eafter the silence remained unbroken for some moments, and then--

"God keep you, mistress," he said.

"God keep you," she answered, softly.

Soon her deep breathing told him she was sleeping, and, as he listened,
in fancy he could hear the faint echoes of her voice, accompanied by
the sighing wind. How intrepid had she seemed; how helpless was she
now; and, as he bent over her, divining yet not seeing, he asked
himself whence had come this faith in him, that like a child she
slumbered amid the unrest of nature? What had her life been, who her
friends, that she should thus have chosen a jester as comrade? What
had driven her forth from the court to nameless hazards? Had he
surmised correctly? Was it--

"The king," she murmured, with sudden restlessness in her sleep.

"The king," she repeated, with aversion.

In the jester's breast upleaped a fierce anger. This was the
art-loving monarch who burned the fathers and brothers of the new
faith; this, the righteous ruler who condemned men to death for
psalm-singing or for listening to grave discourse; this the Christian
king, the brilliant patron of science and learning.

The storm had sighed itself to rest, the stars had come out, but
leaning with his back against a tree, the fool still kept vigil.

CHAPTER XIX

A FIGURE IN THE MOONLIGHT

Experiencing no further inconvenience than the ordinary vicissitudes of
traveling without litter or cavalcade, several days of wandering slowly
passed. Few people they met, and those, for the most part, various
types of vagabonds and nomads; some wild and savage, roaming like
beasts from place to place; others, harmless, mere bedraggled birds of
passage. In this latter class were the vagrant-entertainers, with
dancing rooster or singing dog, who stopped at every peasant's door.
To the shrill piping of the flageolet, these merry stragglers added a
step of their own, and won a crust for themselves, a bone for the dog
or a handful of grain for the performing fowl.

In those days when court ladies rode in carved and gilded coaches, and
their escorts on horses covered with silken, jeweled nets, the modest
appearance of the jestress and her companion was not calculated to
attract especial attention from the yokels and honest peasantry;
although their steeds, notwithstanding their unpretentious housings,
might still excite the cupidity of highway rogues. As it minimized
their risk from this latter class, the young girl