Chapter VII: Part 7

A man in armor, whose horse was half unmanageable, blundered out into the light of the fires. It was John Rich. He waved his sword, and shouted to Fulk de Lisle,

“To us! To us! We are attacked.”

Fulk de Lisle’s torches went tossing up the hill; but before he and his men reached the beech wood, the fight came tumbling out like a drove of swine. John Rich was down with an arrow through his throat, and his horse went charging straight at the torches. Fulk de Lisle caught the beast by the bridle, swung himself into the saddle, and snatched a spear from one of his men.

“Troy! Troy! Hold together, lads!”

But that rough and tumble on the edge of the wood was no fitting stage for flamboyant feats of arms. Falconer’s men poured out in a black swarm. The fighting was at close quarters, a wild swirl of jerking and grotesque figures, a tangle of men and horses, torches, flying embers, oaths and blows. The fires were kicked out, smothered by the bodies of men who fell on them, and rolled away—cursing. Torches were flung, tossed back again, trampled under foot. There was no knightliness in the game. It was a battle of wild beasts who were in a mad haste to kill. My Lord of Troy’s men had raped and bullied the Forest, and the Forest was taking its vengeance.

Mellis’s head was close to Martin’s shoulder, and his arm had slipped about her body. Neither of them spoke. The work up yonder was too grim, too breathless. The fires were scattered; a few torches flared in the grass; the dance of death became a thing of darkness.

Then a horse went galloping down past the mere, a dim, hurrying shape.

“Who was that?”

Martin strained his eyes. A faint radiance was stealing over the grassland, the light of the rising moon. The horse became a gray ghost carrying a man who rode for safety.

“Who should it be?”

“Fulk de Lisle.”

“That devil!”

The bloody game under the black shadows of the beeches seemed to be losing its fury. Men were calling to each other in the darkness; there was a kind of whimpering murmur, a vague scattering of voices. Once a man shrieked aloud, and Martin felt Mellis shiver.

“It is over. Look, you can see men running. One, two, and another—over there, in the open.”

“Is it with us, or against us?”

“Troy is beaten. Hear them shouting—our people, ‘Richmond! Richmond!’”

“What a night, comrade, what a night!”

_Chapter XXXI_

A broad silver radiance spread above the black tops of the beech trees. It was the moon rising behind the wood, throwing long slants of light across the grasslands, and making a glimmer of mystery everywhere. The towering shadow of the beech wood still lay upon the island and the mere, leaving them all black in a world of tremulous white light.

Mellis drew aside suddenly, her arms over her bosom, her eyes looking toward the tops of the beech trees.

“Martin!”

A something in her voice kept him from looking at her.

“I must become a man. This adventure has shipwrecked me.”

He was most desperately and dearly perplexed.

“Is there no cloth anywhere?”

She could not help laughing at his immense seriousness.

“Have you forgotten? Ah!”

The moon seemed to glide suddenly above the beech wood, huge, and yellow, and stealthy. The shadows slipped away from the island; the long grass glimmered like silver wire; the mere shone like a shield.

Mellis threw herself in the long grass.

“Have you forgotten all our gear in that cellar? If you love me, man—hasten.”

“What shall I bring?”

“A suit of light armor, and a wadded coat—and—and—things to go under it.”

He blundered off, calling himself the most imbecile fool that ever was; but before he had got across the orchard he heard Falconer hailing him.

“Martin Valliant—Martin Valliant!”

Martin had other matters to attend to. John Falconer could wait. But he gave him an answering shout,

“Is that Master Falconer?”

“Aye.”

“All’s well.”

“Let down the bridge, man.”

“All in good season.”

Martin ran to the tower, groped for the ring of the great stone, found it, and then remembered that he would need a light. The tinder-box and the candles were in Mellis’s room. He was about to go for them when he heard a sound of soft footsteps, and some one glided up the stairs.

“Martin!”

“I need a light.”

“The tinder-box is above. Come to me in a moment.”

He lifted the stone out, rolled it aside, and waited. He could hear the ring of the flint against the steel, and then her voice calling to him softly,

“Here. It is lighted.”

Martin climbed the stairs and found a candle burning outside her door. He picked it up, holding it in one big hand and shading it as though that flame was one of the most precious things in the world. The light played upon his solemn face, and mirrored itself in his grave, intent eyes. He held his breath all the way down the stairs; the flame was a flickering soul, and he was guarding it.

So Martin lowered himself into the vault, and setting that precious candle on a stone bracket let into the wall, he made a great disorder among the stuff that was stored there. The idea of thoroughness obsessed him, of not letting Mellis lack for anything that might be of use in such a crisis. He made three journeys to the landing outside her chamber door, and the merchandise that was piled there testified to his sincerity. It included a suit of light mail; a woolen doublet and hose to be worn beneath it; a belt, sword and dagger; leather shoes; an odd piece of green cloth that bows had been wrapped in; some strips of leather; a green and blue banner rolled in a canvas bag. He left the candle burning there, and went down to lower the bridge for Falconer and his men.

John Falconer had torches with him, and the causeway was a glare of light. Martin lowered the bridge and swung the gate open; Falconer came across.

He stared at Martin Valliant.

“Hallo! This is a queer way to go harnessed.”

“There is much to be told.”

“Is the child safe?”

“She is in her chamber. Her men were ambushed this morning, and she was taken.”

Falconer nodded understandingly.

