Page:A C Doyle - The White Company.djvu/96

70 hot fight, and I should think twice before I drew it drop by drop as these friars are doing. By my hilt! our young one here is as white as a Picardy cheese. What is amiss then, mon cher?'

'It is nothing,' Alleyne answered. 'My life has been too quiet. I am not used to such sights.'

'Ma foi!' the other cried, 'I have never yet seen a man who was so stout of speech and yet so weak of heart.'

'Not so, friend,' quoth big John; 'it is not weakness of heart, for I know the lad well. His heart is as good as thine or mine, but he hath more in his pate than ever you will carry under that tin pot of thine, and as a consequence he can see further into things, so that they weigh upon him more.'

'Surely to any man it is a sad sight,' said Alleyne, 'to see these holy men, who have done no sin themselves, suffering so for the sins of others. Saints are they, if in this age any may merit so high a name.'

'I count them not a fly,' cried Hordle John; 'for who is the better for all their whipping and yowling? They are like other friars, I trow, when all is done. Let them leave their backs alone, and beat the pride out of their hearts.'

'By the three kings! there is sooth in what you say,' remarked the archer. 'Besides, methinks if I were le bon Dieu, it would bring me little joy to see a poor devil cutting the flesh off his bones; and I should think that he had but a small opinion of me, that he should hope to please me by such provost-marshal work. No, by my hilt! I should look with a more loving eye upon a jolly archer who never harmed a fallen foe and never feared a hale one.'

'Doubtless you mean no sin,' said Alleyne. 'If your words are wild, it is not for me to judge them. Can you not see that there are other foes in this world besides Frenchmen, and as much glory to be gained in conquering them? Would it not be a proud day for knight or squire if he could overthrow seven adversaries in the lists? Yet here are we in the lists of life, and there come the seven black