“In that event, I have to-night enregistered my name among the goodly company of Love’s Lunatics,—­as yokefellow with Dan Merlin in his thornbush, and with wise Salomon when he capered upon the high places of Chemosh, and with Duke Ares sheepishly agrin in the net of Mulciber.  Rogues all, madame! fools all! yet always the flesh trammels us, and allures the soul to such sensual delights as bar its passage toward the eternal life wherein alone lies the empire and the heritage of the soul.  And why does this carnal prison so impede the soul?  Because Satan once ranked among the sons of God, and the Eternal Father, as I take it, has not yet forgotten the antique relationship,—­and hence it is permitted even in our late time that always the flesh rebel against the spirit, and that always these so tiny and so thin-voiced tricksters, these highly tinted miracles of iniquity, so gracious in demeanor and so starry-eyed—­”

Then he turned and pointed, no longer the orotund zealot but the expectant captain now.  “Look, my Princess!” In the pathway from which he had recently emerged stood a man in full armor like a sentinel.  “Mort de Dieu, we can but try to get out of this,” Sire Edward said.

“You should have tried without talking so much,” replied Meregrett.  She followed him.  And presently, in a big splash of moonlight, the armed man’s falchion glittered across their way.  “Back,” he bade them, “for by the King’s orders, I can let no man pass.”

“It would be very easy now to strangle this herring,” Sire Edward reflected.

“But it is not easy to strangle a whole school of herring,” the fellow retorted.  “Hoh, Messire d’Aquitaine, the bushes of Ermenoueil are alive with my associates.  The hut yonder, in effect, is girdled by them,—­and we have our orders to let no man pass.”

“Have you any orders concerning women?” the King said.

The man deliberated.  Sire Edward handed him three gold pieces.  “There was assuredly no specific mention of petticoats,” the soldier now recollected, “and in consequence I dare to pass the Princess, against whom certainly nothing can be planned.”

“Why, in that event,” Sire Edward said, “we two had as well bid each other adieu.”

But Meregrett only said, “You bid me go?”

He waved his hand.  “Since there is no choice.  For that which you have done—­however tardily—­I thank you.  Meantime I return to Rigon’s hut to rearrange my toga as King Caesar did when the assassins fell upon him, and to encounter with due decorum whatever Dame Luck may prefer.”

She said, “You go to your death.”

He shrugged his broad shoulders.  “In the end we necessarily die.”

Dame Meregrett turned, and without faltering passed back into the hut.

When he had lighted the inefficient lamp which he found there, Sire Edward wheeled upon her in half-humorous vexation.  “Presently come your brother and his tattling lords.  To be discovered here with me at night, alone, means trouble for you.  If Philippe chances to fall into one of his Capetian rages it means death.”