Croquart looked grim.
“The little Gascon devil!” he thought. “That ring was worth a hundred crowns, and a ring on the finger, Messire Tête Bois, is worth a thousand crowns in my strong-box, eh? If I ever catch you, my friend, I will break your back. Let us see whether you have taken your own horse.”
But Tête Bois’s horse was standing quietly with the rest, and the frown on the Fleming’s face showed that he was puzzled. What had happened to the fellow? And if he had deserted, why had he left his horse?
Tête Bois’s disappearance opened the day ill-humoredly for the Fleming. The natural roughness of his temper broke to the surface, and he was sullen and abrupt, his affectations of refinement damp as his own finery with the night’s dew. Tiphaïne and her champion had never a smile from him as they made their morning meal and Croquart bustled them to horse, impatient as any merchant afraid of losing his silks and spices to footpads ambushed in the woods. Such baggage as they had was tied on the back of Tête Bois’s horse, and before the sun had been up an hour they were on the road towards Morlaix.
The mists rolled away, leaving a dappling of clouds over the blue of the May sky. The grass glittered with dew, and the scent of the woods was like the scent of some cedar chest filled with the perfumed robes of a queen. The beech-trees, with their splendor of misty green, towered up beside the embattled oaks, whose crockets and finials seemed of bronze and of gold. The grass was thick with many flowers, the robes of the earth wondrous with color.
Yet beauty cannot save a man from pain, and before they had gone two leagues that morning Tiphaïne saw that Tinteniac suffered. From white his face had changed to gray, and his eyes had the wistful look that one sees in the eyes of a wounded dog. He had lost much blood and needed rest, for his harness and each jolting of the saddle gave him pain. Pride kept Tinteniac silent—the pride of the man unwilling to ask favors in defeat. The cool air of the morning had its balm, but when the sun rose above the trees the heat of the day made his forehead burn.
Tiphaïne, looking up at him with pitying eyes, saw how he suffered, though he told her nothing. Croquart, sullen and out of temper, had forged on ahead, feeling the smart of the rout at Josselin. The man Harduin, leading Tête Bois’s horse, followed leisurely in the rear.
“Your wounds are too much for you.” And she drew her palfrey close to the great horse.
“No, child, no.”
“Tell the Fleming you must rest.”