Part 4 (2/2)
”He is in one of his bad moods,” said Isabeau. ”Leave him to himself,” and she drew her reluctant companion back to the table, while Villon seated himself in a corner of the settle, staring into the fire.
At the moment the tavern door was thrust open violently and Guy Tabarie rushed into the room, his great moon face sweating, his eyes bulging, his fringe of crimson locks flaming out from the eggsh.e.l.l dome of his bald head, his mighty belly swaying with a pa.s.sion of excitement.
”Friends!” he shrieked, at the top of his voice, ”there's a fight at Fat Margot's between two wenches. They are stripped to the waist and at it hammer and tongs. Come and see for the love of G.o.d!”
The whole band was afoot in an instant, clamantly agog. Guy Tabarie turned as he finished speaking and rushed through the open door into the s.h.i.+ning moonlit street. The rest trailed after him, wandering stars in the tail of a dishonourable comet, shouting, screaming, laughing, pus.h.i.+ng, panting, eager for the promised sport.
”I'll crown the victor!” cried Montigny as he ran and ”I'll console the vanquished!” shouted Jehan le Loup, as he brought up the rear of the road and vanished, clattering, into the night. Only Huguette remained of all the fellows.h.i.+p, and she turned instinctively to Villon when he crouched over the dying fire.
”Will you come, Francois?” she whispered softly. Villon lifted his head for a moment from his hands to signify a refusal.
”Nay, I am reading.”
Huguette blazed out at him a fierce ”You lie!” which failed to move the poet from his melancholy resolve.
”A man may read without book,” he said. ”Go your ways, girl, and skelp both the hussies!” He drooped into a dejected heap again, oblivious of the girl, who looked at him half sadly, half angrily for an instant, and then disappeared in her turn into the causeway, calling upon her knavish heralds to wait for her.
Robin Turgis, shutting the door after her with a sigh of satisfaction, retired to his own quarters to seek sleep until custom should return. Louie and Tristan, deep in their cards, paid little heed to anything else.
”Your barber tarries,” Tristan said, after a panse.
”The game makes amends,” Louis answered.
”You are winning, sire,” Tristan grunted. The king chirruped merrily.
”My grandsire will be remembered longer than most kings for the sake of these wasters and winners that they made to soothe his madness.”
But even as he spoke his mirth faded, for a turn of Fortune gave Tristan an opportunity.
”My game, sire!” he said, and swept the stakes into his pocket.
The king fell into a frowning silence as Tristan dealt the cards again, and scrutinized his new hand with a sombre care, as if the fate of Empire depended upon it. Scarcely a sound disturbed the heavy quiet of the room. Master Francois Villon glooming in his settle corner, sucked a long noiseless draught from his stolen jug and meditated drearily. Between wine and weariness his head was beginning to swim. His head felt as heavy as lead and his brain as light and foolish as a wind-tumbled feather. Two women's faces danced before his eyes, one proud and beautiful and young, the other humble and pitiful and old, and he tried his best to shut both of them out of his senses. Vaguely he tried to shape a ballade, a n.o.ble ballade in honour of all things good to eat. He had got at least an excellent overword. ”A dish of tripe's the best of all.” He mouthed the line with a relish, but his eyes were seeing straws and his stubbled chin sc.r.a.ped his breast. There came a click at the latch, but he did not heed it. He would scarcely have heeded a Burgundian cannon shot; he had drifted into a lumpish doze. And yet the way of the world depended, for him, upon that lift of a latch.
CHAPTER III
THE COMING OF KATHERINE
The door opened and a woman entered the room, a woman closely m.u.f.fled after the fas.h.i.+on adopted by discreet ladies when they walked abroad in Paris in the fifteenth century. She was followed by an armed serving-man to whom she turned and spoke in a whisper as she paused upon the threshold.
”You are sure this is the place?” she asked, and the man answered--
”Sure!”
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