A cheerful voice hailed him in French: “What ho! you are up with the sun, comrade.”
“He rises betimes that lies in a dog's lair,” answered Gerard crossly.
“Courage, l'ami! le diable est mort,” was the instant reply. The soldier then told him his name was Denys, and he was passing from Flushing in Zealand to the Duke's French dominions; a change the more agreeable to him, as he should revisit his native place, and a host of pretty girls who had wept at his departure, and should hear French spoken again. “And who are you, and whither bound?”
“My name is Gerard, and I am going to Rome,” said the more reserved Hollander, and in a way that invited no further confidences.
“All the better; we will go together as far as Burgundy.”
“That is not my road.”
“All roads take to Rome.”
“Ay, but the shortest road thither is my way.”
“Well, then, it is I who must go out of my way a step for the sake of good company, for thy face likes me, and thou speakest French, or nearly.”
“There go two words to that bargain,” said Gerard coldly. “I steer by proverbs, too. They do put old heads on young men's shoulders. 'Bon loup mauvais compagnon, dit le brebis;' and a soldier, they say, is near akin to a wolf.”
“They lie,” said Denys; “besides, if he is, 'les loups ne se mangent pas entre eux.'”
“Aye but, sir soldier, I am not a wolf; and thou knowest, a bien petite occasion se saisit le loup du mouton.'”
“Let us drop wolves and sheep, being men; my meaning is, that a good soldier never pillages-a comrade. Come, young man, too much suspicion becomes not your years. They who travel should learn to read faces; methinks you might see lealty in mine sith I have seen it in yourn. Is it yon fat purse at your girdle you fear for?” (Gerard turned pale.) “Look hither!” and he undid his belt, and poured out of it a double handful of gold pieces, then returned them to their hiding-place. “There is a hostage for you,” said he; “carry you that, and let us be comrades,” and handed him his belt, gold and all.
Gerard stared. “If I am over prudent, you have not enow.” But he flushed and looked pleased at the other's trust in him.
“Bah! I can read faces; and so must you, or you'll never take your four bones safe to Rome.”
“Soldier, you would find me a dull companion, for my heart is very heavy,” said Gerard, yielding.
“I'll cheer you, mon gars.”
“I think you would,” said Gerard sweetly; “and sore need have I of a kindly voice in mine ear this day.”
“Oh! no soul is sad alongside me. I lift up their poor little hearts with my consigne: 'Courage, tout le monde, le diable est mort.' Ha! ha!”
“So be it, then,” said Gerard. “But take back your belt, for I could never trust by halves. We will go together as far as Rhine, and God go with us both!”
“Amen!” said Denys, and lifted his cap. “En avant!”
The pair trudged manfully on, and Denys enlivened the weary way. He chattered about battles and sieges, and things which were new to Gerard; and he was one of those who make little incidents wherever they go. He passed nobody without addressing them. “They don't understand it, but it wakes them up,” said he. But whenever they fell in with a monk or priest. He pulled a long face, and sought the reverend father's blessing, and fearlessly poured out on him floods of German words in such order as not to produce a single German sentence—He doffed his cap to every woman, high or low, he caught sight of, and with eagle eye discerned her best feature, and complimented her on it in his native tongue, well adapted to such matters; and at each carrion crow or magpie, down came his crossbow, and he would go a furlong off the road to circumvent it; and indeed he did shoot one old crow with laudable neatness and despatch, and carried it to the nearest hen-roost, and there slipped in and set it upon a nest. “The good-wife will say, 'Alack, here is Beelzebub ahatching of my eggs.'”
“No, you forget he is dead,” objected Gerard.
“So he is, so he is. But she doesn't know that, not having the luck to be acquainted with me, who carry the good news from city to city, uplifting men's hearts.”
Such was Denys in time of peace.
Our travellers towards nightfall reached a village; it was a very small one, but contained a place of entertainment. They searched for it, and found a small house with barn and stables. In the former was the everlasting stove, and the clothes drying round it on lines, and a traveller or two sitting morose. Gerard asked for supper.
“Supper? We have no time to cook for travellers; we only provide lodging, good lodging for man and beast. You can have some beer.”
“Madman, who, born in Holland, sought other lands!” snorted Gerard in Dutch. The landlady started.
“What gibberish is that?” asked she, and crossed herself with looks of superstitious alarm. “You can buy what you like in the village, and cook it in our oven; but, prithee, mutter no charms nor sorceries here, good man; don't ye now, it do make my flesh creep so.”
They scoured the village for food, and ended by supping on roasted eggs and brown bread.
At a very early hour their chambermaid came for them. It was a rosy-cheeked old fellow with a lanthorn.
They followed him. He led them across a dirty farmyard, where they had much ado to pick their steps, and brought them into a cow-house. There, on each side of every cow, was laid a little clean straw, and a tied bundle of ditto for a pillow. The old man looked down on this his work with paternal pride. Not so Gerard. “What, do you set Christian men to lie among cattle?”
“Well, it is hard upon the poor beasts. They have scarce room to turn.”
“Oh! what, it is not hard on us, then?”
“Where is the hardship? I have lain among them all my life. Look at me! I am fourscore, and never had a headache in all my born days—all along of lying among the kye. Bless your silly head, kine's breath is ten times sweeter to drink nor Christians'. You try it!” and he slammed the bedroom door.
“Denys, where are you?” whined Gerard.
“Here, on her other side.”
“What are you doing?”
“I know not; but as near as I can guess, I think I must be going to sleep. What are you at?
“I am saying my prayers.”
“Forget me not in them!”
“Is it likely? Denys, I shall soon have done: do not go to sleep, I want to talk.
“Despatch then! for I feel—augh like floating-in the sky on a warm cloud.”
“Denys!”
“Augh! eh! hallo! is it time to get up?”
“Alack, no. There, I hurried my orisons to talk; and look at you, going to sleep! We shall be starved before morning, having no coverlets.”
“Well, you know what to do.”
“Not I, in sooth.”
“Cuddle the cow.”
“Thank you.”
“Burrow in the straw, then. You must be very new to the world, to grumble at this. How would you bear to lie on the field of battle on a frosty night, as I did t'other day, stark naked, with nothing to keep me warm but the carcass of a fellow I had been and helped kill?”
“Horrible! horrible! Tell me all about it! Oh, but this is sweet.”
“Well, we