Dame Alianora wrung her hands. "You go to your death."
He answered: "That is very likely. Therefore I am come to bid you farewell."
The Queen stared at him for a while; on a sudden she broke into a curious fit of deep but tearless sobbing.
"Mon bel esper," said Osmund Heleigh, very gently, "what is there in all this worthy of your sorrow? The man will kill me; granted, for he is my junior by some fifteen years, and in addition a skilled swordsman. I fail to see that this is lamentable. Back to Longaville I cannot go after recent happenings; there a rope's end awaits me. Here I must in any event shortly take to the sword, since a beleaguered army has very little need of ink-pots; and shortly I must be slain in some skirmish, dug under the ribs perhaps by a greasy fellow I have never seen. I prefer a clean death at a gentleman's hands."
"It is I who bring about your death!" she wailed. "You gave me gallant service, and I have requited you with death!"
"Indeed the debt is on the other side. The trivial services I rendered you were such as any gentleman must render a woman in distress. Naught else have I afforded you, madame, save very anciently a Sestina. Ho, a Sestina! And in return you have given me a Sestina of fairer make—a Sestina of days, six days of life." His eyes were fervent now.
She kissed him on either cheek. "Farewell, my champion!"
"Ay, your champion. In the twilight of life old Osmund Heleigh rides forth to defend the quarrel of Alianora of Provence. Reign wisely, my Queen, that hereafter men may not say I was slain in an evil cause. Do not shame my maiden venture."
"I will not shame you," the Queen proudly said; and then, with a change of voice: "O my Osmund! My Osmund!"
He caught her by each wrist. "Hush!" he bade her, roughly; and stood crushing both her hands to his lips, with fierce staring. "Wife of my King! wife of my King!" he babbled; and then flung her from him, crying, with a great lift of speech: "I have not failed you! Praise God, I have not failed you!"