SALOMON IS DRIVEN HOME
Galors, too, knew that the hour had come; but his spirit came up to
meet it, and he made a push for it. He was over the brook; if he could
top the ridge he would have the advantage he had a year ago, which this
time he swore to put to better use. The girl knew his thoughts as she
had known the accolade of the thundering hoofs behind them. She would
have thrown herself if the steel trap had loosed ever so little; as it
was, she fluttered like a rag caught in a bush; the filmy body was what
Galors held, the soul shrilled prayers to the man's confusion. He could
not stay her lips; they moved, working against him, as he knew well.
"Mother of God, send him, send him, send him!" It was ill fighting
against a girl's soul, it slacked his rein and drugged his heel. By
God, let the boy come and be damned; let him fight! "Mother of God,
send, send, send!" breathed Isoult. The horse below them shuddered,
failed to come up to the rein, bowed his head to the jerked spur.
Galors left off spurring, and slackened his rein. Though he would not
look behind him he heard the plash of the ford, heard also Prosper's
low, "Steady, mare, hold up!" Prosper was over; Galors halfway up the
hill. It would be soon.
The black and white gained hand over hand; the red and green felt him
come. The soul of Isoult hovered between them. Black and white drew
level; red and green held on. Side by side, spears erect and tapering
into the moon, plumes nodding, eyes front, they paced; the soul of
Isoult took flight, the body crouched in the steel's hug. The gleam of
the white wicket-gates caught their master's eye; they were risen in
judgment against him. _Entra per me_ was to play him false. This
trifling thing unnerved him till it seemed to speak a message of doom.
But doom once read and accepted, nerve came back. By God, he would die
as he had lived, strenuously, seeking one thing at a time! But to be
killed by his chosen arm, overshrilled by his own shout--that sobered
him, little of a sentimentalist as he was. As for love-lorn Prosper, he
had still less sentiment to waste. True, he had not chosen his arms,
his motto had been found for him by his ancestors--they were
cut-and-dried affairs, so much clothing to which Galors at this moment
served as a temporary peg. Sweet Saviour! the Much-Desired was near
him, close by. He could have touched her head. She never moved to look
at him; he knew so much without turning his own head. And he knew
further that she knew him there. The soul of Isoult, you see, had taken
wings. Thus they gained the ridge and halted. Backing their beasts,
they were face to face, and each looked shrewdly at the other, waiting
who should begin the game.
Then it was that Isoult suddenly sat up and looked at Prosper. He could
not read her face, but knew by her stiff-poised head that she was
quivering. He said nothing, but made a motion, a swift jerk with his
head, to wave her out of the way. Galors responded by first tightening,
finally relaxing, his hold upon her waist. She slipt down from the
saddle, and stood hesitating what to do. She had waited for this moment
so long, that the natural thing had become the most unnatural of all.
Prosper never glanced at her, but kept his eyes steadily on Galors. The
times--in his mannish view--were too great for lovers. Isoult stept
back into the shadows.
The two men at once saluted in knightly fashion, wheeled, and rode
apart. The lists were a long alley between the pines, all soft moss and
low scrub of whortleberry and heather. Galors had the hill behind him,
but no disadvantage in that unless he were pushed down it; the place
was dead level. They halted at some thirty yards' interval, waiting.
Then Prosper gave a shout--_"Bide the time!" "Entra per me!"_ came as a
sombre echo; and the two spurred horses flung forward at each other.
Each spear went true. Prosper got his into the centre of Galors'
shield, and it splintered at the guard. Galors' hit fair; but Prosper
used his trick of dropping at the impact, so that the spear glanced off
over his shoulder. Galors recovered it and his seat together. It would
seem that Prosper had taught him some civility by this, for he threw
his lance away as soon as the horses were free of each other. Both drew
their swords. Then followed a bout of wheeling and darting in, at which
Prosper had clear advantage as the lighter horseman on the handier
horse. Galors' strength was in downright carving; Prosper's in his
wrist-play and lightning recovery. He, moreover, was cool, Galors hot.
