"That my Lady Esclaramonde of Thebes is the rose of the world." There was a moment's pause, and the prince made to resume his journey, but again the stranger stopped him with a question: "You love this lady?" The prince looked wonderingly at the fair, perplexing face. "I wed her to-night," he answered, and still the stripling persisted: "You are very sure you love this lady?" The prince hesitated, then said, sharply: "You question somewhat rustically. I wed her to-night." Again the strange knight interrogated, pertinacious: "You have left no other love for her sake?" The prince drew back and set his hand to his sword. "Sir," he said, angrily, "if you question my honor I will answer you to your hurt!" The bearer of the name of Prince of Eleusis came a little nearer to Rainouart, and her voice was as plaintive as summer rain on forest leaves. "No maid weeps for you in the greenwood?" The prince shifted his hand from his sword-hilt to his brow, for his head ached with confusing, formless memories; but the troubling thoughts fled elusive through his brain, leaving no more behind them than the blackened spaces left by a forest fire. "The greenwood!" he echoed. "The greenwood! It was in the greenwood my lady found me." He paused again, ever seeking to remember the unrememberable, then ended, rapidly, "The Lady Esclaramonde, whom I love, and whose love makes me invincible." Infinitely sad the eyes of Argathona shone upon her lost lover's sadness. Against the spells of the subtle sorceress her simple immortality seemed compelled to surrender. Were she to declare herself now, she might fail to quicken the wit that was crippled by the incantations of Esclaramonde. Only Esclaramonde could undo what Esclaramonde had done, and to bring this about Argathona must trust to herself--she, the immortal, alone in an unfriendly world. Argathona had lived but a few hours in the company of men, yet she had lived with them long enough to pity all, to mistrust most, to love one with a love as abiding as her gift of ceaseless life. But her unstained spirit read clearly and swiftly the lessons of the world's law, and she hoped to overthrow the guile of a woman with the guile of a girl. "You are very proud of your love and your lover," she said, gently, for her heart ached to see him so astray. Rainouart answered her with a kind of resentful defiance, as one that sought to convince himself, and he echoed her words: "I am very proud of my love," and so far his voice rang clear and bright as a battle-call; then he ended, more heavily, "and of my lover." He turned from her with a courteous salutation and went towards his tent, and Argathona went her way to her own pavilion and made an end of her arming, thinking upon many things. XVI THE TOURNAMENT