and proffer me his assistance to set at liberty Cedric and the Lady Rowena, I fear I should hardly have religion enough to refuse the foul fiend’s offer, and bid him get behind me.”
The Friar was now completely accoutred as a yeoman, with sword and buckler, bow and quiver, and a strong partizan over his shoulder. He left his cell at the head of the party, and, having carefully locked the door, deposited the key under the threshold.
“Art thou in condition to do good service, Friar,” said Locksley, “or does the brown bowl still run in thy head?”
“Not more than a draught of St. Dunstan’s fountain will allay,” answered the priest; “something there is of a whizzing in my brain, and of instability in my legs, but you shall presently see both pass away.”
So saying, he stepped to the stone basin, in which the waters of the fountain as they fell formed bubbles which danced in the white moonlight, and took so long a draught as if he had meant to exhaust the spring.
“When didst thou drink as deep a draught of water before, Holy Clerk of Copmanhurst?” said the Black Knight.
“Never since my wine butt leaked, and let out its liquor by an illegal vent,” replied the Friar, “and so left me nothing to drink but my patron’s bounty here.”
Then plunging his hands and head into the fountain, he washed from them all marks of the midnight revel.
Thus refreshed and sobered, the jolly priest twirled his heavy partizan round his head with three fingers, as if he had been balancing a reed, exclaiming at the same time, “Where be those false ravishers who carry off wenches against their will? May the foul fiend fly off with me, if I am not man enough for a dozen of them.”
“Swearest thou, Holy Clerk?” said the Black Knight.
“Clerk me no clerks,” replied the transformed priest; “by St. George and the Dragon, I am no longer a shaveling than while my frock is on my back. When I am cased in my green cassock, I will drink, swear, and woo a lass with any blythe forester in the West Riding.”
“Come on, Jack Priest,” said Locksley, “and be silent; thou art as noisy as a whole convent on a holy eve, when the Father Abbot has gone to bed. Come on you, too, my masters, tarry not to talk of it—I say, come on; we must collect all our forces, and few enough we shall have, if we are to storm the castle of Reginald Front-de- B?uf.”
“What! is it Front-de-B?uf,” said the Black Knight, “who has stopt on the king’s highway the king’s liege subjects? Is he turned thief and oppressor?”
“Oppressor he ever was,” said Locksley.
“And for thief,” said the priest, “I doubt if ever he were even half so honest a man as many a thief of my acquaintance.”
“Move on, priest, and be silent,” said the yeoman; “it were better you led the way to the place of rendezvous than say what should be left unsaid, both in decency and prudence.”
CHAPTER XXI
While these measures were taking in behalf of Cedric and his companions, the armed men by whom the latter had been seized hurried their captives along towards the place of security where they intended to imprison them. But darkness came on fast, and the paths of the wood seemed but imperfectly known to the marauders. They were compelled to make several long halts, and once or twice to return on their road to resume the direction which they wished to pursue. The summer morn had dawned upon them ere they could travel in full assurance that they held the right path. But confidence returned with light, and the cavalcade now moved rapidly forward. Meanwhile, the following dialogue took place between the two leaders of the banditti:
“It is time thou shouldst leave us, Sir Maurice,” said the Templar to De Bracy, “in order to prepare the second part of thy mystery. Thou art next, thou knowest, to act the Knight Deliverer.”
“I have thought better of it,” said De Bracy; “I will not leave thee till the prize is fairly deposited in Front-de- B?uf’s castle. There will I appear before the Lady Rowena in mine own shape, and trust that she will set down to the vehemence of my passion the violence of which I have been guilty.”
“And what has made thee change thy plan, De Bracy?” replied the Knight Templar.
“That concerns thee nothing,” answered his companion.
“I would hope, however, Sir Knight,” said the Templar, “that this alteration of measures arises from no suspicion of my honourable meaning, such as Fitzurse endeavoured to instil into thee?”
“My thoughts are my own,” answered De Bracy; “the fiend laughs, they say, when one thief robs another; and we know, that were he to spit fire and brimstone instead, it would never prevent a Templar from following his bent.”
“Or the leader of a Free Company,” answered the Templar, “from dreading at the hands of a comrade and friend the injustice he does to all mankind.”
“This is unprofitable and perilous recrimination,” answered De Bracy; “suffice it to say, I know the morals of the Temple Order, and I will not give thee the power of cheating me out of the fair prey for which I have run such risks.”
“Psha,” replied the Templar, “what hast thou to fear? Thou knowest the vows of our order.”
“Right well,” said De Bracy; “and also how they are kept. Come, Sir Templar, the laws of gallantry have a liberal interpretation in Palestine, and this is a case in which I will trust nothing to your conscience.”
“Hear the truth, then,” said the Templar; “I care not for your blue-eyed beauty. There is in that train one who will make me a better mate.”
“What! wouldst thou stoop to the waiting damsel?” said De Bracy.
“No, Sir Knight,” said the Templar, haughtily. “To the waiting-woman will I not stoop. I have a prize among the captives as lovely as thine own.”
“By the mass, thou meanest the fair Jewess!” said De Bracy.
“And if I do,” said Bois-Guilbert, “who shall gainsay me?”
“No one that I know,” said De Bracy, “unless it be your vow of celibacy or a check of conscience for an intrigue with a Jewess.”
“For my vow,” said the Templar, “our Grand Master hath granted me a dispensation. And for my conscience, a man that has slain three hundred Saracens need not reckon up every little failing, like a village girl at her first confession upon Good Friday eve.”
“Thou knowest best thine own privileges,” said De Bracy. “Yet, I would have sworn thy thought had been more on the old usurer’s money-bags than on the black eyes of the daughter.”
“I can admire both,” answered the Templar; “besides, the old Jew is but half-prize. I must share his spoils with Front-de-B?uf, who will not lend us the use of his castle for nothing. I must have something that I can term exclusively my own by this foray of ours, and I have fixed on the lovely Jewess as my peculiar prize. But, now thou knowest my drift, thou wilt resume thine own original plan, wilt thou not? Thou hast nothing, thou seest, to fear
