The seneschal’s wife did not think long over the best way quickly to
awaken the love of the page, and had soon discovered the natural
ambuscade in the which the most wary are taken. This is how: at the
warmest hour of the day the good man took his siesta after the Saracen
fashion, a habit in which he had never failed, since his return from
the Holy Land. During this time Blanche was alone in the grounds,
where the women work at their minor occupations, such as broidering
and stitching, and often remained in the rooms looking after the
washing, putting the clothes tidy, or running about at will. Then she
appointed this quiet hour to complete the education of the page,
making him read books and say his prayers. Now on the morrow, when at
the mid-day hour the seneschal slept, succumbing to the sun which
warms with its most luminous rays the slopes of Roche-Corbon, so much
so that one is obliged to sleep, unless annoyed, upset, and
continually roused by a devil of a young woman. Blanche then
gracefully perched herself in the great seignorial chair of her good
man, which she did not find any too high, since she counted upon the
chances of perspective. The cunning jade settled herself dextrously
therein, like a swallow in its nest, and leaned her head maliciously
upon her arm like a child that sleeps; but in making her preparations
she opened fond eyes, that smiled and winked in advance of the little
secret thrills, sneezes, squints, and trances of the page who was
about to lie at her feet, separated from her by the jump of an old
flea; and in fact she advanced so much and so near the square of
velvet where the poor child should kneel, whose life and soul she
trifled with, that had he been a saint of stone, his glance would have
been constrained to follow the flexousities of the dress in order to
admire and re-admire the perfections and beauties of the shapely leg,
which moulded the white stocking of the seneschal’s lady. Thus it was
certain that a weak varlet would be taken in the snare, wherein the
most vigorous knight would willingly have succumbed. When she had
turned, returned, placed and displaced her body, and found the
situation in which the page would be most comfortable, she cried,
gently. “Rene!” Rene, whom she knew well was in the guard-room, did
not fail to run in and quickly thrust his brown head between the
tapestries of the door.
“What do you please to wish?” said the page. And he held with great
respect in his hand his shaggy scarlet cap, less red than his fresh
dimpled cheeks.
“Come hither,” replied she, under her breath, for the child attracted
her so strongly that she was quite overcome.
And forsooth there were no jewels so sparkling as the eyes of Rene, no
vellum whiter than his skin, no woman more exquisite in shape--and so
near to her desire, she found him still more sweetly formed--and was
certain that the merry frolics of love would radiate well from this
youth, the warm sun, the silence, et cetera.
“Read me the litanies of Madame the Virgin,” said she to him, pushing
an open book him on her prieu-dieu. “Let me see if you are well taught
by your master.”
“Do you not think the Virgin beautiful?” asked she of him, smiling
when he held the illuminated prayer-book in which glowed the silver
and gold.
“It is a painting,” replied he, timidly, and casting a little glance
upon his so gracious mistress.
“Read! read!”
Then Rene began to recite the so sweet and so mystic litanies; but you
may imagine that the “Ora pro nobis” of Blanche became still fainter
and fainter, like the sound of the horn in the woodlands, and when the
page went on, “Oh, Rose of mystery,” the lady, who certainly heard
distinctly, replied by a gentle sigh. Thereupon Rene suspected that
his mistress slept. Then he commenced to cover her with his regard,
admiring her at his leisure, and had then no wish to utter any anthem
save the anthem of love. His happiness made his heart leap and bound
into his throat; thus, as was but natural, these two innocents burned
one against the other, but if they could have foreseen never would
have intermingled. Rene feasted his eyes, planning in his mind a
thousand fruitions of love that brought the water into his mouth. In
his ecstasy he let his book fall, which made him feel as sheepish as a
monk surprised at a child’s tricks; but also from that he knew that
Blanche was sound asleep, for she did not stir, and the wily jade
would not have opened her eyes even at the greatest dangers, and
reckoned on something else falling as well as the book of prayer.
There is no worse longing than the longing of a woman in certain
condition. Now, the page noticed his lady’s foot, which was delicately
slippered in a little shoe of a delicate blue colour. She had
angularly placed it on a footstool, since she was too high in the
seneschal’s chair. This foot was of narrow proportions, delicately
curved, as broad as two fingers, and as long as a sparrow, tail
included, small at the top--a true foot of delight, a virginal foot
that merited a kiss as a robber does the gallows; a roguish foot; a
foot wanton enough to damn an archangel; an ominous foot; a devilishly
enticing foot, which gave one a desire to make two new ones just like
it to perpetuate in this lower world the glorious works of God. The
page was tempted to take the shoe from this persuasive foot. To
accomplish this his eyes glowing with the fire of his age, went
swiftly, like the clapper of a bell, from this said foot of
delectation to the sleeping countenance of his lady and mistress,
listening to her slumber, drinking in her respiration again and again,
it did not know where it would be sweetest to plant a kiss--whether on
the ripe red lips of the seneschal’s wife or on this speaking foot. At
length, from respect or fear, or perhaps from great love, he chose the
foot, and kissed it hastily, like a maiden who dares not. Then
immediately he took up his book, feeling his red cheeks redder still,
and exercised with his pleasure, he cried like a blind man--“_Janua
coeli,: gate of Heaven_.” But Blanche did not move, making sure that
the page would go from foot to knee, and thence to “_Janua coeli,: gate
of Heaven_.” She was greatly disappointed when the litanies finished
without any other mischief, and Rene, believing he had had enough
happiness for one day, ran out of the room quite lively, richer from
this hardy kiss than a robber who has robbed the poor-box.
