"Thou art ever filled with ardor, de Claverlok, when the meat and drink are in question," observed Kennedy with a faint trace of a smile. "But canst forget thy loves long enough to keep companionship with our guest whilst I go forward to meet my friend riding below?" "Certes will I bear the sir knight company," the grizzled knight instantly agreed. "And I need not desert my loves in doing so, ... eh, ... my boy?" Whereupon he led Sir Richard to a seat beside a hastily constructed table, made of two broad planks set lengthwise above a pair of empty casks. Over it, fluttering and crackling in the crisp, invigorating breeze that blew across the mountain, was stretched an awning of purple and black, which the young knight took to be a part of the pavilion beneath which he had been so mysteriously transported, and beneath which that morning he had so strangely awakened. The Renegade Duke, with a partially empty tankard at his hand, was already seated before a steaming pasty. From the violent red of his nose and cheeks it could easily be seen that he had been making rather too free with the stum. Besides painting his round face, it had provided him with the fool's courage to unmask his hatred of Sir Richard, at whom he glared across the improvised table with an open defiance. At first he was careful to preserve a sulky silence, but by the time he had emptied a few more flagons he grew noisily vociferant, and would likely have opened the quarrel then and there, had it not been for a now and again lustily delivered nudge of de Claverlok's mailed elbow. He was sufficiently himself, however, to relapse into silence when the Bishop joined them with his youthful friend, whom he addressed intimately as Gerard, but introduced to the three men as Erasmus. The scholar's loose robe did not wholly conceal the angularity of his figure. His cheeks, though almost painfully hollow, were touched with the olive bronze of winds and weathers. His nose was unusually prominent, but cut fine at bridge and nostril. His brow, classically moulded, was deep and broad at its base. Altogether, his physiognomy was remarkable for its combination of severe austerity and innate generosity and kindliness. "It would seem," said he, seating himself beside the table between Bishop Kennedy and Sir Richard, "that the flower of knighthood is gathered here to look upon the flower of Scotland's scenery. I wonder, sir knights, that the restful peace of yonder view does not communicate itself to your martial breasts and render you brothers-in-love of all the world." "Thy business it is to think, dream, and observe, Gerard," said Lord Kennedy, "and ours to act. The world is yet too imperfect to receive thy teachings, my friend." "Yea--that it is," agreed de Claverlok between bites. "With us it's eat, drink, rest betimes, and then away. I'll wager, though, our gear sits lighter on our shoulders than your robe, ... eh?"