THE REDE OF FIVE RIDING ROGUES
Through the silent streets of Paris a slender line of steel moved
slowly--the thread of which Master François Villon was the needle
pricked to sew the realm of France together. The Grand Constable
rode at the head with the Lords of Lau, of Riviere, and of
Nantoillet, and somewhere at the tail rode the five released rascals
and babbled beneath their breaths as they rode. For the order to
keep silence did not count until the gates of Paris were reached and
began to turn on their hinges to let Villon's adventurers forth.
Every man of the ruffians had a stout sword swinging at his girdle;
every man of them sported a steel cap upon his head; every man of
them felt his heart pulsing with rare emotions and his brain busy
with strange thoughts. René de Montigny spoke first the thing that
filled his mind.
"It must be a devil of a business," he reflected, "to be bullied
like that by a beauty. Blood, but she is beautiful, and blood, but
she can bellow."
Guy Tabarie chuckled fatly. "I have been bullied so many times by
grey-faced drabs that I would take my trouncing patiently from such
a pair of lips. It was meat and drink to look at her and think
thoughts."
Jehan le Loup frowned sourly. "Had I been Master François and black
Louis not been by I should have tried to mend my luck with a cudgel.
At best and worst she would have had something to curse for after a
lusty thumping."
Casin Cholet licked his lips. "I shall think of her," he said, "when
next I meet with a sweetheart. With a little wit your honest rascal
can be as happy as a king. In the dark all fur is of the same
colour."
Oolin de Cayeulx yawned. "What are we going a-riding for?" he
questioned. "I would sooner have stayed in the king's rose garden
and filled my belly as we did last week when the great lord in gold
tissue pitied us. And to think that it was no more than François
after all! I could jam my dagger between his shoulder-blades for
making such a ninny of me."
"I knew him all the time," Guy Tabarie was beginning when René de
Montigny silenced him with a ringing clip on the nearest ear which
nearly unsaddled the fat rogue. "You lie, Mountain, you lie," he
whispered. "Do you think that if he cheated me your pig's eyes could
read the riddle? No, no, he fooled us fairly and he fooled us well,
but he treated us kindly and we can afford to cry quits."
"A strange thing," mused Colin, "that a trifle of hair less on a
man's chin and a trifle of dirt less on a man's cheek, with some
matter of clean linen and a smooth jerkin, can make such a
difference."
"Not at all," said René de Montigny," we are all the same at the
core, every man-jack and woman-jill of us, hungering, thirsting,
lusting, just after the same fashion. 'Tis only the coat that
counts."
"'Tis you who lie now," grunted Tabarie. "There's no gold tissue in
the world that would make you as cunning as François. You would
never have done as he did if the king had made you the pick of the
litter."
Rend whistled through his teeth. "May be so, may be not," he said.
"No man can tell what he may do till he is given his chance to test
his mettle. Oh opportunity, golden opportunity! If I were François
Villon I would shape an image of gold in your name and praise you
for a saint."
"I wonder what that girl will say," mused Tabarie, "if our François
comes back with the Duke of Burgundy in his pocket!"
"I wonder what she will say," sneered Jehan le Loup, "if he trundles
back feet foremost with a hole in his body and half a head."
"Whatever happens is sure to vex her," said Casin Cholet. "Women are
made that way."
"Our poor minions will be lonely to-night," said Colin.
"I doubt it," said René de Montigny drily, and then he sighed a
little. "Poor Abbess!"
Sudden tears smeared Tabarie's fat cheeks.
"She was a brave wench if ever," he snivelled. "Through wellfare or
illfare she was always the same, and would share board and blanket
with a friend though his pouch were as barren as Sarah's body."
"It was ten thousand pities," said Eene, "that she fell so love-sick
for François. Did he give her some philtre, some elixir, do you
think? François is a fine fellow though, I'll not deny it, but he's
had the devil's own luck, and by our patron St. Nicholas there be
others as fine as he."
As he spoke the great gate of the city yawned noiselessly, and
stealthy and silent the hope of Paris glided into the darkness and
was swallowed up by the night.