How then could she look upon the race from which he sprang as inferior—as low and degraded by the hand of nature—when not the sagest statesman, the most royal prince, the proudest chevalier, the gentlest troubadour, could vie with him in one point of intellect or of refinement—with him, the Saxon priest, son himself, as he himself had told her, of a Saxon serf.
These were the antecedents, this the character of the beautiful girl, who, on the morning following her adventure in the forest, lay, supported by a pile of cushions, on one of the broad couches in the Lady's Bower of Waltheofstow, inhaling the fresh perfumed breath of the western air, as it swept in, over the shrubs and flowers in the bartizan, through the window of the turret chamber. She was beautiful as ever, but very pale, and still suffering, as it would seem, from the effects of her fall and the injuries she had received in the struggle with the terrible wild beast; for, whenever she attempted to move or to turn her body, an expression of pain passed for a moment across the pure, fair face, and once a slight murmur escaped from her closed lips.
One or two waiting-maids, of Norman race, attended by the side of her couch, one of them cooling her brow with a fan of peacock's feathers, the other sprinkling perfumes through the chamber, and now and again striving to amuse her by reading aloud from a ponderous illuminated tome, larger than a modern cyclopedia, the interminable adventures and sufferings of that true love, whose "course never did run smooth," and feats of knightly prowess, recorded in one of the interminable romances of the time. But to none of these did the Lady Guendolen seriously incline her ear; and the faces of the attendant girls began to wear an expression, not of weariness only, but of discontent, and, perhaps, even of a deeper and bitterer feeling.
The Lady Guendolen was ill at ease; she was, most rare occurrence for one of her soft though impulsive disposition, impatient, perhaps querulous.
She could not be amused by any of their efforts. Her mind was far away; she craved something which they could not give, and was restless at their inability. Three times since her awakening, though the hour was still early, she had inquired for Sir Yvo, and had sent to desire his presence. The first time, her messengers brought her back word that he had not yet arisen; the second, that he was breakfasting, but now, in the knight's hall with Sir Philip, and the Sieurs of Maltravers, De Vesey, and Mauleverer, who had ridden over to Waltheofstow to fly their hawks, and that he would be with her ere long; and the third, that the good knight must have forgotten, for that he had taken horse and ridden away with the rest of the company into the meadows by the banks of brimful Idle, to enjoy the "Mystery of Rivers," as it was the fashion to term the sport of falconry, in the high-flown language of the chase.
For a moment her pale face flushed, her eye flashed, and she bit her lip, and drummed impatiently with her little fingers on the velvet-pillows which supported her aching head; then, smiling at her own momentary ill-humor, she bade her girl Marguerite go seek the Saxon maiden, Edith, if she were in the castle, and if not, to see that a message should be sent down for her to the serfs' quarter.
With many a toss of her pretty head, and many a wayward feminine expression of annoyance, which from ruder lips would probably have taken the shape of an imprecation, the injured damsel betook herself, through winding passages and stairways in the thickness of the wall, to the pages' waiting-chamber on the next floor below. Then tripping, with a demure look, into the square vaulted room, in which were lounging three gayly-dressed, long-haired boys, one twanging a guitar in the embrasure of the window, and the other two playing at tables on a board covered with a scarlet cloth—
"Here, Damian," she said, somewhat sharply, for the temper of the mistress is sure to be reflected in that of the maid, losing nothing by the transmission, "for what are you loitering there, with that old tuneless gittern, when the Lady Guendolen has been calling for you this hour past?"
"And how, in the name of St. Hubert," replied the boy, who had rather been out with the falconers on the breezy leas, than mewed in the hall to await a lady's pleasure—"how, in the name of St. Hubert! should I know that the Lady Guendolen had called for me, when no one has been near this old den since Sir Yvo rode forth on brown Roncesval, with Diamond on his fist? And as for my gittern being tuneless, I've heard you tell a different tale, pretty Mistress Marguerite. But let us have your message, if you've got one; for I see you're as fidgety as a thorough-bred sorrel filly, and as hot-tempered, too."
"Sorrel filly, indeed!" said the girl, half-laughing, half-indignant. "I wish you could see my lady, Damian, if you call me fidgety and hot-tempered. I wish you could see my lady, that's just all, this morning."