“By my faith!” said Aigletta. “Truly a poet finds roses where others feel snow!—Well, I am no thief to take away a lady’s knight! And, perhaps, as you say, fair brother, I could not do it.”
“I think that you could not, fair sister. His Fair Goal has become to him as air and light, streaming through the house of being.”
They had not been long at Panemonde when they had news that eastward of Toulouse the Count of Montmaure made bitter war against Roche-de-Frêne, and that Aquitaine greatly helped Montmaure, while King Philip, distracted by quarrels nearer home, sent to the aid of Roche-de-Frêne but a single company of spears. Now, traditionally, Toulouse was friendly to Roche-de-Frêne, but Toulouse was weary of war, and had made pact with Duke Richard. Moreover Toulouse had present trouble with a spreading heresy and Holy Church’s disfavour. Panemonde heard that Montmaure made very grim war.
For Sir Garin and Sir Aimar the future pushed its head above the present’s rich repose. When war swung his iron bell knights must hearken—not the old knight, ready now for rest from war, for contemplation of a Heaven where that bell lay broken—but the young men, the inheritors of wrath. Aimar wished to ride to Toulouse, to Count Raymond. Garin of the Golden Island would not show restlessness in the house of his benefactor, but those who were awake saw him pacing at dawn the castle wall, or leaning against the battlement, watching the rose in the east.
Once he had assured Sir Eudes and his son that he was of Limousin. But ere he received knighthood he had told plainly his birthplace and home, name, and fealty, and that anger of Montmaure against him. In the land beyond the sea much of the past had drifted toward remoteness, many degrees of experience coming between it and him. But now, early and late, he began to think of Castel-Noir and of Foulque—Foulque who had heard naught of him since that night in which they had parted, beneath the old cypress. The cypress itself rose before him, and the thought of Sicart and Jean. Paladin might be living. Tower and crag and wood, the stream that slipped through the wood—he wished to see them. Not only Castel-Noir—even Raimbaut’s half-ruinous hold—even Raimbaut the Six-fingered himself. Garin half laughed at the thought of the giant. And he wished to follow down that stream again—to see again the boundary stone of Our Lady of Egypt—to find again that little lawn with the cedar, plane, and poplar—to touch again that carved seat, so near the laurels....
He rose from his bed and, while the morning star was still shining, went down the stair and crossing the court mounted the castle wall. Here he rested arms against the stone and gazed at the east where was now a little colour.
Montmaure warred against Roche-de-Frêne. Raimbaut held from Montmaure, but Montmaure, for that fief, was vassal to Roche-de-Frêne. They said that the war was bitter and far-flung. Garin knew not if Raimbaut, carrying with him Castel-Noir, clave to Montmaure, or to the overlord that was Roche-de-Frêne. There sprang within him wish and belief that it was to Roche-de-Frêne. Montmaure! His lips moved, his brow darkened. In imagination he wrestled again with Jaufre de Montmaure. Then, athwart that mood, came again, and stronger than before, a great longing to follow once more that southward-slipping stream, and to hear the nightingale in the covert, and to come again through the laurels to the lawn, the cedar, and the chair of stone. The east was like a rose. “I will tarry no longer!” said Garin.
Five days later he and Aimar rode away toward Toulouse. Behind them, well mounted, rode their esquires, bearing lance and shield; behind these, threescore mounted men. The two knights kneeled for Sir Eudes’s blessing, they kissed the cheek of the Lady of Panemonde and of the dark-eyed Aigletta; they went away like a piece of the summer, and all the castle out to see them go. Here was the bridge, here the road, here a lime tree that Garin remembered, but in an autumn dress. Now it was green and palest gold, fragrant, murmurous with bees. Farther, and here was the calvary, and the way that branched to church and monastery. Wherever there were people, they stopped in their tracks upon the road, or in the fields dropped their work and stood to see the knights go by, with the goodly men behind them. The sky was dazzling blue, the world drenched with light and heat.
They meant to lodge that night in the town to which Garin had come with the scholar, and where first he had seen the cross taken. Reaching it before sunset, they looked up at its castle. But said Garin, “Let us find some hostel! It is not in my mind to-night to be questioned of the Holy Land, made to talk and sing.”
Aimar agreed; could tell, too, that anciently there was here a famous inn. Passing through the town gate, they came into streets where the folk abroad and at door and window turned at the sound of the clattering hoofs, gazed at the well-appointed troop, and made free comment. All the place was bathed in a red light.