"You seem wonderfully improved in health, De Royans," said Jean Charost. "You look younger by four or five years than you did then."
"But a poor, battered old soldier, after all," replied De Royans, tossing up with his fingers one of the curls that hung at the back of his neck. "You see I am as gray as a wild goose. However, I am much better. A year's idleness on the banks of the Garonne, a little music, and a great deal of physic, cured my wounds, loosened my stiff joints, and enabled me to keep my horses back almost as well as ever. I have got on in the world, too, De Brecy, have made some very nice little captures, paid off many old debts, and got two companies of arquebusiers under my command instead of one. I wish to Heaven I had them all here. Had they been in the town, Richmond would never have got in by the northwest gate."
"I marvel much that he did, I will confess," replied Jean Charost. "Two days ago I sent Monsieur de Blondel there intimation that Bourges was in danger. I thought fit, indeed, to tell him the source from which I received the intelligence; but still it might have kept him on his guard."
"Oh, I heard all about that," replied De Royans, laughing; "and we were all more or less in fault. When Blondel got your letter, he held it in his hand, after reading it, and cried out, in his jeering way, 'What's a hermit? and what does a hermit know of war?' Then said Gaucourt, 'As much as the pig does of the bagpipe; and why should he not?' and then they all laughed, and the matter passed by. But who is this hermit who has got such good intelligence? On my life! De Brecy, it would be well to have him in pay."
"That you could hardly have," replied De Brecy. "He was once a famous soldier, my friend, but has met with many disasters in life. I went to see him upon other matters; but the intelligence he gave me, transmitted from mouth to mouth, I believe, all the way from Chatellerault to St. Florent, seemed so important that I left him without even touching upon my object. He is looked upon as a saint by all the country round, and the peasantry tell him every thing they hear."
"But what, in Fortune's name, took you to a saint?" asked Juvenel de Royans, laughing "Was it to ask for absolution for wandering about the land with that lovely little creature you brought hither?"
Jean Charost looked grave, but answered calmly, "That was no sin, I trust, De Royans, for I may call her my adopted daughter. She had, indeed, something to do with my going to see him, for he has great knowledge of her fate and history; and I wished to learn more than he has ever yet told me. It is time that she herself should know all. She will, it is true, have all I die possessed of; but still I could wish the mystery of her birth cleared up."
"Why, surely this is not the infant you brought out of the wood near Beauté sur Marne--the child we had so many jests upon?" exclaimed De Royans.
"The very same," replied Jean Charost. "She has been as a child to me ever since."
"We thought she was your child then," replied De Royans. "Heaven help us! I have learned to think differently since of many things, and would gladly have wished you joy of your babe, if you had acknowledged her, right or wrong; but, as it was, we all vowed she was yours, and only called you the sanctified young sinner. Two or three times I went down to good Dame Moulinet's to see if I could not get the truth out of her; but; though she seemed to know much, she would say little."