At this work he got home thrice to the other's once, but that once was
for a memory, starred the shoulder-piece and bit to the bone. Left arm
luckily. Prosper made a feint at a light canter, spurred when he was up
with his man, and, as his horse plunged, got down a back-stroke, which
sent Galors' weapon flying from his hand. He turned sharply and reined
up. Galors dismounted slowly, picked up his sword, and went to mount
again. He blundered it twice, shook the blood out of his eyes, tried
again, but lurched heavily and dropped. He only saved himself by the
saddle. Prosper guessed him more breathed than blooded.
"Galors," said he, "we have done well enough for the turn. Rest, and
let me rest."
"As you will," said Galors thickly.
The two men sat facing each other on either side of the way. Galors
unlaced his helm and leaned on his elbows, taking long breaths. Prosper
unlaced his; and then followed a lesson to Isoult in warfare, as he
understood it. The girl had run down the hill-side to the brook, so
soon as she saw they must give over. She now came back, bearing between
her hands a broad leaf filled with water. This she brought to her lord.
Prosper smiled to her.
"Take it to Galors, Isoult, whom we must consider as our guest," he
whispered.
She turned at once and went dutifully, with recollected feet and bosom
girt in meekness, to give him the cold water cupped in her palms.
Galors drank greedily, and grunted his thanks. As for Prosper, he
praised men and angels for a fair vision.
She came back after another journey to feed her lover, and afterwards
stood as near to him as she dared. Galors, the alien, looked ever at
the ground.
"Galors," said Prosper presently, "how do you find my harness?"
"It has served me its turn," he answered.
"That also I can say of yours," replied Prosper, with a little laugh;
"for it has taken me into places where, without it, I should have found
a strait gate in. For that I can thank you more than for the head-ache
and cold bath at Goltres."
"Ha!" said the other, "that was a sheer knock. I thought it had
finished you, to be plain. But do not lay it to my door. I fight truer
than that."
"Truly enough you have fought me this night," Prosper allowed heartily,
"and I ask no better. But will you now tell me one thing about which I
have been curious ever since our encounter in this place a year ago?"
"What is it?"
"Your arms--the blazon--do you bear them as of right?"
"I bear them by the right a fighter has. They have carried me far, and
done my work."
"They are not of your family?"
"My family? Messire, you should know that a monk carries no arms. My
family, moreover, was not knightly, till I made it knightly."
"The arms you assumed with your new profession?"
"I did."
"May I know whence you took them?"
"No, I cannot tell you that. They are the arms of a man now dead,
Salomon de Montguichet."
"They are the arms," said Prosper slowly, "of a man now dead. I saw him
dead, and helped to bury him. I knew not then how he died, though I
have thought to be sure since. But you are wrong in one thing. The
bearer of those arms was not Salomon de Montguichet."
"It is you who are wrong, Messire. It is beyond doubt; and the proof is
that on the shield are the _guichets_, taken from the name."
"Galors, the name was taken from the _guichets_, and the _guichets_
from Coldscaur in the north. The man's name was Salomon de Born."
Galors gave a dry sob, and another, and another. He threw up his arms,
twisting with the gesture of a man on the rope. Prosper and Isoult rose
also, Prosper pale and hard, the girl wide-eyed. Galors seemed to tear
at himself, as if at war with a fiend inside him. 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. Out of my own deeds cometh His
judgment, and out of my own sowing the harvest I shall reap. _Entra per
me_, saith God." He turned to Prosper. "Sir, I accept of your
allowance. I will not take you far. One more thing I will ask at your
hands, that you give me back my own sword--Salomon's sword. After a
little you shall have it again."
"I will do it," said Prosper, knowing his thought.
They changed swords. Prosper set Isoult on his horse and himself walked
at her stirrup. The three of them moved forward without another word
given or exchanged. Galors led the way.
Instead of following the line of the chase, which had been north, they
now struck east through the heavy woodland. So they went for some three
hours. It must have been near midnight, with a moon clear of all trees,
when they halted at a cross-ride which ran north and south. Before
them, over the ride, rose a thick wall of pine-stems, so serried that
there was no room for a horse to pass in between them. Isoult started,
looked keenly up and down the ride, then collected herself and sat
quite still. Prosper took no notice of anything.
"Prosper," said Galors quietly, "you will wait here for me. You know
that I shall return. It will be within half-an-hour from now."
