page, who is there whom she sees?"

"I cannot tell," quoth Alleyne shortly; and the two squires rode on
again, each intent upon his own thoughts.

Next day at morning lesson the teacher observed that his pupil was
indeed looking pale and jaded, with listless eyes and a weary manner. He
was heavy-hearted to note the grievous change in her.

"Your mistress, I fear, is ill, Agatha," he said to the tire-woman, when
the Lady Maude had sought her chamber.

The maid looked aslant at him with laughing eyes. "It is not an illness
that kills," quoth she.

"Pray God not!" he cried. "But tell me, Agatha, what it is that ails
her?"

"Methinks that I could lay my hand upon another who is smitten with the
same trouble," said she, with the same sidelong look. "Canst not give a
name to it, and thou so skilled in leech-craft?"

"Nay, save that she seems aweary."

"Well, bethink you that it is but three days ere you will all be gone,
and Castle Twynham be as dull as the Priory. Is there not enough there
to cloud a lady's brow?"

"In sooth, yes," he answered; "I had forgot that she is about to lose
her father."

"Her father!" cried the tire-woman, with a little trill of laughter. "Oh
simple, simple!" And she was off down the passage like arrow from bow,
while Alleyne stood gazing after her, betwixt hope and doubt, scarce
daring to put faith in the meaning which seemed to underlie her words.

CHAPTER XIII. HOW THE WHITE COMPANY SET FORTH TO THE WARS.

St. Luke's day had come and had gone, and it was in the season of
Martinmas, when the oxen are driven in to the slaughter, that the White
Company was ready for its journey. Loud shrieked the brazen bugles from
keep and from gateway, and merry was the rattle of the war-drum, as the
men gathered in the outer bailey, with torches to light them, for the
morn had not yet broken. Alleyne, from the window of the armory, looked
down upon the strange scene--the circles of yellow flickering light,
the lines of stern and bearded faces, the quick shimmer of arms, and the
lean heads of the horses. In front stood the bow-men, ten deep, with a
fringe of under-officers, who paced hither and thither marshalling the
ranks with curt precept or short rebuke. Behind were the little clump
of steel-clad horsemen, their lances raised, with long pensils drooping
down the oaken shafts. So silent and still were they, that they might
have been metal-sheathed statues, were it not for the occasional qui