no doubt a fair and honourable youth, at the entering in of the
abbot's inner chamber.

And the abbot, sitting in his carven chair amid his rolls of parchment
and instruments of writing, raised me swiftly as I stooped to kiss his
hand. Dark-eyed, hawk-nosed, with black hair not yet flecked with snow,
there was an awe and stateliness in him whether he spoke to gentle or to
simple. He was a Norman, and being such feared none, and had his will,
and when it was possible mixed a rare gentleness with his acts and
words.

"Son," said he, "thou hast been happy here?"

The keen eyes were fixed upon me, and I could not but answer the truth,