“You have been in the water, my friend?”

“Swartz and I swam across to rescue her.”

“Swartz? Peter Swartz?”

“He is with us now. He went into the woods to raise an alarm, while I saved Mellis. Warn your men that he is a friend.”

Martin and John Falconer passed on into the courtyard, and the Forest followed them with a tossing of torches, and much grim jubilation. The men were as diverse and rustic as their weapons. Oak clubs, scythe blades on poles, axes, spits, wooden mallets, all came dancing into the yard of Woodmere. Many of the men had bows on their backs and arrows stuck in their belts. Not a few were wounded. There were bloody faces, arms that hung limp, stockings soaked all red. But the crowd was hot, triumphant, and fiercely merry; they had tasted blood; many vile things had been avenged.

“Look to your wounds, lads. Lay a fire, some of you. We have come far, and no man is grudged his supper.”

Several of the Forest gentry gathered around Falconer, and looked curiously at Martin Valliant.

“Is this the fellow?”

“He has some limbs on him.”

“But a runaway priest, gentles, is black company. What say you?”

Falconer answered them gruffly:

“And what are we but traitors, so long as Crookback wears the crown! Men who can fight are the blood and muscle of such a venture as ours. Use your wits, gentlemen. We are not women to tilt our noses and screw up our mouths.”

Martin had drawn aside. He felt a stranger and almost an outcast under the eyes of these mesne lords who stared at him and did not lower their voices. The mysterious and solitary nights and days had vanished. He saw Mellis surrounded by a crowd of figures, knights, yeomen, foresters. They seemed to thrust him back into the darkness; he had served his purpose and no one held out a hand.

He gathered up his harness from the spot where he had left it by the gate that led into the garden, and made his way into the orchard. The life had gone out of him for the moment; this secret and love-enchanted island had been seized by a hundred rough fellows who shouted and crowded in the courtyard. He did not belong to them; he was a thing to be eyed with distrust.

The moonlight flooded the orchard, and Martin sat down under an apple tree and began to arm himself, but there was no pride of purpose in his hands. Bitter thoughts crowded into his heart, and he sank in a slough of self-abasement. He had been in heaven, and suddenly he found himself in hell. What was he but an outcast, a murderer, a thing that was neither priest nor man? And he had believed for one short hour that Mellis loved him. What madness! What could he be to her, or she to him? He had mistaken a child’s gratitude for the love of the woman. The danger was past, for she was in the midst of friends; he had played his part, and the dream was ended.

Into the melancholy circle of his thoughts drifted a sound of some one moving through the orchard grass. Martin was in the shadow of the tree, and the moonlight showed him a primeval figure scouting furtively toward the house. It was Swartz, naked, and very cold.

Martin hailed him, and the man of the horn joined him under the tree.

“God be blessed; all the devils in hell seem loose to-night! A dance I have had of it, everyone’s enemy and no man’s friend. These Forest worthies have been hunting me like a pig. I had to take to the water and sit with my chin in it under the bank.”

He was shivering.

“My kingdom for a bit of lamb’s wool, brother.”

“Where did you leave your clothes, man?”

“On my lady’s table in the garden, God forgive me! But if those wild devils get a sight of such a thing as I am—I shall have a scythe blade between my ribs.”

Martin was in too grim and sad a mood to see the ludicrous in Peter Swartz. He rose, went into the garden, and returned with the soldier’s clothes.

“Corn in Egypt!”

Swartz tumbled into them, his teeth chattering.

“Hallo! those fellows are lighting a fire; they must be taught to love Peter Swartz. And I would not quarrel with some wine and a bite of supper.”

Martin’s melancholy was not a thing that could be overlooked. Swartz discovered it, and ceased his prattling.

“Why, man, things did not go amiss?”

“No. She is safe.”

Swartz was trying to remedy the disastrous haste of his undressing.

“May the curse of the prophet fall on these tags and tatters! What ails you, man?”

“Nothing.”

“Then let it be nothing.”

He stared hard at Martin, puzzled by his strange sullenness, but too shrewd to vex it further.

“Old Falconer came in finely—like a pot boiling over. And Messire Fulk de Lisle has gone galloping home to Troy; he passed within five yards of me. Hallo—cheering! They are in great heart, yonder.”

Those rough men in the ruined court of Woodmere had seen a vision, for Mellis had come out to them, clad in bright harness, her dark hair pouring over it, a naked sword in her hands. Behind her walked John Falconer, carrying a green and blue banner fastened to the throat of a lance. The men crowded from the fire, and from every corner of the courtyard. And she stood and spoke to them in a clear, calm voice:

“Good gentlemen and comrades all, I thank you for coming to me. We have begun bravely. God speed King Harry!”

They cheered her.

“Shout, lads, for our captain.”

“Mistress Mellis—Mistress Mellis!”

“Let Roger Bland try to take ye from us.”

“Aye, and there be more of us a-comin’.”

Mellis’s eyes were restless, searching for something that she could not see. She turned and spoke to John Falconer.

“Martin Valliant——”

Falconer shook his head. She grew imperious.

“Call him. He must be here.”

“The man may have some shame, Mellis.”

“Shame!”

She flushed with sensitive wrath.

“Shame! God forgive you. Ah! I see how things have sped!”

Falconer’s eyes shirked meeting hers.

“There may be draughts that men are loth to swallow,” he said dourly; “I did not make the world or men’s hearts.”

