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Page 35
'"Why should I? Thy son will stay with me. If the King calls me again to
leave Pevensey, which I must guard against England's enemies; if the
King sends his men against me for a traitor; or if I hear that the King
in his bed thinks any evil of me or my two knights, thy son will be
hanged from out this window, Fulke."'
'But it hadn't anything to do with his son,' cried Una, startled.
'How could we have hanged Fulke?' said Sir Richard. 'We needed him to
make our peace with the King. He would have betrayed half England for
the boy's sake. Of that we were sure.'
'I don't understand,' said Una. 'But I think it was simply awful.'
'So did not Fulke. He was well pleased.'
'What? Because his son was going to be killed?'
'Nay. Because De Aquila had shown him how he might save the boy's life
and his own lands and honours. "I will do it," he said. "I swear I will
do it. I will tell the King thou art no traitor, but the most excellent,
valiant, and perfect of us all. Yes, I will save thee."
'De Aquila looked still into the bottom of the cup, rolling the
wine-dregs to and fro.
'"Ay," he said. "If I had a son, I would, I think, save him. But do not
by any means tell me how thou wilt go about it."
'"Nay, nay," said Fulke, nodding his bald head wisely. "That is my
secret. But rest at ease, De Aquila, no hair of thy head nor rood of thy
land shall be forfeited," and he smiled like one planning great good
deeds.
'"And henceforward," said De Aquila, "I counsel thee to serve one
master--not two."
'"What?" said Fulke. "Can I work no more honest trading between the two
sides these troublous times?"
'"Serve Robert or the King--England or Normandy," said De Aquila. "I
care not which it is, but make thy choice here and now."
'"The King, then," said Fulke, "for I see he is better served than
Robert. Shall I swear it?"
'"No need," said De Aquila, and he laid his hand on the parchments which
Gilbert had written. "It shall be some part of my Gilbert's penance to
copy out the savoury tale of thy life, till we have made ten, twenty, an
hundred, maybe, copies. How many cattle, think you, would the Bishop of
Tours give for that tale? Or thy brother? Or the Monks of Blois?
Minstrels will turn it into songs which thy own Saxon serfs shall sing
behind their plough-stilts, and men-at-arms riding through thy Norman
towns. From here to Rome, Fulke, men will make very merry over that
tale, and how Fulke told it, hanging in a well, like a drowned puppy.
This shall be thy punishment, if ever I find thee double-dealing with
thy King any more. Meantime, the parchments stay here with thy son. Him
I will return to thee when thou hast made my peace with the King. The
parchments never."
'Fulke hid his face and groaned.
'"Bones of the Saints!" said De Aquila, laughing. "The pen cuts deep. I
could never have fetched that grunt out of thee with any sword."
'"But so long as I do not anger thee, my tale will be secret?" said
Fulke.
'"Just so long. Does that comfort thee, Fulke?" said De Aquila.
'"What other comfort have ye left me?" he said, and of a sudden he wept
hopelessly like a child, dropping his face on his knees.'
'Poor Fulke,' said Una.
'I pitied him also,' said Sir Richard.
'"After the spur, corn," said De Aquila, and he threw Fulke three wedges
of gold that he had taken from our little chest by the bedplace.
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