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In the main hall he found the vicomte still sitting over his wine of Anjou. "Cousin," said Adhelmar, "I must ride hence to-night." Reinault stared at him: a mastering wonder woke in Reinault's face. "Ta, ta, ta!" he clicked his tongue, very softly. Afterward he sprang to his feet and clutched Adhelmar by both arms. "No, no!" Reinault cried. "No, Adhelmar, you must not try that!
This befell at Bretigny when, in 1360, the Great Peace was signed between France and England, and Hugues, as one of the English embassy, came face to face with Reinault and Melite. History does not detail the meeting; but, inasmuch as the Sieur d'Arques and Melite de Puysange were married at Rouen the following October, doubtless it passed off pleasantly enough.
It is likely I shall hear nothing of the night's doings, ohime, no! not if you murder d'Andreghen in the court-yard!" Reinault ended, and smiled, somewhat sadly. Afterward he took Adhelmar's hand and said: "Farewell, lord Adhelmar! O true knight, sturdy and bold! terrible and merciless toward your enemies, gentle and simple toward your friends, farewell!"
He demanded how many of Hugues' men were about. Some twenty of them had come to Puysange, Melite said, in the hope that Reinault might aid them to save their master.
For my own part, I would not think of wearing a pelisse in the Desert of Sahara merely because I happened to be sailing for Greenland during the ensuing week. I shall trust to His common-sense. "And yet, I wish "I wish Reinault would hurry with the supper-trays. I am growing very hungry." That night he was roused by a tapping at his door. "Jean Bulmer, Jean Bulmer! I have bribed Reinault.
So Adhelmar was half-forgot, and the Sieur d'Arques turned his mind to other matters. He was still a bachelor, for Reinault considered the burden of the times in ill-accord with the chinking of marriage-bells.
It is death, lad, sure death! It means hanging, boy!" the vicomte pleaded, for, hard man that he was, he loved Adhelmar. "That is likely enough," Adhelmar conceded. "They will hang you," Reinault said again: "d'Andreghen and the Count Dauphin of Vienna will hang you as blithely as they would Iscariot." "That, too," said Adhelmar, "is likely enough, if I remain in France."
She would have me me, the King's man, look you! save Hugues at the peril of my seignory! And I protest to you, by the most high and pious Saint Nicolas the Confessor," Reinault swore, "that sooner than see this huckster go unpunished, I would lock Hell's gate on him with my own hands!" For a moment Adhelmar stood with his jaws puffed out, as if in thought, and then he laughed like a wolf.
But while Adhelmar had busied himself in the acquisition of some scant fame and a vast number of scars, Hugues had sensibly inherited the fief of Arques, a snug property with fertile lands and a stout fortress. How, then, should Reinault hesitate between them? He did not.
Reinault informed his sister of his decision; she wept a little, but did not refuse to comply. So Adhelmar, come again to Puysange after five years' absence, found Melite troth-plighted, fast and safe, to Hugues. Reinault told him. Adhelmar grumbled and bit his nails in a corner, for a time; then laughed shortly. "I have loved Melite," he said. "It may be that I love her still.
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