“I guess what you mean,” said the Frenchman; “but speak yet more plainly.”
“To speak more plainly, then,” said the youth, “there grows a fair oak some flight shot or so from yonder Castle—and on that oak hangs a man in a gray jerkin, such as this which I wear.”
“Ay and indeed!” said the man of France—“Pasques dieu! see what it is to have youthful eyes! Why, I did see something, but only took it for a raven among the branches. But the sight is no ways strange, young man; when the summer fades into autumn, and moonlight nights are long, and roads become unsafe, you will see a cluster of ten, ay of twenty such acorns, hanging on that old doddered oak.—But what then?—they are so many banners displayed to scare knaves; and for each rogue that hangs there, an honest man may reckon that there is a thief, a traitor, a robber on the highway, a pilleur and oppressor of the people the fewer in France. These, young man, are signs of our Sovereign's justice.”
“I would have hung them farther from my palace, though, were I King Louis,” said the youth. “In my country, we hang up dead corbies where living corbies haunt, but not in our gardens or pigeon houses. The very scent of the carrion—faugh—reached my nostrils at the distance where we stood.”
“If you live to be an honest and loyal servant of your Prince, my good youth,” answered the Frenchman, “you will know there is no perfume to match the scent of a dead traitor.”
“I shall never wish to live till I lose the scent of my nostrils or the sight of my eyes,” said the Scot. “Show me a living traitor, and here are my hand and my weapon; but when life is out, hatred should not live longer.—But here, I fancy, we come upon the village, where I hope to show you that neither ducking nor disgust have spoiled mine appetite for my breakfast. So my good friend, to the hostelrie, with all the speed you may.—Yet, ere I accept of your hospitality, let me know by what name to call you.”
“Men call me Maitre Pierre,” answered his companion. “I deal in no titles. A plain man, that can live on mine own good—that is my designation.”
“So be it, Maitre Pierre,” said Quentin, “and I am happy my good chance has thrown us together; for I want a word of seasonable advice, and can be thankful for it.”
While they spoke thus, the tower of the church and a tall wooden crucifix, rising above the trees, showed that they were at the entrance of the village.
But Maitre Pierre, deflecting a little from the road, which had now joined an open and public causeway, said to his companion that the inn to which he intended to introduce him stood somewhat secluded, and received only the better sort of travellers.