She stood a moment, with dark, thinking eyes and a proud, hurt face.

“I am young—still. Oh, these jealous tangles that men weave! Must we be little and thankless for the sake of fools?”

Mellis made her way through the crowd of mesne lords and gentlemen, looking neither to the right hand nor the left. They stood back for her, for she was proud, more pure in her strength than they. The moon hung clear and white and splendid in the sky, shining on her face and the plated steel half hidden by her hair.

“So they would think him an outcast,” she said to herself. “My scorn is theirs for the asking.”

Some instinct led her through the garden into the orchard, where the long grass was all patterned with the black shadows of the trees. She stood in the moonlight, and called softly:

“Martin—Martin Valliant!”

Old Swartz crept away, a dog grown mute, and wise in his silence. Martin’s face was all twisted with a spasm of pain, for he was fey that night with a mysterious forefeeling of great sorrow and despair.

“Martin—Martin Valliant!”

She came down through the orchard, and Martin rose to his feet. The moonlight through the trees shone on his harness, and betrayed him to her. He stood absolutely still, waiting for her to draw near.

“Martin!”

Her voice had a soft, wounded plaintiveness.

“Why are you hiding here?”

His face was all somber in the shadows.

“I had a wish to be alone.”

He could not bring himself to look at her, because of the new bitterness in his heart, and because her voice was so soft and luring.

“What has happened to you, Martin?”

She went close, looking in his face.

“Tell me. Have I no right to know?”

He answered her with strange gentleness, but his eyes would not meet hers.

“Perhaps I have seen a vision, a glimpse of the world as it is. Some things are too beautiful to endure, for other men break them in pieces.”

She drew her breath deeply.

“Ah! Have these rough fools touched your pride? They can have my scorn for the asking. And are you nothing to me, or I to you? Have we not gone through the deeps together, and have you not carried my life in your hands? Man, what do these rough squires matter? Look into my eyes and see if there is shame in them.”

He bowed his head.

“Mellis—what am I but an outcast?”

“Then I am an outcast also. But for me you would be chanting your Masses. And you have been very noble and good to me. Oh, Martin, Martin! this wounds my heart.”

He gave a sudden cry, and fell on his knees before her.

“God help me, but there is nothing else in the world but you. I cannot bear that for my sake you should even suffer pain.”

She bent over him, her hands hovering close to his face.

“Pain! What pain is there? And were it real—should I not bear it?”

“God forbid! Child, I have a kind of dark forefeeling to-night. Yesterday was all sunlight, there was no fear or sorrow in my heart. I was Martin Valliant, a man who was ready to die for you. What has happened? I feel a menace, a threat, a shadow drifting toward us; we are not alone; other voices strike in on ours. This island is not the world; here—I could serve you; but beyond us there are shadows, the shadows of other men—other women; they whisper together against me.”

A great light transfigured her face. She was on her knees, her hands on his shoulders, her eyes wonderful to behold.

“Martin, what has come to us? Oh, my dear, must I speak out?”

He looked at her, awed, trembling, entranced.

“Mellis, Mellis!”

“Is not my fate yours—and yours mine? What is pain to you is pain to me. If there is a world of shadows before us, I go—where my man goes.”

He uttered a deep cry.

“Can I touch you? Is it possible? Will you not melt into the air? Oh, my God! but I dare hardly look at you.”

“Martin, I am a soul in a body. What am I but a woman? Guard me—hold me!”

His arms went around her, but they were all tremulous with awe. Her face was close to his, a white, yearning face, with parted lips and half-closed eyes.

“Mellis—oh, my heart!”

She lay in his arms and smiled at him as he kissed her.

_Chapter XXXII_

Fulk de Lisle rode all that night, a madman, inflamed, balked of the satisfaction of a violent desire. He had nothing but the stars and the moon to guide him; the Forest was no more than a pathless waste; he pushed northwards, raging like a torch burning in the wind. At dawn his horse died under him, driven by the spurs till its heart failed on the brow of a steep hill. Fulk de Lisle kicked the beast’s body, and looked with red eyes at a gray and silent world.

But the luck was with him—the luck of the adventurer and the drunkard. Dim and sullen, Troy Castle stood less than two miles away on its great hill; the rising sun struck slantwise upon it, so that it looked like a huge turreted ship sailing above a sea of green.

Fulk de Lisle came on his own feet to Troy Castle. There was a sense of stir about the place although the day was still so young. A couple of dusty and sweat-streaked horses were waiting outside the gate-house; grooms and servants were gossiping, and on the battlements soldiers were unlashing the canvas covers of my lord’s cannon.

Some one on the walls recognized Fulk de Lisle when he was a quarter of a mile from the dry fosse; there was some shouting and running to and fro; a man vaulted on to the back of one of the tired horses and went cantering down the road. He was a squire in Roger Bland’s service, a youngster with red hair and an impudent mouth.

“Good morning to you, sir. Why this humility?”

Fulk de Lisle took him by the leg and pitched him out of the saddle.

“Thanks. I will ride the last furlong, and help you to mend your manners.”

Red Head scrambled up and dusted his clothes. Fulk de Lisle was too soaring a bird for him to fly at, but his impudence refused to be chastened.

“I trust your news is better than your face, sir. Our dear lord has the ague this morning.”

Fulk de Lisle rode on, without troubling to turn the lad’s wit.

