"It is fortunate you have other hues to choose from," said the
Countess with a smile, "or otherwise you would be no falconer. But
your story is very strange. Have you ever consulted about it?"
"I have said very little about it," Prosper replied, remembering as he
spoke the forest Mass which he had heard, and that he had discoursed
upon this adventure with Alice of the Hermitage.
"The hawk pecked at the girl's heart," said the lady.
"It did not get so far as that, Countess."
"You speak prose, my friend."
"I am no troubadour, but speak what I know."
"The heart means nothing to you, Prosper!"
"The heart? Dear lady, I assure you the girl was not hurt. She is a
young woman by now, probably wife to a clown and mother of half-a-
dozen."
"Prosper, you disappoint me. Let us ride on. I am sick of these
shivering grey fields."
The Countess was vexed, for the life of him he could not tell why. He
made peace at last, but she would not tell him the cause of her
morning's irritation.
That was not the only reminder he had that day--in fact, it was but
the first. In the evening came another.
He was in the Countess's chamber after supper. She was embroidering a
banner, and he had been singing to her as she worked. After his music
the Countess took the lute from him, saying that she would sing. And
so she did, but in a voice so low and constrained that it seemed more
to comfort herself than any other.
Prosper sat by the table idly turning over a roll of blazonry--the
coats of all the knights and gentlemen who had ever been in the
service of High March. It was a roll carefully kept by the pursuivant,
very fine work. He saw that his own was already tricked in its place,
and recognized many more familiar faces. Suddenly he gave a start, and
sat up stiff as a bar. He looked no further, but at the end of the
Countess's song said abruptly-"Tell me, Countess, whose are these arms?"
She looked at the coat--sable, three wicket-gates argent. "There is a
story about that," she said.
"I beg you to tell it to me," said Prosper; "story for story."
"That is only fair," she laughed, having quite recovered her easy
manner with him. "Come and sit by the fire, and you shall hear it. The
arms," she began, "are those which were assumed by a young knight
after a very bold exploit in my service. He came to me as Salomon de
Born, and I think he was but eighteen--a mere boy."
Prosper, from the heights of his three-and-twenty years, nodded
benignly.
"So much so," said the Countess, "that I fear I must have wounded his
vanity by laughing away what he asked of me. This was no less than to
lead a troop of my men against Renny of Coldscaur, an enemy and
slanderer of mine, but none the less as great a lord as he was rascal.
However, he begged so persistently that I gave in, finding other
things about him--a mystery of his birth and upbringing, a
steadfastness also and gravity far beyond his years--which drew me to
put him to the proof of what he dared. He went, therefore, with a
company of light horse, some fifty men. He was away eight weeks, and
then came back--with but six men, it is true; but youth is prodigal of
life, knowing so little of it."