Courtoise sat down again when she left him, and remained motionless, the steel on his knees, his hands idle, staring into space. Suddenly he leaped to his feet and hurled the breastplate to the floor with a smothered oath. “Gray of St. Gray!” he cried, “what devil hath seized the man I loved? Gerault, my lord, rides out and leaves this angel to weep after him! Gray of St. Gray! what desires he more fair than this his Lenore? What—what—what—” the muttered words died into thoughts as Courtoise clapped a cap on his head and strode away from the armory and out of the Castle. In the courtyard the first object that met his eyes was Gerault’s horse, standing in front of the keep, with a stable-boy holding him by the bridle. Gerault himself was in the doorway of the empty falcon-house, holding a _hagard_ on his wrist, while two dead pigeons swung from his girdle. “Courtoise! Behold our spoils! Hath not Talon-Fer done Alixe’s training honor?” cried Gerault, the note of pleasure keener than usual in his voice. Courtoise, flushed with rising anger, went over to him. “My lord, the Lady Lenore asks for thee!” he said a little hoarsely, paying no attention to the dead pigeons or the young falcon. Gerault very slightly raised his brows, more at Courtoise’s tone, perhaps, than at the words he spoke. “The Lady Lenore,” he said. “Even so—the Lady Lenore—thy wife!” “I understand thee, good Courtoise.” The veins in the younger man’s neck and temples stood out under the strain of repression. “Comes my lord?” he asked slowly. “In good time, Courtoise. The _hagard_ must be fed.” Gerault would have turned away, but Courtoise, with a burst of irritation, exclaimed,— “I will feed the creature!” Now Gerault turned to him again: “Hast thou some strange malady or frenzy, that thou shouldst use such tones to me, boy?” “Tones—tones, and yet again tones! Gerault—thou churl! Ay, I that have been faithful squire to thee these many years, I say it. Thou churl and worse, to have wedded with the sweetest lady ever sun shone upon, to bring her, a stranger, home to thy Castle, and then leave her there, day following day, while thou ridest over the moors to dally with some bird! All the Castle stares at the cruelty of thy neglect. Daily the demoiselles whisper together, wondering what distemper thy lady hath that thou seest her not by day—” “Hush, boy—hush! Thou’rt surely mad!” cried out Gerault, with a note in his voice that gave Courtoise pause. Then there fell between them a silence, heavy, and so binding that Courtoise could not move. He stood staring into his master’s face, watching the color grow from white to red and back again, and the expression change from angry amazement to something softer, something strange, something that Courtoise did not know in his lord’s face. And Gerault gnawed his lip, and bent low his head, and presently spoke, in a voice that was not his own, but was rather curiously muffled and unnatural.