“Oh!” said Henri, “finely. He has just made a lovely new song!” And with that he hummed a snatch of the melody he had heard Count William singing, and which he thought his master had composed.
As Pierrot heard the music he could scarce believe his ears; first he was speechless with astonishment, but at last he sputtered out:
“It is not true—it is stolen! That is my dear master’s, the Count Reynaurd’s!”
“Pierrot,” burst in Henri, “I would have thee understand that my noble lord, the Count William, does not steal, and is a far better singer, anyhow, than thy great Reynaurd!”
From this matters went from bad to worse, till the two little pages were just on the point of coming to blows; but, fortunately, at this point one of King René’s seneschals caught sight of them, and, hastening up, gave each a sound cuff on the ear, crying out as he did so:
“Ho, ye saucy little knaves! Know ye not the good king will have no brawlers upon these palace grounds? Take that, sirrahs! and see to it that ye behave more seemly hereafter.”
The pages being thus forcibly separated, Pierrot ran as fast as his legs could carry him up the palace stairs, and burst into his master’s chamber, panting out indignantly:
“Dear Lord Reynaurd, the wicked Count William has stolen thy beautiful song and will win the prize! And I tried to stop Henri, and—o-o-oh—” Here poor Pierrot, still smarting under the cuff from the seneschal, quite broke down, and was obliged to double his fists very hard and bite his lips to keep back the angry tears.
At first Count Reynaurd gasped with astonishment, and then jumped up in a towering passion. But by and by his wits came back to him, and he remembered that Count William had always been a good friend of his; but then his heart misgave him as he remembered, too, that Count William was a famous joker, and loved a jest above all things.
The more he thought of it, the more sure he felt that William only meant in some way to tease him, though he could not understand how he had learned the song. Just then his eyes fell on the door, that Pierrot in his haste had left unfastened, as usual; and then it flashed through Count Reynaurd’s mind how Count William had found out about the music. Reynaurd, moreover, had no doubt but that, before the king, William would probably sing the piece as his own,—a thing which he could easily do, as René had announced that they would be called on in alphabetical order, according to the names of their domains; and as Auvergne thus came before Poitiers, Reynaurd knew that Count William would sing first, and that it would then be hard to make the people believe that the song was his and not William’s; yet he determined, if possible, to try in some way to get the better of him.