The Forest Lovers

"Take it to Galors, Isoult, whom we must consider as our guest," he

whispered.

She turned at once and went dutifully, with recollected feet and bosom

girt in meekness, to give him the cold water cupped in her palms.

Galors drank greedily, and grunted his thanks. As for Prosper, he

praised men and angels for a fair vision.

She came back after another journey to feed her lover, and afterwards

stood as near to him as she dared. Galors, the alien, looked ever at

the ground.

"Galors," said Prosper presently, "how do you find my harness?"

"It has served me its turn," he answered.

"That also I can say of yours," replied Prosper, with a little laugh;

"for it has taken me into places where, without it, I should have

found a strait gate in. For that I can thank you more than for the

head-ache and cold bath at Goltres."

"Ha!" said the other, "that was a sheer knock. I thought it had

finished you, to be plain. But do not lay it to my door. I fight truer

than that."

"Truly enough you have fought me this night," Prosper allowed

heartily, "and I ask no better. But will you now tell me one thing

about which I have been curious ever since our encounter in this place

a year ago?"

"What is it?"

"Your arms--the blazon--do you bear them as of right?"

"I bear them by the right a fighter has. They have carried me far, and

done my work."

"They are not of your family?"

"My family? Messire, you should know that a monk carries no arms. My

family, moreover, was not knightly, till I made it knightly."

"The arms you assumed with your new profession?"

"I did."

"May I know whence you took them?"

"No, I cannot tell you that. They are the arms of a man now dead,

Salomon de Montguichet"

"They are the arms," said Prosper slowly, "of a man now dead. I saw

him dead, and helped to bury him. I knew not then how he died, though

I have thought to be sure since. But you are wrong in one thing. The

bearer of those arms was not Salomon de Montguichet."

"It is you who are wrong, Messire. It is beyond doubt; and the proof

is that on the shield are the guichets, taken from the name."

"Galors, the name was taken from the guichets, and the

guichets from Coldscaur in the north. The man's name was

Salomon de Born."

Galors gave a dry sob, and another, and another. He threw up his arms,

twisting with the gesture of a man on the rope. Prosper and Isoult

rose also, Prosper pale and hard, the girl wide-eyed. Galors seemed to

tear at himself, as if at war with a fiend inside him. Prosper stepped

forward; you would not have known his voice.