Sir Eudes and his son stood still, and behind them the riders checked their horses.
“What is your name, youth?” asked the first, “And whence do you come?”
“Garin Rogier,” answered Garin, “and from Limousin. I was a younger brother, and have set out to seek my fortune. Of your grace, Lord of Panemonde, place me among your men!”
Sir Eudes regarded him shrewdly. “I make my guess that you are a runaway from trouble.”
“If I am,” said Garin, “it is no trouble that will touch your honour if you take me! I fought, with good reason, one that was more powerful than I.”
The other made to shake his head and go on by. But Garin spread out his arms that he might not pass and still cried, “Take me with you, Lord of Panemonde! I have vowed to go with you across the sea, and so to serve you that you will make me a knight!”
The two gazed at him, and those behind them gazed. He kneeled, so resolved, so energized, so seeing the fate he had chosen, that as at Castel-Noir, so now, the glow within came in some fashion through the material man. From his blue-grey eyes light seemed to dart, his hair, between gold and brown, became a fine web holding light, his flesh seemed to bloom. His field of force, expanding, touched them. “In the name of the Mother of God!” cried Garin; but what the man within meant was, “Because I will it, O Lord of Panemonde!”
The people on foot, too far in the rear to see more than that there was a momentary halting of the train, began a louder singing.
“Jerusalem!
Shall the paynim hold thee,
Jerusalem?
And shame our Lord Jesus,
Jerusalem?
And shame our blessed Lady, his meek Mother,
Jerusalem?
So that they say, ‘Why come not the men
To slay Mahound and cleanse our holy places?
Where are the knights, the sergeants and the footmen?’
Jerusalem!
Who takes the cross and wendeth over seas,
Jerusalem!
Will save his soul thereby, raze out his sins,
Jerusalem!”
Sir Eudes de Panemonde stared at the kneeling figure. But the young knight beside him who had stood in silence, his eyes upon the suppliant, now spoke. “Let him go with us, father! Give him to me for esquire.—There is that that draws between us.”