"There is truth in the suspicion." "Ah, what is life to me!" "We Christians still have need of you." The man’s seeming scorn scourged her anguish to a shrill despair. The hot blood swept more swiftly through her worn, white body. "Cursed be your ambition," she said to him; "must you torture me before the world?" "Perhaps." "I renounce this lying part." "As you will, madame; it will only make you look the greater fool." "Ah, you are brutal." He turned to her with the look of one enduring unuttered anguish in the spirit. His strong pride throttled passion, twisting his rough face into tragic ugliness. "No, believe it not," he said; "I desire even for your heart’s sake that you should make the best of an evil fortune. Learn to smile again; pretend to a zest in life. I have fathomed hell in my grim years, and my words are true. Time loves youth and recovers its sorrow. Know this and ponder it: ’tis better to play the hypocrite than to suffer the world to chuckle over one’s tears." XXXVIII The royal host had massed about the walls of Lauretia, and marched southwards to surprise Fulviac at St. Gore. Half the chivalry of the land had gathered under the standard of the King. Sir Simon of Imbrecour had come in from the west with ten thousand spears and five thousand bowmen. The Northerners under Morolt boasted themselves twoscore thousand men, and there were the loyal levies of the midland provinces to march under "The Golden Sun" upon the south. Never had such panoply of war glittered through the listening woods. Their march was as the onrush of a rippling sea; the noise of their trumpets as the cry of a tempest over towering trees. Chivalry, golden champion of beauty, had much to avenge, much to expurgate. The peasant folk had plunged the land into ruin and red war. Castles smoked under the summer sky; the noble dead lay unburied in the high places of pride. To the wolf cry of the people there could be no answer save the hiss of the sword. Before the high altar at Lauretia, the King had sworn on relics and the Scriptures, to deal such vengeance as should leave the land cowering for centuries in terror of his name. Southwards from St. Gore there stretched for some fifteen leagues the province of La Belle Forêt, a region of rich valleys and romantic woods, green and quiet under the tranquil sky. Its towns were mere gardens, smothered deep in flowers, full of cedars and fair cypresses. Its people were simple, happy, and devout. War had not set foot there for two generations, and the land overflowed with the good things of life. Its vineyards purpled the valleys; its pastures harboured much cattle. Its houses were filled with rich furniture and silks, chests laden with cloth of gold, caskets of gems, ambries packed with silver plate. The good folk of La Belle Forêt had held aloof from the revolt. Peace-loving and content in their opulence, they had no fondness for anarchy and war.