"Do you know him?" asked Eleanor, almost sharply, and her eyes hardened.
"I have seen him many times, but I have never spoken with him. We talk of him now and then, because he is unlike the other knights, mixing little with them in the camp and riding often alone on the march. They say he is very poor, and he is surely brave."
"What does Beatrix de Curboil say of him?" The Queen's voice was still sharp.
"Beatrix? She is my friend, poor girl. I never heard her speak of this gentleman."
"She is very silent, is she not?"
"Oh, no! She is sometimes sad, and she has told me how her father took a second wife who was unkind to her, and she speaks of her own childhood as if she were the daughter of a great house. But that is all."
"And she never told you her stepmother's name, and never mentioned this
Englishman?"
"Never, Madam, I am quite sure. But she is often very gay and quick of wit, and makes us laugh, even when we are tired and hot after a day's march and are waiting for our women; and sometimes she sings strange old Norman songs of Duke William's day, very sweetly, and little Saxon slave songs which we cannot understand."
"I have never heard her laugh nor sing, I think," said Eleanor, thoughtfully.
"She is very grave before your Grace. I have noticed it. That may be the English manner."