“Then must I write to Sir Robert?” said Richard; “mine is scarce a message for word of mouth.”
“So he said it was like to be,” returned the knight, “and he took thought to send you a slip of parchment, knowing, he said, that such things are not wont to be found in a crusader’s budget. Moreover, if ink be wanting, he bade me tell you that there’s a fish in these seas, with many arms, and very like the foul fiend, that carries a bag of ink as good as any scrivener’s.”
“I have seen the monster,” said Richard, who had often been down to the beach to see the unlading of the fishermen’s boats, and to share little John of Dunster’s unfailing marvel, that the Mediterranean should produce such outlandish creatures, so alien to his Bristol Channel experiences.
And the very next time the boats came in, Richard made his way to the shore, on the beautiful, rocky, broken coast; and presently encountered a sepia, which fully justified Sir Robert’s comparison, lying at the bottom of a boat. The fisherman intended it for his own dinner, when all his choicer fish should have gone to supply the Friday’s meal of the English chivalry; and he was a good deal amazed when the young gentleman, making his Provençal as like Sicilian as he could, began to traffic with him for it, and at last made him understand that it was only its ink-bag that he wanted.
The said ink, secured in a shell, was brought home by Richard, together with a couple of the largest sea-bird’s quills that he could find—and which he shaped with his dagger, as best he might, in remembrance of Father Adam de Marisco’s writing lessons. He meditated what should be the language of his letter, which was not likely to be secure from the eyes of the few who could read it; and finally decided that English was the tongue known to the fewest readers, who, if they knew letters at all, were sure to be acquainted with French and Latin.
On a strip of parchment, then, about nine inches long and three wide, he proceeded to indite, in upright cramped letters, with many contractions, nearly in such terms as these—
Reverend and Knightly Father,
The good ghostly father and knight, Sir Raynald Ferrers, hath borne to me your tidings of my brother’s sickness, and of all your goodness to him—whereof I pray that our blessed Lady and good St. John may reward you, for I can only pray for you. Touching his poor little daughter, in case of his death or frenzy, which the Saints of their mercy forefend, I would entreat you of your goodness to place her in some nunnery, but without making known her name and quality until my return; so Heaven bring me home safe. But an if I should be slain in this Eastern land, then were it most for the little one’s good to present her to the gracious lady Princess, by whom she would be most lovingly and naturally cared for; and would be more safe than with such as might shun to own her rights of blood and heirship. Commend me to my brother, if so be that he cares to hear of me; and tell him that Guy hath wedded the lady of a castle in the land of Italy. And so praying you, ghostly father, for your blessing, I greet you well, and rest your grateful bedesman and servant,
Richard of Leicester.
Given at the Prince’s camp at Drepanum, in the realm of Sicilia, on the octave of the Epiphany, in the year of grace MCCLXX.; and so our Lord have you heartily in His keeping.
Letter-writing was a mighty task; and Richard’s extemporary implements were not of the best. He laboured hard over his composition, kneeling against a chest in the tent. When at length he raised his head, he encountered a face full of the most utter amazement. Little John of Dunster had come into the tent, and stood gazing at him with open eyes and gaping mouth, as if he were perpetrating an incantation. Richard could not help laughing.
“Why, Jack, dost think I am framing a spell for thee?”
“Writing!” gasped John, relieving his distended mouth by at length closing it.