"You?" she said, the lines deepening across her forehead. "A roadside singer presented to the Dauphin! Surely you forget yourself—and him?"
"Even a roadside singer may be a loyal son of France," he retorted, looking her full in the face. He keenly resented the false position into which the King's ill-considered scheme had thrust him, but he had gone too far to retreat. "You know best, mademoiselle, whether the Dauphin has need of a man's honest love and devotion."
"Devotion that is here to-day, was God knows where yesterday, and will be God knows where to-morrow! Merci! the Dauphin is indeed grateful."
"Spitfire!" murmured Villon, but so cautiously that only La Mothe heard him. "Certainly I should have said Mademoiselle and Monseigneur. Or better still have left the Monseigneur out altogether. You do not go the right way. Win the girl, I tell you, and the boy will follow like a sheep."
"Let me win her my own way," answered La Mothe, which has always been the man's desire since Adam was in Eden with the one woman in all the world. Then he went on aloud, "Pour your scorn on it as you will, mademoiselle, it is devotion that will wait patiently in Amboise until it has proved itself."
"That will wait patiently in Amboise?" she repeated. Her eyes challenged his as she spoke, and in them there was nothing of the light the sons of Adam have loved to see in a woman's eyes so that they might dwell together in Paradise.
"Why not? And if a poor gentleman desires to see France in this fashion is there any reason against it?"
"A poor gentleman, but not a poor minstrel?"
"As both I can but give my best. May I have the honour, mademoiselle?"
Her clasp upon the boy's hand must have tightened, for again he raised his face to hers as she stooped over him, speaking softly. This time it was he who nodded.