When Denise and Marpasse came near the west gate of the town, they saw a huge fire burning there, the flames lighting the black battlements above. A great crowd had gathered about the fire, and the noise might have equalled the noise at Barnet Fair. Men were running about half naked like hairy-legged satyrs mad with wine. The platform of the town gate was crowded with a roaring, squealing mob that amused itself by emptying nature upon the equally repulsive mob below. Mounted upon a tub, a man with one eye, dressed like a Franciscan, spouted indecent skits on the clergy, pretending the while to be zealously in earnest. Elsewhere a crowd of excited and contorted figures made a ring round two women who, stripped to the waist, were wrestling, their faces smeared with the blood of a dead ox. Drunken rascals were scrambling about on all fours, and pretending to be dogs. If any mad whim came into a man’s head, he acted on it, and did not stop to think.
Marpasse had taken Denise by the wrist, and they had melted back into the darkness, holding their breath over the chance of being plunged into that simmering human stew. Marpasse was no innocent, but her face went hard and ugly with the sincerity of her disgust.
“Drunken swine! We will keep away from your sty, I warrant you.”
She spoke in a harsh whisper, her pupils contracting as she stared at the gate and the bonfire that was half hidden by live things that swarmed like beetles. Denise shuddered inwardly, and was silent. She thought of the cool, dark woods over yonder, and of the grim and quiet men who waited for the dawn.
Marpasse waved an arm towards the town.
“You see,” she seemed to say.
“They are like wild beasts.”
“What did you think to find, my dear; blessed banners and crosses, and priests galore? Or perhaps so many Sir Tristans keeping watch under the stars, and thinking of noble and great ladies. No, no, the King and Earl Simon handle their hot coals differently. Come away, we shall do no good yonder.”
They retreated along the road, and hearing loud squeals of laughter near them, drew aside, and hid themselves in a ditch. Marpasse could feel Denise shivering. When the laughter had gone by them towards the town, Marpasse stood up and looked about her in the darkness.
“We were walking into the cattle market,” she said in an ironical whisper. “The Priory lies yonder, most likely the King is lodged there. Pick your feet up out of this mud.”