Mary stood with her head erect; her eyes bright, but not with tears.
Richard turned to the others, smiling.
"Ah; good friends, how can I be weak when my dear wife is so strong!" They did not answer. Then he touched Musa, leading him aside. "I must speak with you."
The Andalusian's eyes were wet. He was no ice-bound northerner, to nurse his fires deep within, and to wax more stony the more they burned.
"Musa," said Richard, very directly, "we have been to each other as few brothers and fewer friends. God knows why you have run this peril. Yet I believe you care more for the Greek than for any woman, if you have loved any, save as a sister."
The Spaniard shrugged his shoulders almost gayly.
"If to any woman I could yield," said he, lightly, "it were to her, peerless from Andalus to Ind! Alas, I am clothed in some magic armor the darts of the eyes of the houris may not pierce; yet if any eyes could pierce, it would be those of Mary de St. Julien."
Richard held his lips close to the other's ear.
"Musa," said he, "I may get into Antioch; but a long road lies still to Jerusalem. Where the arrows sing, I must be. And if I fall"—he spoke lower—"Mary will be alone. She cannot go to La Haye and be wedded to another by her uncle, as would surely be her fate. Not a kinsman remains at Constantinople. You must"—he hesitated—"you must swear to me that you will love her; that if I die, she shall be your wife. For Moslem as you are, no man breathes I would rather see with his arms about her than you. You alone can make her forget me; make her look forward and laugh in the sunlight."
Why were beads of sweat on the Spaniard's brow? Why came his breath so swift and deep? But he answered steadily:—