Chivalry: Dizain des Reines by James Branch Cabell (top 100 novels TXT) 📕

of hoofs, a yelping and scurrying, and a contention of soft bodies, and above all a man’s voice commanding the turmoil. She was seventeen, so she climbed into the crotch of an apple-tree and peered over the wall.

He was in rusty brown and not unshabby; but her regard swept over this to his face, and there noted how his eyes shone like blue winter stars under the tumbled yellow hair, and noted the flash of his big teeth as he swore between them. He held a dead fox by the brush, which he was cutting off; two hounds, lank and wolfish, were scaling his huge body in frantic attempts to get at the carrion. A horse grazed close at hand.

So for a heart-beat she saw him. Then he flung the tailless body to the hounds, and in the act spied two black eyes peeping through the apple-leaves. He laughed, all mirth to the heels of him. “Mademoiselle, I fear we have disturbed your devotions. But I had not heard that it was a Benedictine custom to rehearse aves in tree-tops.” Then, as she leaned forward, both elbows resting more comfortably upon the wall, and thereby disclosing her slim body among the foliage like a crimson flower green-calyxed, he said, “You are not a nun—Blood of God! you are the Princess Katharine!”

The nuns, her present guardians, would have declared the ensuing action horrific, for Katharine smiled frankly at him and asked how could he thus recognise her at one glance.

He answered slowly: “I have seen your portrait. Hah, your portrait!” he jeered, head flung back and big teeth glinting in the sunlight. “There is a painter who merits crucifixion.”

She considered this indicative of a cruel disposition, but also of a fine taste in the liberal arts. Aloud she stated:

“You are not a Frenchman, messire. I do not understand how you can have seen my portrait.”

The man stood for a moment twiddling the fox-brush. “I am a harper, my Princess. I have visited the courts of many kings, though never that of France. I perceive I have been woefully unwise.”

This trenched upon insolence—the look of his eyes, indeed, carried it well past the frontier,—but she found the statement interesting. Straightway she touched the kernel of those fear-blurred legends whispered about Dom Manuel’s reputed descendants.

“You have, then, seen the King of England?”

“Yes, Highness.”

“Is it true that in him, the devil blood of Oriander has gone mad, and that he eats children—like Agrapard and Angoulaffre of the Broken Teeth?”

His gaze widened. “I have heard a deal of scandal concerning the man. But certainly I never heard that.”

Katharine settled back, luxuriously, in the crotch of the apple-tree. “Tell me about him.”

Composedly he sat down upon the grass and began to acquaint her with his knowledge and opinions concerning Henry, the fifth of that name to reign in England, and the son of that squinting Harry of Derby about whom I have told you so much before.

Katharine punctuated the harper’s discourse with eager questionings, which are not absolutely to our purpose. In the main, this harper thought the man now buffeting France a just king, and he had heard, when the crown was laid aside, Sire Henry was sufficiently jovial, and even prankish. The harper educed anecdotes. He considered that the King would manifestly take Rouen, which the insatiable man was now besieging. Was the King in treaty for the hand of the Infanta of Aragon? Yes, he undoubtedly was.

Katharine sighed her pity for this ill-starred woman. “And now tell me about yourself.”

He was, it appeared, Alain Maquedonnieux, a harper by vocation, and by birth a native of Ireland. Beyond the fact that it was a savage kingdom adjoining Cataia, Katharine knew nothing of Ireland. The harper assured her that in this she was misinformed, since the kings of England claimed Ireland as an appanage, though the Irish themselves were of two minds as to the justice of these pretensions; all in all, he considered that Ireland belonged to Saint Patrick, and that the holy man had never accredited a vicar.

“Doubtless, by the advice of God,” Alain said: “for I have read in Master Roger de Wendover’s Chronicles of how at the dread day of judgment all the Irish are to muster before the high and pious Patrick, as their liege lord and father in the spirit, and by him be conducted into the presence of God; and of how, by virtue of Saint Patrick’s request, all the Irish will die seven years to an hour before the second coming of Christ, in order to give the blessed saint sufficient time to marshal his company, which is considerable.” Katharine admitted the convenience of this arrangement, as well as the neglect of her education. Alain gazed up at her for a long while, as if in reflection, and presently said: “Doubtless the Lady Heleine of Argos also was thus starry-eyed and found in books less diverting reading than in the faces of men.” It flooded Katharine’s cheeks with a livelier hue, but did not vex her irretrievably; if she chose to read this man’s face, the meaning was plain enough.

I give you the gist of their talk, and that in all conscience is trivial. But it was a day when one entered love’s wardship with a plunge, not in more modern fashion venturing forward bit by bit, as though love were so much cold water. So they talked for a long while, with laughter mutually provoked and shared, with divers eloquent and dangerous pauses. The harper squatted upon the ground, the Princess leaned over the wall; but to all intent they sat together upon the loftiest turret of Paradise, and it was a full two hours before Katharine hinted at departure.

Alain rose, approaching the wall. “To-morrow I ride for Milan to take service with Duke Filippo. I had broken my journey these three days past at Châteauneuf yonder, where this fox has been harrying my host’s chickens. To-day I went out to slay him, and he led me, his murderer, to the fairest lady earth may boast. Do you not think that, in returning good for evil, this fox was a true Christian, my Princess?”

Katharine said: “I lament his destruction. Farewell, Messire Alain! And since chance brought you hither—”

“Destiny brought me hither,” Alain affirmed, a mastering hunger in his eyes. “Destiny has been kind; I shall make a prayer to her that she continue so.” But when Katharine demanded what this prayer would be, Alain shook his tawny head. “Presently you shall know, Highness, but not now. I return to Châteauneuf on certain necessary businesses; to-morrow I set out at cockcrow for Milan and the Visconti’s livery. Farewell!” He mounted and rode away in the golden August sunlight, the hounds frisking about him. The fox-brush was fastened in his hat. Thus Tristran de Léonois may have ridden a-hawking in drowned Cornwall, thus statelily and composedly, Katharine thought, gazing after him. She went to her apartments, singing an inane song about the amorous and joyful time of spring when everything and everybody is happy,—