He clattered over the bridge and into the main court, and the men who saw him ride in stared at his savage face.

“Pride has had a fall,” said some one.

“Or been balked of a woman.”

Fulk de Lisle called a page who was loitering on the steps of the chapel.

“Have you nothing but eyes, you brat? Where is my lord?”

“In his closet, sir.”

“Run and tell him that I am in the castle.”

Roger Bland already had the news, and his groom of the chamber came out with a haggard face.

“My lord would see you—instantly.”

“Damnation—may not a man eat?”

The Lord of Troy sat in his great padded chair with a writing-board on his knees, and quills and an inkhorn on the table at his side. He looked white about the gills, with that whiteness that tells of a faltering heart; his hand had lost its steady, clerkly niceness, and there were blots upon the paper. He had not been barbered, and still wore a gorgeous crimson bed-gown that made his thin face look all the yellower.

“What’s this—what’s this, man? Shut that door, Bennington. Not more bad news?”

He was petulant to the point of childishness. Fulk de Lisle’s red-brown eyes looked at him with veiled and subtle scorn.

“I could not make it worse, my lord. The Forest is up.”

“The Forest—in arms against us! Man—you are dreaming!”

“I am very wide awake, sir. We were ambushed last night as we lay outside Woodmere. They must have been a hundred to our thirty. We made a fight of it; that is all that can be said.”

Roger Bland’s face twitched.

“How many men came back with you?”

“None, my lord.”

There was a short silence. My Lord of Troy’s fingers were playing with his quill. He looked old and querulous.

“These swine! I thought we had tamed them. There is a deeper cunning in all this. I have had secret news this very morning. Richmond is on the sea. By now he may have landed.”

Fulk de Lisle took the news as a soldier of fortune takes his pay.

“The King will not grudge him a battle, my lord.”

“Bombast is so easy. But to say who are friends and who are enemies! Supposing I chose to have you hanged, sir?”

“A most unreasonable fancy, my lord.”

“And why?”

“I have risked my neck in your service. I have no quarrel with your generosity. And my pride is concerned in this—the pride of a soldier and a captain.”

“We shall see, sir; I may let you prove it. And now—we must strike, and strike quickly. These letters shall go at once; they must not miscarry. In three days we should muster a hundred spears and two hundred archers. The falconets and serpents are to come from Roychester; Sir Humphrey Heron will be master of the cannon. I have chosen my gallopers. Look to the garrison, and see that our tenants are fitly armed as they come in.”

Fulk de Lisle bowed.

“My heart is in this venture, my lord,” he said; “you can trust me, because my blood is up.”

So Roger Bland’s gallopers went out from Troy Castle, carrying letters to Sir Humphrey Heron at Roychester, to Sir Paul Scrooby at Granet, and to such lords and gentlemen as favored the White Rose. The rallying place was to be Troy Castle. Naught was said of the Earl of Richmond being upon the seas, for such news might have aroused a dubious loyalty among the gentry of those parts, where fear ruled and the King.

“I charge you to come to me with all your might—and within three days—for the chastening and humbling of certain rebels and traitors.”

So ran the Lord of Troy’s message. These smaller fires had to be quenched before the great beacon burst into a blaze.

My Lord of Troy had eyes in Gawdy Town to serve him, and men were watching to see the Rose come into port; but, seeing that she carried merchandise that was too precious to be fingered, her master elected to lower it overboard before making the land. The Rose came towering along about sunset, with a mild breeze behind her. The sea was a deep purplish blue, and the red west promised fair weather.

Her master had put the ship on a strange course. She hung out to sea till the land grew gray with the dusk, and then, turning her gilded bows shorewards, footed it solemnly toward the land. No one in Gawdy Town had seen her topsails. The gossips on the quay said that she would not make port before the morning.

Half a mile from the land the Rose backed her sails and lay to. The sky was all blue-green above, the sea black as pitch, and the land, with its Forest ridge, looked like a great cloud-bank. The Rose lowered two boats, each manned by half a dozen seamen. Baggage was tumbled into them from the waist, and about a score of voyagers left the ship.

The master stood on the poop and lifted his hat to them as the boats pulled away.

“A good market to you, gentlemen,” he shouted.

A deep voice answered him,

“God save the King.”

The boats went shorewards at a good speed, looking like two gray beetles on the water crawling with white legs, the foam from the oars. They melted into the dusk, and the Rose veered and beat up against the breeze, to play mother till her boats returned.

The baggage and the twenty adventurers were landed in a horseshoe-shaped cove under the cliffs. Some one had been watching for them above, for a couple of men came scampering down the steep path, one of them waving a piece of red cloth.

“All’s well.”

The seamen pushed off and rowed back toward the Rose, but the men stood in a group on the shingle and talked.

“The King is at sea.”

“Sure enough.”

“And the Forest is up.”

“So soon!”

“A woman as usual! They stabbed young Dale in Gawdy Town, and would have taken his sister. So Falconer raised the Forest. Bland’s men came to beleaguer Woodmere; we ambushed thirty of them last night, so the fat is in the fire.”

The man with the deep voice, who seemed to be the leader, betrayed a savage impatience. He had the hard, flat, high-cheeked face of a Mongol, with a brutal mouth, and cold blue eyes.

“The devil fly away with all women! Young Dale was a fool to take the wench with him, and Falconer was a fool to trouble his head about her.”

“That is not the whole story, Sir Gregory.”

