"My dear boy – my own lad!" said Crawford, taking him in his arms – "Ye think like a Scot, every joint of you! Like one that will forget a cause of quarrel with a friend whose back is already at the wall, and remember nothing of him but his kindness."
"Since my Lord Crawford has embraced my nephew," said Ludovic Lesly, "I will embrace him also – though I would have you to know, that to understand the service of an ambushment is as necessary to a soldier, as it is to a priest to be able to read his breviary."
"Be hushed, Ludovic," said Crawford; "ye are an ass, my friend, and ken not the blessing Heaven has sent you in this braw callant. – And now tell me, Quentin, my man, hath the King any advice of this brave, christian, and manly resolution of yours? for, poor man, he had need, in his strait, to ken what he has to reckon upon. Had he but brought the whole brigade of Guards with him! – But God's will be done – Kens he of your purpose, think you?"
"I really can hardly tell," answered Quentin; "but I assured his learned astrologer, Martius Galeotti, of my resolution to be silent on all that could injure the King with the Duke of Burgundy. The particulars which I suspect, I will not (under your favour) communicate even to your lordship; and to the philosopher I was, of course, far less willing to unfold myself."
"Ha! – ay!" – answered Lord Crawford – "Oliver did indeed tell me that Galeotti prophesied most stoutly concerning the line of conduct you were to hold; and I am truly glad to find he did so on better authority than the stars."
"He prophesy!" said Le Balafré, laughing; "the stars never told him that honest Ludovic Lesly used to help yonder wench of his to spend the fair ducats he flings into her lap."
"Hush! Ludovic," said his captain, "hush! thou beast, man! – If thou dost not respect my grey hairs, because I have been e'en too much of a routier myself, respect the boy's youth and innocence, and let us have no more of such unbecoming daffing."
"Your honour may say your pleasure," answered Ludovic Lesly; "but, by my faith, second-sighted Saunders Souplejaw, the town-souter of Glenhoulakin, was worth Gallotti, or Gallipotty, or whatever ye call him, twice told, for a prophet. He foretold that all my sister's children would die some day; and he foretold it in the very hour that the youngest was born, and that is this lad Quentin – who, no doubt, will one day die, to make up the prophecy – the more's the pity – the whole curney of them is gone but himself. And Saunders foretold to myself one day, that I should be made by marriage, which doubtless will also happen in due time, though it hath not yet come to pass – though how or when, I can hardly guess, as I care not myself for the wedded state, and Quentin is but a lad. Also, Saunders predicted" –
"Nay," said Lord Crawford, "unless the prediction be singularly to the purpose, I must cut you short, my good Ludovic; for both you and I must now leave your nephew, with prayers to Our Lady to strengthen him in the good mind he is in; for this is a case in which a light word might do more mischief than all the Parliament of Paris could mend. – My blessing with you, my lad; and be in no hurry to think of leaving our body; for there will be good blows going presently in the eye of day, and no ambuscade."
"And my blessing too, nephew," said Ludovic Lesly; "for, since you have satisfied our most noble captain, I also am satisfied, as in duty bound."