“Madame,” said he, looking her coolly in the face, “it is every man’s privilege to see that he is not fooled. Let us be merciful to one another. You will find a horse at the gate.”
Now Etoile might have persuaded most men with her beauty, but in my Lord Peter’s eyes there was a look that told her that he would use steel if she made a mocking of his pride. She smothered her words, and dissembled her wrath before him, for he was too cold and clever a man to be treated as she would have treated Gaillard. “Go,” his eyes said to her, “and be thankful in the going.” And Etoile hid her rage, and went, half wondering the while whether some man had orders to stab her in the back.
Then Peter of Savoy sent for Messire Gaillard, but the Gascon had become suddenly discreet, and betaken himself early to the stable.
His master snapped his fingers.
“Let the fool go,” he said. “Madame will need company on the road to the devil.”
One of his gentlemen, a very young man, showed some concern for the Lady of the Peacocks.
“Will you turn her out next to naked, sire?”
Peter of Savoy laughed in his face.
“Are you a fool, also, Raymond? Go with her if it pleases you, you will have to fight the Gascon. God knows, I would prevent no man drinking green wine.”
So they turned Etoile out of Pevensey, suffering her to take nothing with her but the horse, the clothes she rode in, a little money, and such jewels as were hers.