“It is true, fair lord! It is true!” cried a dozen French voices.
“Nay, sir, judge not too soon!” shouted an English squire, pushing his way to the front. “It was I who had him at my mercy, and he is my prisoner, for he spoke to this man only because he could tell by his tongue that he was his own countryman. I took him, and here are a score to prove it.”
“It is true, fair lord. We saw it and it was even so,” cried a chorus of Englishmen.
At all times there was growling and snapping betwixt the English and their allies of France. The Prince saw how easily this might set a light to such a flame as could not readily be quenched. It must be stamped out now ere it had time to mount.
“Fair and honored lord,” he said to the King, “again I pray you for a moment of patience. It is your word and only yours which can tell us what is just and right. To whom were you graciously pleased to commit your royal person?”
King John looked up from the flagon which had been brought to him and wiped his lips with the dawnings of a smile upon his ruddy face.
“It was not this Englishman,” he said, and a cheer burst from the Gascons, “nor was it this bastard Frenchman,” he added. “To neither of them did I surrender.”
There was a hush of surprise.
“To whom then, sir?” asked the Prince.
The King looked slowly round. “There was a devil of a yellow horse,” said he. “My poor palfrey went over like a skittle-pin before a ball. Of the rider I know nothing save that he bore red roses on a silver shield. Ah! by Saint Denis, there is the man himself, and there his thrice-accursed horse!”