He looked at me quietly, without speaking, for a while.
"And you, Master Hugo, did you go thither to distinguish yourself by breaking up their child's folly, or, like the others, to taste the stone ale?"
It was a question I had not expected. But it was best to be very plain with Master Gerard.
"I went," I replied, "along with Michael Texel, because he asked me. I knew not in the least what I was to see, but I was ready for anything."
"And you acquitted yourself on the whole extremely well," he nodded; "so at least they are all very ready to say, hoping, I doubt not, for your good offices with the Duke when it comes to their turn. You flouted them right manfully and defied their mystery, they told me."
At this moment I became conscious that a door opposite me was open and the curtain drawn a little way back. There, in the half-light, I saw Mistress Ysolinde listening. She leaned her head aside as though it had been heavy with its weight of locks of burned gold. She pillowed her cheek against the door-post, and let her dreamy sea-green eyes rest upon me. And the look that was in them gave me a sense of pleasure strange and acute, as well as a restless uneasiness and vague desire to escape out under the blue sky, and mingle with the throng of every-day men on the streets of the city.
***
CHAPTER XI
THE VISION IS THE CRYSTAL
Master Gerard, however, did not seem to be aware of her presence, for he continued his catechism steadily.