The King's Esquires Part 19

"Oh yes, it's nothing. Don't laugh at me, please. I turned faint like a great silly girl. You touched the tenderest place, where my arm was hurt, and--"

"Denis, boy! May I come in?"

"Yes, yes," said the lad faintly. "Come in. Carrbroke, this is Master Leoni, the gentleman who handles his sword so well."

"I am glad to know you, sir," said the youth, drawing himself up and welcoming with courtly grace the slight, keen-looking, elderly man whose strange, penetrating eyes seemed to be searching him through and through. "I am so sorry that I was asleep when you came last night. I was helping my father's visitor just now, and I am afraid I have hurt him a great deal. His shoulder is hurt, and he tells me that it has not been treated by a leech."

"Hurt?" cried Leoni, speaking quickly. "I did not know of this. Why did you not tell me last night?"

"Oh, I didn't think," said Denis. "I had enough to do to sit my horse and manage to get here; and," added the lad lightly, "I thought that it would be better."

"Ah," said Master Leoni quietly, "let me see." And he looked at the boy fixedly with that curious hard stare of the left eye which Denis never could explain.

"Oh no; I'm nearly dressed now, and breakfast is waiting."

"How did this happen?" said Leoni, paying no heed to the lad's words.

"Sit still, boy, and tell me everything at once."

Denis gave a hurried narrative of his encounter, and his listeners eagerly grasped every word.

"I see," said Leoni gravely. "Your blade must have pa.s.sed through the ruffian, and been held long enough by the muscles for you to receive a horrible wrench. There, set your teeth, and if I hurt you try and bear it. I will be as gentle as I can."

A rapid examination followed, and then the carefully educated fingers ceased their task, and Leoni spoke again as he drew a white kerchief from his pouch and gently wiped his patient's moistened brow.

"There is nothing wrong," he said, "but a bad strain at the tendons, and of course the slightest touch gives great suffering. I will return directly. I am only going to my room for something that will lull that pain, and nature will do the rest."

He nodded gravely to both the lads, and pa.s.sed quickly from the room, while as the door closed the young Englishman said eagerly:

"I like him. He seems to know a deal. But you said that he was a _maitre d'armes_."

"He's everything," said Denis with a faint laugh--"_chirurgien_, statesman--oh, I can't tell you all. Oh, how he hurt me, though! If you hadn't been here I believe I should have shrieked."

"Not you," cried the other. "I was watching, and I saw how you set your teeth. Why, if he had pulled your arm off you wouldn't have said a word. I say, I wish you were English."

"Why?" said Denis wonderingly.

"Oh, I don't know," said the other rather confusedly, "only I seem to like a fellow who can act like that."

"Then because I am French you feel as if you couldn't like me?"

"That I don't!" replied the lad bluffly. "Because I do like you, and I'm glad you've come. I say, can you shake hands?"

"Like the English?" said Denis. "Of course."

"Oh, I did not mean that," said the other. "Of course I know that you fellows embrace; but I meant about your arm. Can you shake hands without its hurting? Because we always do it with our right."

"Try," said Denis, smiling, as, pa.s.sing his left hand under his wrist, he softly raised the injured limb, and the next moment the two lads seemed to seal the beginning of a long friendship in a warm, firm pressure, which had not ended when they became conscious that the door had softly opened and Master Leoni was standing there, a dark, peculiar-looking, living picture in an oaken frame, an inscrutable-looking smile upon his lips and his eyes half closed.

The blood flushed to the cheeks of both the lads, as the young Englishman tightened his grip and stood firm, while without appearing to have noticed the lads' action, Leoni came forward, and they saw that he had a little silver _flacon_ in his hand.

"Feel faint now, Denis?" he said.

"Oh no," was the reply. "That pa.s.sed away at once. Is that what you have been to fetch?"

"Yes," said Leoni, smiling, "and you need not think that I am going to give you drops in water such as will make you shudder. I am only going to moisten this linen pad and lay it beneath your waistcoat. I believe it will quite dull the pain. There," he said, a few minutes later, after carefully securing the moistened linen so that it should not slip, and fastening the lad's doublet to his throat, "it feels better now, does it not?"

"Better?" said Denis with a low hiss, and speaking through his teeth.

"Why, it's as if a red-hot point was boring through my shoulder."

"Yes," said Leoni, smiling; "and that's a good sign. In another minute you will not feel the same. Come, Master Carrbroke, let us both finish dressing our patient and get him to his breakfast."

"Oh, I couldn't have believed it," cried Denis, five minutes later.

"Master Carrbroke--"

"Ned," said the young man correctively. "Ned always to my friends."

"Ned, then," said Denis warmly; "once more, this is Master Leoni, and you ought to make him one, for you never before met such a man as he."

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.

A FEW BARS' REST.

A short time later, the dull aching pain seemed to have pa.s.sed completely out of the injured shoulder, and after a few words evincing his grat.i.tude, which Leoni received with a rather cynical smile, they pa.s.sed together, led by their new young friend, into the long low dining-hall of the house, where the King, in company with Saint Simon, both apparently none the worse for the previous night's experience, was impatiently waiting, and conversing with his host, a tall grey-bearded man of sixty, whose aspect told at once that he was father to the youth who ushered in the injured lad.

"Let me introduce my son, my lord," said Sir John. "Ned, my boy, this is Comte de la Seine, a French n.o.bleman about to visit your royal master's Court. My lord, my fighting days have long been over, and I only serve my King now with my counsel; but he has honoured me by accepting the service of my only son for his father's sake, and has made him, young as he is, one of the King's esquires."

"And a brave one too, I'll warrant," said Francis, holding out his hand, quite forgetful of his new character as a travelling n.o.bleman, for his host's heir to kiss.

He winced slightly, his face twitched, and an e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n nearly pa.s.sed his lips, while the sinister look on Master Leoni's countenance deepened as he half closed his eyes, at heart enjoying the scene; for the youth advanced with the frank, manly courtesy of a young Englishman, and instead of bending over and kissing, courtier-like, the extended hand, he took it and shook it with a hearty grip.

"I am glad to know my father's guest, my lord," he said. "It was not from want of respect that I was not here before. I have been with your esquire.--He was badly hurt yesterday, father; he mustn't go on. You must keep him here for days, till we have set him right."

"Gladly, my boy," cried Sir John, "if his lordship will honour my poor home with his presence."

"Oh no, no," said the King shortly. "Why, Denis, boy, you are not so bad as that. Here, Master Leoni, what have you to say?"

"That he must rest two or three days at least, sir. His arm is badly wrenched, and he is not fit to sit a horse."

"But he sat one bravely enough last night," cried the King.--"But, Sir John, are all your roads like this? If the people we pa.s.sed last night could have had their way you would have no guests to throw themselves upon your kindness, for we should have been lying somewhere in the forest to feed the English crows. But there, we have kept you waiting long enough," and he made a gesture towards the well-spread board.

Sir John raised his eyebrows slightly, for his visitor's imperious, authoritative way impressed him unfavourably. But no suspicion of his status occurred to him then, and directly after he was busily employed doing the honours of his table, the good things spread thereon soon having a mollifying influence upon his guest, whose autocratic ways became less prominent under the influence of a most enjoyable meal.

Thoroughly softened then by his meal as far as temper was concerned, the King now began to find out that he was exceedingly stiff, and questioned Saint Simon a good deal about his sensations, to learn that he too was in the same condition.

"Ah, well," he said, "riding will soon take that off. Here, let's go and have a look at the horses."

Sir John accompanied his guest into the great stable-yard, followed by Saint Simon and the two young esquires.