“Damn your story! They have rushed matters too rashly. We may have to fight before we are ready. Now for the baggage. Have you any horses above?”

“Six.”

“Bustle up, then. The sooner we are knee-deep in the Forest the better.”

The baggage was carried up the cliff and lashed on the backs of the pack-horses. The men who had landed were well armed under their cloaks. Sir Gregory took the lead, one of the foresters walking beside him.

“Now, man, this story of yours; let us hear it.”

The forester told all that he knew concerning Mellis and her championing by Martin Valliant.

The round-headed man was not pleased.

“Beelzebub—what a beginning! A blackguard monk is a pretty stormcock to open the hurly-burly for us. Fools are superstitious, and I am one of the fools.”

_Chapter XXXIII_

The Forest had sounded its war-horn, and the woods and heaths and leaf-hidden hamlets gave up their men. They gathered in Woodmere valley, foresters, laborers, charcoal burners, breeders of horses, swineherds, and a scattering of broken men. The gentry and their tenants were passably horsed and harnessed; the foresters had their bows; but there was many a fellow who had no more than an oak cudgel or a scythe blade lashed to a pole.

They brought cattle and sheep with them and tumbrils laden with sacks of flour. Booths were built, fires lit, scouts sent to watch the woodland ways and the gray menace of Troy Castle. The vault at Woodmere was emptied of its arms, and a new bridge built in place of Martin’s single beam.

As for Martin Valliant, he held aloof from the mesne lords and slept at night across Mellis’s door.

Now the Forest was superstitious, and devout with the devoutness of ignorance. There was no wild thing that could not happen, no marvel that might not be believed. God, the Virgin and the Saints, the devil and his progeny were part of the Forest life, mysterious beings to be prayed to and to be feared. There were holy wells, wonder-working images in more than one of the churches, places that were accursed, goblin stones, devil’s hounds that ran by night, headless horsemen, ghosts, fairies, haunted trees. The people of the Forest were obstinate, credulous children. They believed all that the Church taught them, even though many a priest spat at his own conscience.

Martin Valliant had been a priest. He had shed blood, and he slept at night outside the door of a woman’s bed-chamber. The facts were flagrant, fiercely honest. Your pious savage does not love honesty; he lives in a world of make-believe; he will not quarrel with imperfections that spue their slime in dark and hidden corners. He will even laugh and delight in the lewd tales that are told of priests. But let some priest be honest, shake off his vows, and declare himself a clean man, then he has committed the unforgivable sin, and any foul sot or filthy hag may sit in judgment upon him.

So it proved with these rough Forest gentry. Martin Valliant had sensed things truly. That sudden shadowy foreboding had heralded a real darkness that was spreading toward him from the mistrusts and prejudices of these common men. They looked at the facts baldly as they would have looked at pigs in a sty. The strange, tragic, sacrificial beauty of the thing was lost on them. To them love was a giggling scrimmage. Their religion was so much bogey worship, a rude mysticism that was shaped to suit their lives.

Before a day had passed Martin Valliant found himself outlawed by a vague and reticent distrust. He cast a shadow. The common men looked askance at him and held aloof. The gentry were more open, and more brutal in their displeasure; with them it was not a mere matter of superstition; there were young men among them, and Mellis was very comely. And this fellow had the insolence to sleep across her door.

Falconer was the only man who spoke to Martin Valliant, and it was done grudgingly and with an ill grace.

The rest looked through him, over him, at his feet. There was no place for Martin at the table that had been set up under a shelter of boughs in the hall. Even Peter Swartz was better treated; he was half prisoner, half comrade, but he drank and ate with them, diced with them, told tales.

Martin took his meals on the leads of the tower or in the garden. His heart grew heavy in him, and a kind of fierce sadness showed in his eyes.

These English worthies were ready with their judgments as they sat at table.

“The wench is mad.”

“The fellow is wearing her brother Gilbert’s harness.”

“Such a thing cannot be stomached, sirs. We lack godliness if we carry such an unclean vagabond with us. My men are grumbling already, and seeing a curse in the fellow.”

“Send him back to Paradise.”

“The prior will thank you for nothing. One kicks a mangy dog out of the gate, and that’s the end of it.”

Swartz listened and said nothing. He was a rough god compared with these boors; he had seen the world and tasted the wine of many countries, and he knew that it is mere foolishness to step in between a clown and his drink.

Falconer tried to speak up, but they were against him to a man.

“I choose to live with honest men, sir, not with vermin.”

Such was the Forest’s verdict.

On the second day the gentlemen of the Rose marched into Woodmere, Sir Gregory at their head. There was much cheering, much shaking of hands. “The King was upon the sea.” That night they drank much ale. And women had come from Gawdy Town, bold-eyed wenches dressed as men. Some of the wilder spirits made a rough night of it, shouting, quarreling, and singing songs, and Mellis was kept awake by their clowning. Nor did Martin Valliant get much sleep, for he had to take more than one drunken man by the shoulders and prove to him that the threshold of Mellis’s chamber was sacred ground.

The coming of Sir Gregory and the gentlemen from France made matters more sinister for Martin Valliant. Sir Gregory was a man of violent self-pride, obstinate as sin, and far more cruel.

He bearded John Falconer.

“A pretty chaplain you have found us! This fellow must go, or I’ll not answer for the men.”

“We owe him some gratitude.”

