Page:A C Doyle - The White Company.djvu/297

Rh 'Sir knight,' said the prince, 'you speak like a brave man, and our cousin of France is happy in having a cavalier who is so fit to uphold his cause either with tongue or with sword. But if you think such evil of us, how comes it that you have trusted yourself to us without warranty or safe-conduct?'

'Because I knew that you would be here, sire. Had the man who sits upon your right been ruler of this land, I had indeed thought twice before I looked to him for aught that was knightly or generous.' With a soldierly salute, he wheeled round bis horse, and, galloping down the lists, disappeared amid the dense crowd of footmen and of horsemen who were streaming away from the scene of the tournament.

'The insolent villain!' cried Pedro, glaring furiously after him. 'I have seen a man's tongue torn from his jaws for less. Would it not be well, even now, Edward, to send horsemen to hale him back? Bethink you that it may be one of the royal house of France, or at least some knight whose loss would be a heavy blow to his master. Sir William Felton, you are well mounted, gallop after the caitiff, I pray you.'

'Do so, Sir William,' said the prince, 'and give him this purse of a hundred nobles as a sign of the respect which I bear for him; for, by St. George! he has served his master this day even as I would wish liegemen of mine to serve me.' So saying, the prince turned his back upon the king of Spain, and, springing upon his horse, rode slowly homewards to the Abbey of St. Andrew's.

 

the morning after the jousting, when Alleyne Edricson went, as was his custom, into his master's chamber to wait upon him in his dressing, and to curl his hair, he found him 