第82章 HOW ELLIOT'S JACKANAPES CAME HOME(3)

In these months I had tidings of Elliot now and again;and as occasion served I wrote to her,with messages of my love,and with a gift,as of a ring or a jewel.But concerning the manner of my escape from Paris I had told Elliot nothing for this cause.My desire was,when soonest I had an occasion,to surprise her with the gift of her jackanapes anew,knowing well that nothing could make her greater joy,save my own coming,or a victory of the Maid.The little creature had been my comrade wheresoever we went,as at Sully,Gien,and Bourges,only I took him not to the leaguers of St.

Pierre le Moustier and La Charite,but left him with a fair lady of the Court.He had waxed fat again,for as meagre as he was when he came to me in prison,and he was full of new tricks,warming himself at the great fire in hall,like a man.

Now in the middle of the month of January,in the year of Grace fourteen hundred and thirty,the Maid told us of her household that she would journey to Orleans,to abide for some space with certain ladies of her friends,namely,Madame de St.Mesmin and Madame de Mouchy,who loved her dearly.To the most of us she gave holiday,to see our own friends.The Maid knew surely that in France my friends were few,and well she guessed whither I was bound.

Therefore she sent for me,and bidding me carry her love to Elliot,she put into my hands a gift to her friend.It was a ring of silver-gilt,fashioned like that which her own father and mother had given her.At this ring she had a custom of looking often,so that the English conceived it to be an unholy talisman,though it bore the Name that is above all names.That ring I now wear in my bosom.

So,saying farewell,with many kind words on her part,I rode towards Tours,where Elliot and her father as then dwelt,in that same house where I had been with them to be healed of my malady,after the leaguer of Orleans.To Tours I rode,telling them not of my coming,and carrying the jackanapes well wrapped up in furs of the best.The weather was frosty,and folk were sliding on the ice of the flooded fields near Tours when I came within sight of the great Minster.The roads rang hard;on the smooth ice the low sun was making paths of gold,and I sang as I rode.Putting up my horse at the sign of the "Hanging Sword,"I took the ape under my great furred surcoat,and stole like a thief through the alleys,towards my master's house.The night was falling,and all the casement of the great chamber was glowing with the colour and light of a leaping fire within.There came a sound of music too,as one touched the virginals to a tune of my own country.My heart was beating for joy,as it had beaten in the bushment outside Paris town.

I opened the outer door secretly,for I knew the trick of it,and Isaw from the thin thread of light on the wall of the passage that the chamber door was a little ajar.The jackanapes was now fretting and struggling within my surcoat,so,opening the coat,I put him down by the chamber door.He gave a little scratch,as was his custom,for he was a very mannerly little beast,and the sound of the virginals ceased.Then,pushing the door with his little hands,he ran in,with a kind of cry of joy.

"In Our Lady's name,what is this?"came the voice of Elliot."My dear,dear little friend,what make you here?"Then I could withhold myself no longer,but entered,and my lady ran to me,the jackanapes clinging about her neck with his arms.But mine were round her too,and what words we said,and what cheer we made each the other,I may not write,commending me to all true lovers,whose hearts shall tell them that whereof I am silent.Much was I rebuked for that I did not write to warn them of my coming,which was yet the more joyful that they were not warned.And then the good woman,Elliot's kinswoman,must be called (though in sooth not at the very first),and then a great fire must be lit in my old chamber;and next my master came in,from a tavern where he had been devising with some Scots of his friends;and all the while the jackanapes kept such a merry coil,and played so many of his tricks,and got so many kisses from his mistress,that it was marvel.But of all that had befallen me in the wars,and of how the Maiden did (concerning which Elliot had questioned me first of all),I would tell them little till supper was brought.

And then,indeed,out came all my tale,and they heard of what had been my fortune in Paris,and how the jackanapes had delivered me from durance,whereon never,surely,was any beast of his kind so caressed since our father Adam gave all the creatures their names.

But as touching the Maid,I told how she had borne herself at St.

Pierre le Moustier,and of all the honours that had been granted to her,and I bade them be of good heart and hope,for that her banner would be on the wind in spring,after Easter Day.All the good news that might be truly told I did tell,as how La Hire had taken Louviers town,and harried the English up to the very gates of Rouen.And I gave to Elliot the ring which the Maid had sent to her,fashioned like that she herself wore,but of silver gilt,whereas the Maid's was of base metal,and it bore the Holy Names MARI.IHS.Thereon Elliot kissed it humbly,and avowed herself to be,that night,the gladdest damsel in all France.