“And for what? Bloodying our game for us? Dale was a fool in the beginning, and you have been little better than his shadow. I’ll have no women picking and choosing in my company.”

Falconer owned as rough a temper as this crop-headed bully, but he knew that Sir Gregory had the crowd at his back.

“There is no harm done yet. I will speak to the girl.”

“What claim has the wench to be considered?”

“The claim of courtesy—and compassion, sir. Look to it, Gregory, I will have none of the bully in you; my fist is as heavy as ever it was.”

And there the matter rested for a while.

John Falconer did not deceive himself; these mesne lords and squirelings were no children of romance. The wars had bred a savage spirit in the land; the middle age was dying, cruel and brutish in its decadence, and the strong man was not there as yet to smite it down forever with his kingly club. Martin Valliant would have to go; these men of the Forest would not hesitate to sacrifice him.

But Mellis?

He hardened his heart, and went in search of her, and finding her in the tower room, he shut the door and spoke out.

“Child, this man cannot stay with us; he will bring us evil luck.”

“Who sent you with that message, John?”

“The whole place is whispering it. It might have been born with the men, but our friends will have none of him.”

She stood at her full height, calmly scorning him and them all.

“What an amazing thing is life! You come to me, and bid me turn on this man, and hound him out as an outcast. Am I so vile and heartless a thing, and are men so afraid of the devil that they must throw a sop to him?”

Falconer stood his ground.

“You should know the Forest, Mellis.”

“I know the trees and the glades, the blown leaves and the sunlight, the little streams and the deer—but its men! If these are they, I know them not!”

“Valliant has blackened himself in their eyes.”

She flung out her hands.

“And for whom, and for what purpose? I tell you that man has the heart of a child. I was in peril, and he succored me; I was lost, and he gave me his all. Nay, more than his all, for in saving me he lost the good will of God’s noble men. And you—you come to me and tell me to spurn him, desert him, because these fools are afraid of the devil. I would rather die than stoop to such shame.”

His face was clouded and stubborn.

“Your heart is too kind, because——”

“Ah! Speak out.”

She went nearer, her eyes dangerously shining.

“I am not afraid, John Falconer. Tell me I love this man. I do most dearly love him, with all my heart and soul. And who shall cast a reproach at me, or make me believe that there is any man who would have treated me with such sweet, strong faith? I care not what men say. God shall judge. If there is beauty and tenderness and truth in our poor hearts, will He throw us to the dogs?”

“You are mad!” he said miserably.

“Mad! Then I would that all the world were mad! And if your law is God’s law, then I am a rebel against God. Yes, and I would glory in it. I have no more to say to you, John Falconer.”

He left her, ashamed, angry, feeling that tragic things were about to happen.

As for Martin Valliant, he knew what he knew, and his heart was heavy. He thought of the lepers in the wood of yews at Paradise, and his lot seemed like unto theirs. Love had made him an outcast, a thing of evil omen to be thrust away into the darkness. No one was ready to call him brother or comrade in arms, or to pity him because the man had been stronger than the monk.

He strove bitterly with himself and with his love, but the truth showed him no mercy. It was like the great wooden cross on the Black Moor, standing bleak and clear against the sunset, bidding mortals remember that Christ suffered. He understood why these men hated and mistrusted him, and grudged him the right of guarding Mellis.

Words were spoken that were meant for his ears.

“The monks of Paradise have earned a foul name.”

“They have reared a fine, upstanding rogue in that fellow.”

“Old Valliant’s son. A pretty mate for Mellis Dale! What shame for the woman!”

Martin Valliant could bear no more. If his homage meant shame for her, then it had better end.

He went in search of Mellis, but for a long time he could not find her, and the house and island seemed full of fools who stared at him. Martin Valliant’s humility was in the dust. Had he been a fiercer and more carnal man, a strong and striving selfishness might have carried him through; but the rebel spirit faltered in him when voices whispered that the woman suffered shame because he loved her. Generous souls are always at the mercy of the meaner and more cunning spirits. A clever lie, like a snake crawling from the mouth of a sorcerer, has bitten many a strong man’s heel.

Martin found his love in a far corner of the orchard where an old tree had been blown down, but still lived and threw out green leaves. Mellis was seated on the trunk and half among the boughs, so that she was hidden like a bird, and discoverable only by some one who came quite near, for the weeds and grass were rank and tall, and melted into the green of the tree.

He stood before her, sorrowful and heavy-eyed, and she knew why he had come to her and what was in his heart.

“Martin!”

Her eyes loved him.

“So these clowns have been pulling ugly faces.”

He answered her simply and sadly.

“It may be that the clowns are right. We live our lives among clowns; we must not live too finely, or the clowns will be displeased. Is it not a sin to offend even against fools?”

She left her seat on the tree and stood facing him.

“So they would drive you out—send you to beggary or death.”

“They think me accursed.”

Her hands went to his shoulders, but his arms remained rigid, and he did not move.

“Martin Valliant, the rebel in me fights for you. Why should we truckle to this clowns’ world? What does it know of my heart or of yours? Why, we could go on living to the mean level of the beasts, throwing our pearls in the troughs, forever and ever.”

“But what I was—and what I am!”

“Man, man, I love you! Is there shame or sin in my eyes? Why, there was no true beauty in the world till we began to love each other. And am I to disown you, send you back to your death, because these lords and gentlemen have unclean, grudging hearts? No—by my God, I will not let you go.”

