Page:A C Doyle - The White Company.djvu/112

86 thoughtful forehead and eyes which shone brightly from under his fierce and overhung brows. His beard, streaked thickly with grey, bristled forward from his chin, and spoke of a passionate nature, while the long finely-cut face and firm mouth marked the leader of men. His figure was erect and soldierly, and he rode his horse with the careless grace of a man whose life had been spent in the saddle. In common garb, his masterful face and flashing eye would have marked him as one who was born to rule; but now, with his silken tunic powdered with golden fleurs-de-lis, his velvet mantle lined with the royal minever, and the lions of England stamped in silver upon his harness, none could fail to recognise the noble Edward, most warlike and powerful of all the long line of fighting monarchs who had ruled the Anglo-Norman race. Alleyne doffed hat and bowed head at the sight of him, but the serf folded his hands and leaned them upon his cudgel, looking with little love at the knot of nobles and knights-in-waiting who rode behind the king.

'Ha!' cried Edward, reining up for an instant his powerful black steed, 'Le cerf est passé? Non? Ici, Brocas; tu parles Anglais.'

'The deer, clowns?' said a hard-visaged, swarthy-faced man, who rode at the king's elbow. 'If ye have headed it back, it is as much as your ears are worth.'

'It passed by the blighted beech there,' said Alleyne, pointing, 'and the hounds were hard at its heels.'

'It is well,' cried Edward, still speaking in French: for, though he could understand English, he had never learned to express himself in so barbarous and unpolished a tongue. 'By my faith, sirs,' he continued, half turning in his saddle to address his escort, 'unless my woodcraft is sadly at fault, it is a stag of six tines and the finest that we have roused this journey. A golden St. Hubert to the man who is the first to sound the .' He shook his bridle as he spoke, and thundered away, his knights lying low upon their horses and galloping as hard as whip and spur would drive