"Thus many and many an artful-artless strain
Is fashioned all in vain:
Sound proves unsound; and even her name, that is
To me more glorious than the glow of fire
Or dawn or love's desire
Or opals interlinked with turquoises,
Mocks utterance.
"So, lacking skill to praise
That perfect bodily beauty which is hers,
Even as those worshippers
Who bore rude offerings of honey and maize,
Their all, into the gold-paved ministers
Of Aphrodite, I have given her these
My faltering melodies,
That are Love's lean and ragged messengers."_
When he had ended, Adhelmar cast aside the lute, and caught up both of Mélite's hands, and strained them to his lips. There needed no wizard to read the message in his eyes.
Mélite sat silent for a moment. Presently, "Ah, cousin, cousin!" she sighed, "I cannot love you as you would have me love. God alone knows why, true heart, for I revere you as a strong man and a proven knight and a faithful lover; but I do not love you. There are many women who would love you, Adhelmar, for the world praises you, and you have done brave deeds and made good songs and have served your King potently; and yet"—she drew her hands away and laughed a little wearily—"yet I, poor maid, must needs love Hugues, who has done nothing. This love is a strange, unreasoning thing, my cousin."
"But do you in truth love Hugues?" asked Adhelmar, in a harsh voice.
"Yes," said Mélite, very softly, and afterward flushed and wondered dimly if she had spoken the truth. Then, somehow, her arms clasped about Adhelmar's neck, and she kissed him, from pure pity, as she told herself; for Mélite's heart was tender, and she could not endure the anguish in his face.
This was all very well. But Hugues d'Arques, coming suddenly out of a pleached walk, at this juncture, stumbled upon them and found their postures distasteful. He bent black brows upon the two.
"Adhelmar," said he, at length, "this world is a small place."
Adhelmar rose. "Indeed," he assented, with a wried smile, "I think there is scarce room in it for both of us, Hugues."
"That was my meaning," said the Sieur d'Arques.