He stood rigid, opening and shutting his hands. His eyes looked into hers appealingly.

“But, child, they speak shameful things.”

“Let them call me all the foul names that ever were. Am I touched by them? It is for me to choose. And I say to you that they shall not part us. For if you love me, Martin——”

She gripped his arms, and her face lay close to his, her lips open, her eyes full of soft gleams. Her voice was quick, passionate, and challenging.

“For if you love me, dear——”

He stared at her, head thrown back, his eyes filling with a strange, wild light.

“Mellis!”

“Death—what would death be? But here is life and desire—and beauty. Oh, my heart, play me not false! They shall not take you from me!”

“Mellis—dear heart!”

He held her at arm’s length, his face transfigured.

“God help me! If this is sin—then let them write it down against me. Why, all that I hold here, the most adorable thing in all the world——”

“Martin!”

“The beauty, the mystery of you, the white light in my soul!”

“Ah! ah! Can mortal men harm us? We will hold to each other, you and I. Is not the whole world open, and can these so-called comrades say us nay? Where you go, I go also.”

“So be it, child,” he said.

_Chapter XXXIV_

About dusk that day, as Martin was passing through the courtyard, some one touched him on the shoulder. He turned, and found himself looking into Peter Swartz’s face. The soldier gave a significant jerk of the head, closed one eye, and lounged casually in the direction of the doorway opening on the garden. The courtyard was full of men who had been cooking and eating their supper; one side of it had been turned into a stable; the south-east corner had become a kitchen where a huge fire blazed. The men lay about on piles of bracken, their arms hanging from wooden pegs that had been driven into the wall. There seemed to be an abundance of ale. One of the women from Gawdy Town was sitting on a saddle and singing to the men, while she thrummed her lute. Martin had to pass close to her, and she looked at him insolently and laughed.

Martin followed Swartz into the garden. The place was so wild and overgrown and tangled that no one troubled to enter it, save when there was a reason for lying concealed. Swartz was waiting by the yews near the sundial, and Martin joined him.

“A word with you, man.”

His eyes were restless and alert.

“Come this way, under the nut trees. Those sluts are still at supper, and not looking for dark corners.”

They pushed into the tunnel of leaves and stood listening. Then Swartz began.

“The Forest is full of swine, and I go elsewhere. Look to yourself.”

He jerked a thumb toward the house.

“Swine! I know the nature of the beasts. If I stayed here a day longer I should have my throat slit, just to make matters certain. Dead men need not be watched.”

He drew Martin close to him.

“Guard yourself, my friend; the pigs do not love you. If you are wise you will come with me and leave these gentry to be hunted by my Lord of Troy. Thunder, but what a man-at-arms I could make of you! In France and in Italy a good sword wins much gold; they offer you a gay life, plenty of wine, and honor to be won. These English have no souls; they are all butchers and brewers.”

He looked into Martin’s face.

“What say you? Would she come also? Three comrades in arms! I have money on me; you can buy any ship-master, and he will sail you to hell or heaven. Come—what do you say?”

Martin’s answer showed on his face.

“Swartz, no man has been more brotherly to me——”

“Damnation, man, I have a sort of foolish liking for you. Good men are rare, men who can fight, and throw the whole world over for a bit of honor. And here they are ready to play some foul trick on you.”

“Swartz—I cannot come.”

“And why not, man? If——”

“I have a doom here to work out; I feel it in my blood. Nor would she go—as yet.”

“Try her.”

“No; the word would come from her—if it ever came. I stay here, on guard, her man-at-arms. I have set myself on this path, and I shall not leave it.”

Swartz knew his man, and that he was not to be persuaded.

“One word. I shall make for Gawdy Town; I shall lie there for seven days; if your mind changes you will find Swartz at a tavern near the harbor, at the sign of the ‘Crossed Keys.’ Much may happen in seven days.”

They gripped hands.

“Look to yourself, Martin.”

“There are things a man never forgets.”

“Tush! I have the soul of a soldier. Remember the ‘Crossed Keys.’”

When Martin Valliant went to his post that night outside the door of Mellis’s room he found a drunken man trying to open her door. It was barred on the inside, but the fellow was fumbling with the latch, sottishly enraged and babbling oaths. Martin took him by the shoulder, sent him rolling down the stairs, and followed to see whether he betrayed any desire to return. The man went down the newel stairway with absurd contortions, like a beetle rolling over and over and kicking as he rolled. He gathered himself up at the bottom, clasped his head between his hands, and disappeared unsteadily through the doorway.

Martin returned to the landing outside Mellis’s room, and stood listening.

“Mellis!”

Her voice answered him from the other side of the door.

“I am here. What has happened?”

“Nothing. A clown had lost his way, and I showed it to him with some briskness. These knights and gentlemen keep but poor order among their men.”

He heard her sigh.

“Martin!”

“Dear lady!”

“I have a feeling of strange restlessness to-night. I know not what ails me.”

“What is there to fear?”

He spoke with calmness, but her voice had made him think of a wind blowing sadly in the distant woods at night, plaintive and forlorn. His own heart was heavy in him with deep foreboding, though he would not confess to it before her.

“Is John Falconer in the house?”

“I saw him an hour ago.”

“One friend, please God. Where is Swartz?”

Martin hesitated, and then gave her the truth.

“Escaped—or on the verge of it. He does not trust to promises—fears to be treated as a traitor.”

