“Don’t you think your gallantry is a little old-fashioned?” she said;
and when I looked confused and humbled, she added quietly, “Oh, I like
it, I like everything old-fashioned, and it is delightful to hear you
say such pretty things.”
The moorland around us was very still now under its ghostly sheet
of mist. The plovers had ceased their calling; the crickets and all
the little creatures of the fields were silent as we passed, yet it
seemed to me as if I could hear them beginning again far behind us.
Well in advance, the two tall falconers strode across the heather, and
the faint jingling of the hawks’ bells came to our ears in distant
murmuring chimes.
Suddenly a splendid hound dashed out of the mist in front, followed
by another and another until half-a-dozen or more were bounding and
leaping around the girl beside me. She caressed and quieted them with
her gloved hand, speaking to them in quaint terms which I remembered to
have seen in old French manuscripts.
Then the falcons on the circlet borne by the falconer ahead began
to beat their wings and scream, and from somewhere out of sight the
notes of a hunting-horn floated across the moor. The hounds sprang
away before us and vanished in the twilight, the falcons flapped and
squealed upon their perch, and the girl, taking up the song of the
horn, began to hum. Clear and mellow her voice sounded in the night air.
“Chasseur, chasseur, chassez encore,
Quittez Rosette et Jeanneton,
Tonton, tonton, tontaine, tonton,
Ou, pour, rabattre, dès l’aurore,
Que les Amours soient de planton,
Tonton, tontaine, tonton.”
As I listened to her lovely voice a grey mass which rapidly grew more
distinct loomed up in front, and the horn rang out joyously through the
tumult of the hounds and falcons. A torch glimmered at a gate, a light
streamed through an opening door, and we stepped upon a wooden bridge
which trembled under our feet and rose creaking and straining behind
us as we passed over the moat and into a small stone court, walled on
every side. From an open doorway a man came and, bending in salutation,
presented a cup to the girl beside me. She took the cup and touched it
with her lips, then lowering it turned to me and said in a low voice,
“I bid you welcome.”
At that moment one of the falconers came with another cup, but before
handing it to me, presented it to the girl, who tasted it. The falconer
made a gesture to receive it, but she hesitated a moment, and then,
stepping forward, offered me the cup with her own hands. I felt this
to be an act of extraordinary graciousness, but hardly knew what was
expected of me, and did not raise it to my lips at once. The girl
flushed crimson. I saw that I must act quickly.
“Mademoiselle,” I faltered, “a stranger whom you have saved from
dangers he may never realize empties this cup to the gentlest and
loveliest hostess of France.”
“In His name,” she murmured, crossing herself as I drained the cup.
Then stepping into the doorway she turned to me with a pretty gesture
and, taking my hand in hers, led me into the house, saying again and
again: “You are very welcome, indeed you are welcome to the Château
d’Ys.”