The Forest Lovers

"Entra per me," he read. "Enter I will," said Prosper, "and by

you. This device," he went on, as he fitted the cuisses, "this

device is not very worthy of Dom Galors. It speaks of hurry. It

speaks, even, of precipitation, for if he must needs wear my harness,

at least he might have carried his own. Galors was flurried. If he was

flurried he must have had news. If, having news, he took my arms, it

must have been news of Isoult. He intended to deceive her by passing

for me. Good; I will deceive his allies by passing for himself. But

first I must find Spiridion."

He had too much respect for his enemy, as you will observe if I have

made anything of Galors. Galors was no refiner, not subtle; he was

direct. When he had to think he held his tongue, so that you should

believe him profound. When he got a thought he made haste to act upon

it, because it really embarrassed him. None of Prosper's imaginings

were correct. If the monk had been capable of harbouring two thoughts

at a time, there would not have been a shred of mail in the room.

That sodden thing lipped by the restless water was Spiridion. He lay

on his back, thinner and more peaked than ever in life; his yellow

hair made him an aureole. He looked like some martyred ascetic, with

his tightened smile and the gash half-way through his neck.

Prosper leaned upon his punt-pole looking sorrowfully at him.

"Alas, my brother," he said half whimsically, "do you smile? Even so I

think God should smile that He had let such a thing be made. And if,

as I believe, you know the truth at last, that is why you also smile.

But shut your eyes, my brother," he added, stooping to do the office,

"shut your eyes, for you wore them thin with searching and now can see

without them. Let them rest."

Very tenderly he pulled him out of the water, very reverently took

him to land. He buried him before his own gates, and over him set the

crucifix, which in the end he had found grace to see. He was too good

a Christian not to pray over the grave, and not sufficient of a hero

to be frank about his tears. At the end of all this business he found

his horse. Then he rode off at a canter for Hauterive.

* * * * * It is one thing to kindle military fires in the breast of a High

Bailiff, quite another to bid them out. Prosper had overstepped his

authority. The High Bailiff of Wanmeeting held himself in check for

the better part of a week after his generalissimo's departure; at the

end of five days he could endure it no more. His harness clamoured,

his sword tarnished for blood; he had fifteen hundred men in steel.

That would mean fifteen hundred and one tarnishing blades, and the

unvoiced reproaches of fifteen hundred and one suits of mail. In a

word, the High Bailiff itched to try a fall with the redoubtable

Galors de Born.