It was the fourth of July, 1380, and the sun was shining bright and warm on the craggy hills, and dark thickets, and quaint little hamlets of Western Auvergne, when four horseman (two of whom wore the gold spurs of knights) came at a brisk pace to a point where three roads met, and paused as if in doubt which to take.
“Methinks we cannot be far from the place now, brother Hugo,” said Alured de Claremont; “but how shall we tell which of these roads leads to it? I see no one of whom to ask our way.”
“Stay!” cried Hugo, rising in his stirrups, “meseems I spy a man at work in yon trench. What ho! good fellow! which of these ways leadeth to Chateau-Neuf de Randon?”
“Fair sirs,” said the peasant, coming up to them and bowing low, “the midmost road is your way, and ye have scarce three leagues to ride; but know ye not that the town is sieged by the armies of France, and that none may enter?”
“We go not to the town, but to the camp,” said Hugo; “men say we shall there find our old and tried friend, Messire Bertrand du Guesclin.”
“Be ye friends of Messire Bertrand?” cried the man, with a sudden glow on his hard face; “nay, then, may God bless ye every one, whoever ye be. But, alack! noble sirs, ye will find him in ill case; for his sickness gaineth on him day by day, and——”
“Sickness, say’st thou?” cried both brothers in dismay. “What ails him?”
Ere the man could reply, he started suddenly, straining his eyes past the group as if watching some coming figure, and then threw himself on his face in the dust. The wondering knights turned and saw that he had prostrated himself before an old man in the garb of a monk, whose thrown-back cowl fully revealed his face.
The hair that framed that face had turned snow-white since Alured saw it last, but the face itself still wore the same look of calm and holy sweetness; and the knight knew it as the monk knew him.
“Give me thy blessing, holy father,” said he, leaping from his horse; “I little hoped for such good hap as to see Brother Michael once more.”