"Good. I shall be here."
Galors dismounted and plunged into the wall of pines; they seemed to
move and fold him in their mazes, and nothing spoke of him thereafter
but the sound of his heavy tread on dry twigs. When this was lost an
immense stillness sat brooding.
Neither Prosper nor Isoult could speak. Her presence was to him a warm
consolation, to be apprehended by flashes in the course of a long
battle with black and heavy thoughts; her also the pause (more fateful
than the battle it had interrupted) affected strangely, the more
strangely because she did not know the whole truth. I may say here that
Prosper never told her of it; nor did she ask it of him. It was the one
event of their lives, joint and disjoint, upon which they were always
as dumb as now when they thought apart. Thoughtful apart though they
were, they felt together. Prosper's hand stole upwards from his side;
Isoult's drew to it as metal to magnet; the rest of that heavy hour
they passed hand-in-hand. So children comfort each other in the dark.
Very faint and far off a solitary cry broke the vast dearth of the
night. It rose like an owl's hooting, held, shuddered, and then died
down. Prosper's clasp on the girl's hand suddenly straightened; it held
convulsively while the call held, relaxed when it relaxed. Then the
former hush swam again over the wood, and so endured until, after
intolerable suspense, they heard the heavy tread of Galors de Born.
His bulk, his white impassive mask, were before them.
"I have settled my account, Prosper," he said. "Now settle yours."
Prosper shivered.
"I am quite ready," said he.
They changed, then crossed swords, and began their second rally on
foot. You would have said that they were sluggish at the work, as if
their blood had cooled with the long wait or sense of still more
dreadful business in the background, and needed a sting to one or other
to set it boiling again. They fenced almost idly at first; it was cut
and parry--formalism. Galors was very steady; Prosper, breathing
tightly through his nose, very wary. Gradually, however, they warmed to
it. Galors got a cut in the upper arm, and began making ugly rushes,
blundering, uncalculated bustles, which could only end one way. Prosper
had little difficulty in evading most of these; Galors lost his breath
and with it his temper. The sight of his own shield and sword, ever at
point against him, made him mad. He could never reach his adroit enemy,
it seemed. For a supreme effort he feigned, drew back, then made a
rush. Prosper parried, recovered, and let in with a staggering head-cut
which for the time dizzied his opponent. Galors lowered his head under
his shield, made another desperate blind rush, and got to close
quarters. The two men struggled together, fighting as much with shields
as swords, and more with legs and arms than anything else. They were
indistinguishable, a twisting and flashing tangle; they locked,
writhed, swayed, tottered--then rent asunder. Galors fell heavily. He
got on his feet again, however, for another rush. As he came on Prosper
stepped aside, knocked out his guard and slashed at the shoulder--a
dreadful thirsty blow. Galors staggered, his shield dropped; but he
came on once more. Another side-cut beat his weapon down, and then a
back-handed blow crashed into his gorget. He threw up his arms and
staggered backwards; a last cut finished him. Galors with a cough that
ended in a wet groan fell like lead. He never spoke nor moved again.
Prosper sank on his knees, beaten out. Isoult started from the wood to
hold him, but he waved her back. All was not done. He put his sword in
his mouth and crept on all fours to his enemy, lifted his visor, looked
in his face. Then he got up and stood over him. He swung back the bare
sword of Salomon de Born with both hands. It came down, did its last
work and broke.
Prosper threw the pommel from him and lifted up the head of Galors. The
times were grim times. He tied it to his saddle-bow. Then he turned to
Isoult.
"Come," he said, "the fight is done."
They did not stay. He took his own shield and sword from the dead, girt
on the first and slung the latter to the spare saddle. He took his wife
in his arms, not daring to kiss her in such a place, and put her on
Galors' horse; and so they went their way into the misty woods.
Dark Tortsentier took up the watch amid the sighing of its pine-tree
host. Its array of shields, its swords and mail kept their counsel. The
figures in the singular tapestry of Troilus went through their aping
unadmired, and the grey dawn found them at it. Then you might see how
idle Cresseide, peering askance at Maulfry with her sly eyes, watched
the black pool drown her hair.