A Ladder of Swords: A Tale of Love, Laughter and Tears. Gilbert Parker

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      “A moment, Monsieur of Rozel,” she ventured. “Did my father send you to me?”

      He inclined his head and smiled again.

      “Did you say to him what you have said to me?” she asked, not quite without a touch of malice.

      “I left out about the color in the cheek,” he answered, with a smirk at what he took to be the quickness of his wit.

      “You kept your paint-pot for me,” she replied, softly.

      “And the dove-cote, too,” he rejoined, bowing finely, and almost carried off his feet by his own brilliance.

      She became serious at once—so quickly that he was ill prepared for it, and could do little but stare and pluck at the tassel of his sword, embarrassed before this maiden, who changed as quickly as the currents change under the brow of the Couperon Cliff, behind which lay his manor-house of Rozel.

      “I have visited at your manor, Monsieur of Rozel. I have seen the state in which you live, your retainers, your men-at-arms, your farming-folk, and your sailor-men. I know how your Queen receives you; how your honor is as stable as your fief.”

      He drew himself up again proudly. He could understand this speech.

      “Your horses and your hounds I have seen,” she added, “your men-servants and your maid-servants, your fields of corn, your orchards, and your larder. I have sometimes broken the commandment and coveted them and envied you.”

      “Break the commandment again for the last time,” he cried, delighted and boisterous. “Let us not waste words, lady. Let’s kiss and have it over.”

      Her eyes flashed. “I coveted them and envied you; but, then, I am but a vain girl at times, and vanity is easier to me than humbleness.”

      “Blood of man, but I cannot understand so various a creature!” he broke in, again puzzled.

      “There is a little chapel in the dell beside your manor, monsieur. If you will go there, and get upon your knees, and pray till the candles no more burn and the Popish images crumble in their places, you will yet never understand myself or any woman.”

      “There’s no question of Popish images between us,” he answered, vainly trying for foothold. “Pray as you please, and I’ll see no harm comes to the Mistress of Rozel.”

      He was out of his bearings and impatient. Religion to him was a dull recreation invented chiefly for women.

      She became plain enough now. “ ’Tis no images nor religion that stands between us,” she answered, “though they might well do so. It is that I do not love you, Monsieur of Rozel.”

      His face, which had slowly clouded, suddenly cleared.

      “Love! Love!” He laughed good-humoredly. “Love comes, I’m told, with marriage. But we can do well enough without fugling on that pipe. Come, come, dost think I’m not a proper man and a gentleman? Dost think I’ll not use thee well and ‘fend thee, Huguenot though thou art, ’gainst trouble or fret or any man’s persecutions—be he my lord bishop, my lord chancellor, or King of France, or any other?”

      She came a step closer to him, even as though she would lay a hand upon his arm. “I believe that you would do all that in you lay,” she answered, steadily. “Yours is a rough wooing, but it is honest—”

      “Rough! Rough!” he protested, for he thought he had behaved like some Adonis. Was it not ten years only since he had been at court?

      “Be assured, monsieur, that I know how to prize the man who speaks after the light given him. I know that you are a brave and valorous gentleman. I must thank you most truly and heartily, but, monsieur, you and yours are not for me. Seek elsewhere, among your own people, in your own religion and language and position, the Mistress of Rozel.”

      He was dumfounded. Now he comprehended the plain fact that he had been declined.

      “You send me packing!” he blurted out, getting red in the face.

      “Ah, no! Say that is my misfortune that I cannot give myself the great honor,” she said, in her tone a little disdainful dryness, a little pity, a little feeling that here was a good friend lost.

      “It’s not because of the French soldier that was with Montgomery at Domfront?—I’ve heard that story. But he’s gone to heaven, and ’tis vain crying for last year’s breath,” he said, with proud philosophy.

      “He is not dead. And if he were,” she added, “do you think, monsieur, that we should find it easier to cross the gulf between us?”

      “Tut! tut! that bugbear love!” he said, shortly. “And so you’d lose a good friend for a dead lover? I’ faith, I’d befriend thee well if thou wert my wife, ma’m’selle.”

      “It is hard for those who need friends to lose them,” she answered, sadly.

      The sorrow of her position crept in upon her and filled her eyes with tears. She turned them to the sea—instinctively towards that point on the shore where she thought it likely Michel might be—as though by looking she might find comfort and support in this hard hour.

      Even as she gazed into the soft afternoon light she could see, far over, a little sail standing out towards the Ecréhos. Not once in six months might the coast of France be seen so clearly. One might almost have noted people walking on the beach. This was no good token, for when that coast may be seen with great distinctness a storm follows hard after. The girl knew this, and, though she could not know that this was Michel de la Forêt’s boat, the possibility fixed itself in her mind. She quickly scanned the horizon. Yes, there in the northwest was gathering a dark-blue haze, hanging like small, filmy curtains in the sky.

      The Seigneur of Rozel presently broke the silence so awkward for him. He had seen the tears in her eyes, and, though he could not guess the cause, he vaguely thought it might be due to his announcement that she had lost a friend. He was magnanimous at once, and he meant what he said, and would stand by it through thick and thin.

      “Well, well, I’ll be thy everlasting friend if not thy husband,” he said, with ornate generosity. “Cheer thy heart, lady.”

      With a sudden impulse she seized his hand and kissed it, and, turning, ran swiftly down the rocks towards her home.

      He stood and looked after her, then, dumfounded, at the hand she had kissed.

      “Blood of my heart!” he said, and shook his head in utter amazement.

      Then he turned and looked out upon the Channel. He saw the little boat Angèle had descried making from France. Glancing at the sky, “What fools come there!” he said, anxiously.

      They were Michel de la Forêt and Buonespoir the pirate, in a black-bellied cutter with red sails.

III

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