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The charcoal-burners' Jack had hair to his waist and had to hide it in his cap; the charcoal-burners' beards were six weeks old. There was talk of nights of a market in Hauterive, where Falve's mother kept a huckster's shop. Prosper's aim on leaving High March after his gests of arms had been Goltres, for there he had believed to find Galors.
Isoult hid her face, lying prone on her breast. Galors and his men came thundering through the wood. Their horses were reeking, dripping from the flanks. The riders, four of them, looking neither right nor left, past over the open ground, where a few minutes before she whom they desperately sought had been lying at their mercy.
Prosper stepped forward; you would not have known his voice. "Man," he said, "our account is not yet done. But I know what I know. If you have accounts to settle, settle them now. I will bear you company and wait for you where you will." The words steadied Galors, sobered and quieted him. He began to mutter to himself. "God hath spoken to me.
"The marriage-bed," he said waggishly, and blew out the light. Isoult lay down on the bed; Prosper took off his body-armour and lay beside her, and his naked sword lay between them. Dom Galors knew a woman in East Morgraunt whose name was Maulfry. She lived in Tortsentier, a lonely tower hidden deep in the woods, and had an unwholesome reputation. She was held to be a courtesan.
But as yet I have not found it so. Maybe I shall try yours another day if I have another day." Whereupon, as if reminded of his delaying, he would have turned again to his work; but Prosper clapped a hand to his shoulder. "Have done with groping in books, Spiridion," cried he, "and tell me if you think this a time for such folly, when your life is threatened by Galors and his riders?"
It may be doubted if any prayed but the girl and the priest. The holy office proceeded; the Sanctus bell shrilled for the first time. Hoofs shattered scandalously on the flags, and Galors, with an armed man on either hand of him, rode into the nave. The choir rose in a body, the nave huddled; Isoult, as she believed, saw Prosper, spear, crest, and shield.
"Master Galors, good-day to you," he said. "My lady the Countess of Hauterive hath heard of you. She may possibly send for you anon. In the meantime, in the pendency of her motions to that grace, I am to receive from you the Lady Pietosa, who has suffered your attentions so far, and who thanks you, through me, her inherited minister. At your ladyship's pleasure now. Follow us, good Master Galors."
The sun of her day-dreaming rose again and shone full upon her. By the end of the day they had reached Tortsentier. Isoult was fast in a prison that had no look of a prison, where Galors was mending his throat in an upper chamber. Maulfry came and sat on the foot of his bed.
It was to Tortsentier and to Maulfry that Dom Galors rode through the rain when he had finished biting his nails in the quarry. Very late that night he knocked at her door. Maulfry, who slept by day, opened at once, and when she saw who it was made him very welcome.
He would have made speeches and let vapours. This lad was quiet." "Quiet as God," said Maulfry with a stare. "But," Galors went on, "you need not think for him, who or what he was. I shall meet him to-morrow, and if things go as they should you shall see me again very soon. You shall come to a wedding. A wedding in Tortsentier will not be amiss, dame. Moreover, it will be new.
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