He said more lately: "And so she is at Stirling now? with Robert Stewart?" He laughed, not overpleasantly. "Eh, yes, it needed a bold person to bring all your tidings! But you Brabanters are a very thorough-going people."
The King rose and flung back his big head as a lion might. "John, the loyal service you have done us and our esteem for your valor are so great that they may well serve you as an excuse. May shame fall on those who bear you any ill-will! You will now return home, and take your prisoner, the King of Scotland, and deliver him to my wife, to do with as she may elect. You will convey to her my entreaty—not my orders, John—that she come to me here at Calais. As remuneration for this evening's insolence, I assign lands as near your house as you can choose them to the value of £500 a year for you and for your heirs."
You must know that John Copeland fell upon his knees before King Edward. "Sire—" he stammered.
But the King raised him. "Nay," he said, "you are the better man. Were there any equity in Fate, John Copeland, your lady had loved you, not me. As it is, I shall strive to prove not altogether unworthy of my fortune. Go, then, John Copeland—go, my squire, and bring me back my Queen."
Presently he heard John Copeland singing without. And through that instant was youth returned to Edward Plantagenet, and all the scents and shadows and faint sounds of Valenciennes on that ancient night when a tall girl came to him, running, stumbling in her haste to bring him kingship. Now at last he understood the heart of Philippa.
"Let me live!" the King prayed; "O Eternal Father, let me live a little while that I may make atonement!" And meantime John Copeland sang without and the Brabanter's heart was big with joy.
Sang John Copeland:
"Long I besought thee, nor vainly,
Daughter of water and air—
Charis! Idalia! Hortensis!
Hast thou not heard the prayer,
When the blood stood still with loving,
And the blood in me leapt like wine,
And I murmured thy name, Melaenis?—
That heard me, (the glory is thine!)
And let the heart of Atys,
At last, at last, be mine!
"Falsely they tell of thy dying,
Thou that art older than Death,
And never the Hörselberg hid thee,
Whatever the slanderer saith,
For the stars are as heralds forerunning,
When laughter and love combine
At twilight, in thy light, Melaenis—
That heard me, (the glory is thine!)
And let the heart of Atys,
At last, at last, be mine!"