"Oh, now I love you!" she cried, a-thrill with disappointment. "Yet you have done wrong, for Guienne is a king's ransom."
He smiled whimsically, and presently one arm swept beneath her knees, so that presently he held her as one dandles a baby; and presently his stiff and yellow beard caressed her burning cheek. Masterfully he said: "Then let it serve as such and ransom for a king his glad and common manhood. Ah, m'amye, I am both very wise and abominably selfish. And in either capacity it appears expedient that I leave France without any unwholesome delay. More lately—hé, already I have within my pocket the Pope's dispensation permitting me to marry the sister of the King of France, so that I dare to hope."
Very shyly Dame Meregrett lifted her little mouth toward his hot and bearded lips. "Patience," she said, "is a virtue; and daring is a virtue; and hope, too, is a virtue: and otherwise, beau sire, I would not live."
And in consequence, after a deal of political tergiversation (Nicolas concludes), in the year of grace 1299, on the day of our Lady's nativity, and in the twenty-seventh year of King Edward's reign, came to the British realm, and landed at Dover, not Dame Blanch, as would have been in consonance with seasoned expectation, but Dame Meregrett, the other daughter of King Philippe the Bold; and upon the following day proceeded to Canterbury, whither on the next Thursday after came Edward, King of England, into the Church of the Trinity at Canterbury, and therein espoused the aforesaid Dame Meregrett.
THE END OF THE THIRD NOVEL
IV
The Story of the Choices
"Sest fable es en aquest mon
Semblans al homes que i son;
Que el mager sen qu'om pot aver
So es amar Dieu et sa mer,
E gardar sos comendamens."
THE FOURTH NOVEL.—YSABEAU OF FRANCE, DESIROUS OF
DISTRACTION, LOOKS FOR RECREATION IN THE TORMENT
OF A CERTAIN KNIGHT, WHOM SHE PROVES TO BE NO MORE
THAN HUMAN; BUT IN THE OUTCOME OF HER HOLIDAY
HE CONFOUNDS THIS QUEEN BY THE WIT OF HIS REPLY.