“Ah! he is right. Martin, I have come by a most evil fear of my own people; their eyes do not look straight into mine. That man, Sir Gregory, is no friend of ours. Oh, I know; we women are quick. I feel a shadow over us.”

He heard her move the bar that closed the door, and the rustling of her dress.

“The shadow is mine,” he said.

“No—no.”

There was passion in her voice.

“It is the evil in the hearts of other men. I feel it—feel it like a fog creeping into my window. And I loved this place; we were so happy, even though death was near; I was not afraid. But now—a dread of something seizes me.”

The bar was in her hands, and the door moved so that Martin saw a little streak of light. His heart seemed to stand still, and then beat like the heart of a man who is afraid.

“Martin!”

He did not answer her.

“There is danger for you—there. They might creep up while you are sleeping. Oh! what am I saying, what is this dread that makes me a coward? But I am not a coward, and I love you. See—you can sleep here, across my door, so that no one can touch you.”

She threw the door open, and the gray light from her room fell upon his face. She was all shadow, wrapped in a cloak that had been found for her—a vague, soft outline that seemed to yearn toward him, a dream begotten of the night, tender, mysterious.

He covered his face with his hands.

“Mellis!”

“Is there pride between us, and no sweet faith? Am I asking you to do a shameful thing? Why, this is no more than a simple room, where I breathe and move—and sleep. I have a great fear for you to-night; I want you near me.”

He was silent.

“Martin, would you shame me, hold aloof as though I had tempted you?”

She caught his hands, and drew them from his face.

“Oh! I am wounded—if you have no faith!”

“Mellis!”

“Yes—wounded, to the heart! Oh! my dear love!”

He lifted her hands and kissed them almost fiercely.

“It shall be as you wish. This room is a chapel, its altar—where you sleep.”

He was over the threshold, and freeing a hand, she softly closed the door. Her breath came quickly, with a flutter of exultation.

“Oh, my dear lord, my man, is this not a great sacrament between us? Now—you have made me happy; is it not strange? See—you will lie here; there is bracken, and I will spread it; and here—is a wallet for a pillow.”

She glided about the room with innocent joy.

“Set your sword there. Now, we are in our castle, and I have no fear. Shall we pray, kneel down like children?”

She caught his hand, and they knelt down side by side. Their prayers were said in silence, such prayers as save this world of ours from the doom that it has earned.

She started up suddenly, took his face between her hands, and kissed him.

“Dear heart, good-night!”

Mellis stretched herself on the bed, and Martin went to his couch of bracken by the door. Neither of them spoke again, but they lay awake for a long while, listening to each other’s breathing.

_Chapter XXXV_

Martin Valliant was asleep when a man crawled up the stairs, groped his way to the closed door, lay there a moment listening, and then crawled back by the way he had come.

A number of figures showed black about a fire that had been lit in the center of the roofless hall. John Falconer was there, sullen, heavy-eyed—a man who found no pleasure in looking at his own thoughts; also Sir Gregory, skull-faced and ominous, with blue eyes that stared. A hot posset was going around in a big tankard. These gentlemen had but little to say to one another; they were waiting; the case had been heard, and judgment given.

The man who had gone a-spying up the tower came and stood before Sir Gregory.

“The priest is not this side of the door, lording.”

John Falconer’s sullen eyes seemed to catch the light of the fire.

“You lie!”

“See for yourself, Master Falconer. What’s more, he is asleep across the door, for I could hear a sound of breathing.”

A grim laugh went around the fire. Ironical looks were thrown at Falconer, who was frowning and biting his beard.

Sir Gregory spoke.

“Such insolence must be chastened; we must be rid of this bastard. Hallo, there! Axes for the breaking of a door.”

A little man with a sallow face and bright black eyes stood forward.

“The room has a window, sir.”

“Well?”

“Breaking the door is a clumsy device, and this Valliant is desperate strong. Why not use the window, gentlemen, and crawl in upon him while he is asleep?”

“Most excellent! But will God give us a ladder twenty feet long?”

“There is no need for a ladder. Strain a stout rope over the battlement so that it runs in front of the window, and men can slide down the rope.”

“Well thought of.”

John Falconer appeared to rouse himself from a sort of stupor.

“Wait, gentlemen. Let no violence be done this man. He has served us, and will suffer for it.”

“What would you, John Falconer?”

“Let him be taken, mastered, stripped of his harness and his arms, and turned out into the woods. His blood should not be upon our hands.”

“Plausible, very plausible!”

“I stand for that—or nothing.”

Sir Gregory chuckled.

“By my soul, such a punishment is better than blows. There is a certain subtlety about it. I put my seal to the document. Some one fetch the rope.”

The work was done noiselessly by men who crept about on bare feet, and without as much as a whisper. John Falconer and a dozen of his own fellows were ready on the stairs. Four men were to slide down the rope, enter by the window, and while three of them fell upon Martin Valliant, the fourth was to unbar the door.

Nature willed it that Mellis and her man should sleep heavily that night, solaced by the innocent sweetness of being so near each other, so full of a happy faith in their great love. They slept like children, Mellis on her bed, Martin lying across the door, his arms folded, his naked sword beside him.

He woke to a cry from Mellis.

“Martin—Martin! Guard yourself!”

The last man to enter by the window had slipped on the sill, and blundered against the man in front of him; and Mellis, opening her eyes, had seen him outlined dimly against the window.