“God and St. Martin hearten her. The devil vexes those who live for good works.”
“Father Grimbald must know of it. He is man enough to come and take a devil by the beard.”
So Oswald and Peter went back to their womenfolk and their cattle, glad to be near warm bodies, snug under their woodland huts. The night passed, and the dawn came, a slow, stealthy dawn muffled in silver mist. Rabbits scampered in the glades, brushing the dew from the wet grass. Birds hunted for worms, and fluttered away to feed their young. And the devil whom Oswald and Peter had seen, sent the rabbits bolting for their burrows as he rode away through the beech wood towards the sea.
Before noon Etoile the lute girl had a wreath of hair curled like a snake about the little wooden cross in her lap. Gaillard had brought them to her, hiding a guilty memory in the eyes behind a laughing swagger. The Gascon’s voluble tongue was driven to deal very fancifully with the adventure, since Etoile was very curious, and intent on hearing everything. The Red Saint was very ready to be worshipped, such was Gaillard’s explanation. She was a little vainer than the majority of women, and Gaillard shrugged his shoulders and laughed.
“A red apple is always a red apple,” he said. “Mother Eve taught us that.”
The mischievous devil in Etoile was not yet satisfied.
“Never trust a saint, Gaillard,” she said. “I have not forgotten that the man in the tower might be glad of this piece of hair. It will give him something to think about while he sits and nibbles straws. Take it up and push it under his door, and tell him it comes from his lady.”
The joke caught Gaillard’s fancy. He climbed the tower, and pushed the trophy under Aymery’s door with the point of his poniard.
“A woman gave it me, my man,” he said. “But since I have something better for a keepsake, you can have the hair.”
He went away, laughing, a thorough Gascon in his gross self-satisfaction. And Aymery picked up what Gaillard had left him. He knew it for Denise’s hair, for there was none like it in all those parts.