"Why so, sir?" asked the king in surprise. "Do you fear you will not fancy the lady?"
"I fear she may not fancy me," retorted the nobleman, soberly. "Your own remark, Sire; that I appear older than you had expected?" he continued, gravely, significantly.
"A recommendation in your favor," laughed the monarch. "I ever prefer sober manhood to callow youth about me. The one is a prop, stanch, tried; the other a reed that bends this way and that, or breaks when you press it too hard."
"I should be lacking in gratitude were I not deeply appreciative of your Majesty's singular kindness," replied the duke, his face flushing with pleasure. "But your Majesty knows womankind—"
"Nay; I've studied them a little, but know them not," retorted Francis, dryly.
"And it is unlikely the lady may find me all her imagination has depicted," went on the nobleman, with palpable embarrassment. "My noble master, the emperor, hath—regarding me still as but a stripling from his own vantage point of age and wisdom—represented me a young man in his proposals. But though I'm younger than I look, and feel no older than I am, how young, or how old, shall I seem to the princess?"
"Young enough to be her husband; old enough for her to look up to," answered the monarch, reassuringly.
"Again," objected the duke, meditatively regarding the castle, "she may be expecting a handsome, debonair bridegroom, and when she sees me"—ruefully surveying himself—"what will she say?"
"What will she say? 'Yes' at the altar. Is it not enough?" Leaning back in his saddle, the king's face expressed the enjoyment he derived from the conversation with the backward and too conscientious soldier. Here was a groom whose wedding promised the court much amusement and satisfaction in those jovial days of jesting and merry-making.
"Come," resumed the king, encouragingly, "I'll warrant you more forward in battle."