A sudden impulse seized her, and with a quick explosion of feeling she dropped on her knees, and looking into his eyes, as though hungering for the words she so often yearned to hear, she said:
"You love your mother, Guilbert? You love her, little son?"
With a pretty smile and eyes brimming with affectionate fun, but without a word, the child put out a tiny hand and drew the fingers softly down his mother's face.
"Speak, little son, tell your mother that you love her." The tiny hand pressed itself over her eyes, and a gay little laugh came from the sensitive lips, then both arms ran round her neck. The child drew her head to him impulsively, and kissing her, a little upon the hair and a little upon the forehead, so indefinite was the embrace, he said:
"Si, maman, I loves you best of all," then added: "Maman, can't I have the sword now?"
"You shall have the sword too some day," she answered, her eyes flashing.
"But, maman, can't I touch it now?"
Without a word she took down the sheathed goldhandled sword and laid it across the chair-arms.
"I can't take the sword out, can I, maman?" he asked.
She could not help smiling. "Not yet, my son, not yet."