When the seneschal’s lady was alone, she thought to herself that this
page would be rather a long time at his task if he amused himself with
the singing of the Magnificat at matins. Then she determined on the
morrow to raise her foot a little, and then to bring to light those
hidden beauties that are called perfect in Touraine, because they take
no hurt in the open air, and are always fresh. You can imagine that
the page, burned by his desire and his imagination, heated by the day
before, awaited impatiently the hour to read in this breviary of
gallantry, and was called; and the conspiracy of the litanies
commenced again, and Blanche did not fail to fall asleep. This time
the said Rene fondled with his hand the pretty limb, and even ventured
so far as to verify if the polished knee and its surroundings were
satin. At this sight the poor child, armed against his desire, so
great was his fear, dared only to make brief devotion and curt
caresses, and although he kissed softly this fair surface, he remained
bashful, the which, feeling by the senses of her soul and the
intelligence of her body, the seneschal’s lady who took great care not
to move, called out to him--“Ah, Rene, I am asleep.”
Hearing what he believed to be a stern reproach, the page frightened
ran away, leaving the books, the task, and all. Thereupon, the
seneschal’s better half added this prayer to the litany--“Holy Virgin,
how difficult children are to make.”
At dinner her page perspired all down his back while waiting on his
lady and her lord; but he was very much surprised when he received
from Blanche the most shameless of all glances that ever woman cast,
and very pleasant and powerful it was, seeing that it changed this
child into a man of courage. Now, the same evening Bruyn staying a
little longer than was his custom in his own apartment, the page went
in search of Blanche, and found her asleep, and made her dream a
beautiful dream.
He knocked off the chains that weighed so heavily upon her, and so
plentifully bestowed upon her the sweets of love, that the surplus
would have sufficed to render to others blessed with the joys of
maternity. So then the minx, seizing the page by the head and
squeezing him to her, cried out--“Oh, Rene! Thou hast awakened me!”
And in fact there was no sleep could stand against it, and it is
certain that saints must sleep very soundly. From this business,
without any other mystery, and by a benign faculty which is the
assisting principle of spouses, the sweet and graceful plumage,
suitable to cuckolds, was placed upon the head of the good husband
without his experiencing the slightest shock.
After this sweet repast, the seneschal’s lady took kindly to her
siesta after the French fashion, while Bruyn took his according to the
Saracen. But by the said siesta she learned how the good youth of the
page had a better taste than that of the old seneschal, and at night
she buried herself in the sheets far away from her husband, whom she
found strong and stale. And from sleeping and waking up in the day,
from taking siestas and saying litanies, the seneschal’s wife felt
growing within her that treasure for which she had so often and so
ardently sighed; but now she liked more the commencement than the
fructifying of it.
You may be sure that Rene knew how to read, not only in books, but in
the eyes of his sweet lady, for whom he would have leaped into a
flaming pile, had it been her wish he should do so. When well and
amply, more than a hundred times, the train had been laid by them, the
little lady became anxious about her soul and the future of her friend
the page. Now one rainy day, as they were playing at touch-tag, like
two children, innocent from head to foot, Blanche, who was always
caught, said to him--
“Come here, Rene; do you know that while I have only committed venial
sins because I was asleep, you have committed mortal ones?”
“Ah, Madame!” said he, “where then will God stow away all the damned
if that is to sin!”
Blanche burst out laughing, and kissed his forehead.
“Be quiet, you naughty boy; it is a question of paradise, and we must
live there together if you wish always to be with me.”
“Oh, my paradise is here.”
“Leave off,” said she. “You are a little wretch--a scapegrace who does
not think of that which I love--yourself! You do not know that I am
with child, and that in a little while I shall be no more able to
conceal it than my nose. Now, what will the abbot say? What will my
lord say? He will kill you if he puts himself in a passion. My advice
is little one, that you go to the abbot of Marmoustiers, confess your
sins to him, asking him to see what had better be done concerning my
seneschal.
“Alas,” said the artful page, “if I tell the secret of our joys, he
will put his interdict upon our love.”
“Very likely,” said she; “but thy happiness in the other world is a
thing so precious to me.”
“Do you wish it my darling?”
“Yes,” replied she rather faintly.
“Well, I will go, but sleep again that I may bid you adieu.”
And the couple recited the litany of Farewells as if they had both
foreseen that their love must finish in its April. And on the morrow,
more to save his dear lady than to save himself, and also to obey her,
Rene de Jallanges set out towards the great monastery.