Blinking, he stood upon the threshold. Then, without words, their lips met.
"My king!" said Catherine; "heart's emperor!"
"O rose of all the world!" he cried.
There was at first no need of speech.
But after a moment she drew away and stared at him. François, though he was but thirty, seemed an old man. His bald head shone in the candle-light. His face was a mesh of tiny wrinkles, wax-white, and his lower lip, puckered by the scar of his wound, protruded in an eternal grimace. As Catherine steadfastly regarded him, the faded eyes, half-covered with a bluish film, shifted, and with a jerk he glanced over his shoulder. The movement started a cough tearing at his throat.
"Holy Macaire!" said he. "I thought that somebody, if not Henri Cousin, the executioner, was at my heels. Why do you stare so, lass? Have you anything to eat? I am famished."
In silence she brought him meat and wine, and he fell upon it. He ate hastily, chewing with his front teeth, like a sheep.
When he had ended, Catherine came to him and took both his hands in hers and lifted them to her lips. "The years have changed you, François," she said, curiously meek.
François put her away. Then he strode to the mirror and regarded it intently. With a snarl, he turned about. "The years!" said he. "You are modest. It was you who killed François de Montcorbier, as surely as Montcorbier killed Sermaise. Eh, Sovereign Virgin! that is scant cause for grief. You made François Villon. What do you think of him, lass?"
She echoed the name. It was in many ways a seasoned name, but unaccustomed to mean nothing. Accordingly François sneered.