Small wonder then that so astute a monarch as the First Edward had taken vast pains to draw closer the bond which united this fair province to England. The bold Gascons well knew that they would find no such liberties as they now enjoyed did they once put themselves beneath the rule of the French King. His country was already overgrown and almost unmanageable. He might cast covetous eyes upon Gascony, but he would not pour into it the wealth that flowed steadily from prosperous England. He would not endow it with charters, each one more liberal than the last, or bind it to his kingdom by giving it a pre-eminence that would but arouse the jealousy of its neighbours. No: the shrewd Gaseous knew that full well, and knew when they were well off. They could often obtain an increase of liberty and an enlarged charter of rights by coquetting with the French monarch, and thus rousing the fears of the English King; but they had no wish for any real change, and lived happily and prosperously beneath the rule of the Roy Outremer; and amongst all the freemen of the Gascon world, none enjoyed such full privileges as those who lived within the walls of the "villes Anglaises," of which Sauveterre was one amongst the smaller cities.
The construction of these towns (now best seen in Libourne) is very simple, and almost always practically the same – a square in the centre formed by the public buildings, with eight streets radiating from it, each guarded by a gate. An outer ditch or moat protected the wall or palisade, and the towns were thus fortified in a simple but effective manner, and guarded as much by their own privileges as by any outer bulwarks. The inhabitants were bound together by close ties, and each smaller city looked to the parent city of Bordeaux, and was proud of the title of her daughter.
Sauveterre and its traditions and its communistic life were familiar enough, and had been familiar from childhood to the twin brothers.
Halfway between the mill and the town stood a picturesque and scattered hamlet, and to this hamlet was attached a church, of which a pious ecclesiastic, by name Father Anselm, had charge. He was a man of much personal piety, and was greatly beloved through all the countryside, where he was known in every hut and house for leagues around the doors of his humble home. He was, as was so frequently the case in those times, the doctor and the scribe, as well as the spiritual adviser, of his entire flock; and he was so much trusted and esteemed that all men told him their affairs and asked advice, not in the confessional alone, but as one man speaking to another in whom he has strong personal confidence.
The twin brothers knew that during the years when their dead mother had resided at the mill with honest Jean and Margot (they began greatly to wonder now why she had so lived in hiding and obscurity), she had been constantly visited by the holy Father, and that she had told him things about herself and her history which were probably known to no other human being beside. Brought up as the youths had been, and trained in a measure beneath the kindly eye of the priest, they would in any case have asked his counsel and blessing before taking any overt step in life; but all the more did they feel that they must speak to him now, since he was probably the only person within their reach who could tell them anything as to their own parentage and history that they did not know already.
"We will go to him upon the morrow," said Gaston with flashing eyes. "We will rise with the sun – or before it – and go to him ere his day's work is begun. He will surely find time to talk with us when he hears the errand upon which we come. I trow now that when he has sat at our board, and has bent upon our faces those glances I have not known how to read aright, he has been wondering how long it would be ere we should awake to the knowledge that this peasant life is not the life of the De Brocas race, guessing that we should come to him for counsel and instruction ere we spread our wings to flee away. They call us eaglets in sooth; and do eaglets rest for ever in their mountain eyry? Nay, they spread their wings as strength comes upon them, and soar upwards and onwards to see for themselves the great world around; even as thou and I will soar away, Brother, and seek other fortunes than will ever be ours here in Sauveterre."
With these burning feelings in their hearts, it was no wonder that the twins uttered a simultaneous exclamation of satisfaction and pleasure when, as they approached the mill, they were aware of the familiar figure of Father Anselm sitting at the open door of the living house, engaged, as it seemed, in an animated discussion with the worthy miller and his good wife.
The look which the Father bent upon the two youths as they approached betrayed a very deep and sincere affection for them; and when after supper they asked to speak with him in private, he readily acceded to their request, accepting the offer of a bed from the miller's wife, as already the sun had long set, and his own home was some distance away.
The faces of Jean and Margot were grave with anxious thought, and that of the priest seemed to reflect something of the same expression; for during the course of the simple meal which all had shared together, Gaston had told of the unlooked-for encounter with the proud Sieur de Navailles in the forest, and of the defiance he had met with from the twin eaglets. As the good miller and his wife heard how Gaston had openly declared his name and race to the implacable foe of his house, they wrung their hands together and uttered many lamentable exclamations. The present Lord of Saut was terribly feared throughout the neighbourhood in which he dwelt. His fierce and cruel temper had broken forth again and again in acts of brutality or oppression from which there was practically no redress. Free as the Gascon peasant was from much or the serfdom and feudal servitude of other lands, he was in some ways worse off than the serf, when he chanced to have roused the anger of some great man of the neighbourhood. The power of the nobles and barons – the irresponsible power they too often held – was one of the crying evils of the age, one which was being gradually extinguished by the growing independence of the middle classes. But such changes were slow of growth, and long in penetrating beyond great centres; and it was a terrible thing for a brace of lads, unprotected and powerless as these twin brothers, to have brought upon themselves the hostility and perchance the jealousy of a man like the Sieur de Navailles. If he wished to discover their hiding place, he would have small difficulty in doing so; and let him but once find that out, and the lives of the boys would not be safe either by night or day. The retainers of the proud baron might swoop down at any moment upon the peaceful mill, and carry off the prey without let or hindrance; and this was why the secret of their birth and name had been so jealously kept from all (save a few who loved the house of De Brocas) by the devoted miller and his wife.
But Gaston little recked of the threatened peril. The fearless nature of his race was in him, and he would have scorned himself had he failed to speak out boldly when questioned by the haughty foe of his house. If the De Brocas had been ruined in all else, they had their fearless honour left them still.
But the priest's face was grave as he let the boys lead him into the narrow bedchamber where they slept – a room bare indeed of such things as our eyes would seek, but which for the times was commodious and comfortable enough. He was pondering in his mind what step must now be taken, for it seemed to him as though the place of safety in the mill in which their mother had left her sons could hide them no longer. Go they must, of that he felt well assured; but where? That was a question less easily answered offhand.
"Father," began Gaston eagerly, so soon as the door had closed behind the three, and Raymond had coaxed the dim taper into its feeble flicker – "Father, we have come to thee for counsel – for help. Father, chide us not, nor call us ingrate; but it has come to this with us – we can no longer brook this tame and idle life. We are not of the peasant stock; why must we live the peasant life? Father, we long to be up and doing – to spread our wings for a wider flight. We know that those who bear our name are not hiding their heads in lowly cots; we know that our sires have been soldiers and statesmen in the days that are past. Are we then to hide our heads here till the snows of age gather upon them? Are we, of all our race, to live and die obscure, unknown? Father, we cannot stand it; it shall not be! To thee we come to ask more of ourselves than yet we know. To thee our mother commended us in her last moments; to thee she bid us look in days to come when we needed guidance and help. Wherefore to thee we have come now, when we feel that there must surely be an end to all of this. Tell us, Father, of our sire; tell us of our kinsfolk. Where be they? Where may we seek them? I trow thou knowest all. Then tell us, I beseech thee tell us freely all there is to know."
The good priest raised his eyes and thoughtfully scanned the faces of the two eager youths. Gaston was actually shivering with repressed excitement;