The two left the hall. Without, Foulque must discover from Jean and Sicart if all went well and the abbot’s train was in good humour. “I’ve known a discontented horse-boy make a prince as discontented!” But they who followed the abbot were laughing in the small, bare court, and the bare ward room. Even mistral did not seem to trouble them. South of the tower, in the angle between it and the wall, lay the tiniest of grass-plots, upbearing one tall cypress. Foulque, his mantle close around him, beckoned hither Garin. Here was a stone seat in the sun, and the black tower between one and that wind from the mountains. Foulque sat and argued, Garin stood with his back against the cypress. The hour dropped away, and Foulque saw nothing gained. He shook with wrath and concern for slipping fortunes. “Since yesterday! This has happened since yesterday! You took your rod and went down to the river to fish. What siren sang to you from what pool?” Garin lifted his head. “No siren. Something wakened within me, and now I will be neither monk nor priest. I am sorry to grieve you, Foulque.” But Foulque nursed his wrath. “The hour has passed,” he said. “So we go back to the abbot and spurn a rich offer!” He rose and with a bleak face left the grass-plot. Garin followed, but not immediately. He stood, beneath the cypress tree and tried to see his life. He could not do so; he could only tell that his heart was parted between sorrow and joy, and that a nightingale sang and sang. He could tell that he wished to live beautifully, to do noble deeds, to win honour, to serve, if need be to die for, a goddess whose face was veiled. His life whirled; at once he felt generous, wealthy, and great, and poor, humble, and despairing. He seemed to see through drifting mists a Great Meaning; then the cloud thickened and he was only Garin, Raimbaut’s squire—then again images and music, then aching sadness. He stood with parted lips, beneath the cypress, and he looked south. At last he sighed and covered his eyes with his hand, then turned and went back to the hall. The abbot was awake, had left the great bed and come to the great chair. Seated at ease in the light of the renewed fire, he was goldenly discoursing to Foulque who sat on a stool, of Roche-de-Frêne and its prince and his court, and of Bishop Ugo. “Ah, the great chances in the fair lap of Mother Church! Ugo is ambitious. There it is that we differ. I am not ambitious—no, no! I am an easy soul, and but take things as they come my way!” He turned in his chair and looked at Garin standing behind his brother. “Ha!” he said, “and this is the squire who would become canon?” Foulque groaned. “Most Reverend Father, the boy is mad! I think that he is bewitched. I pray that of your goodness, wisdom and eloquence you bring him to a right mind—” The Abbot of Saint Pamphilius smiled, assured as the sun. “What is it? Does he think that already he has Fortune for mistress?”