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Walter met her just as she had arranged her dress, to bid nurse make ready her bales, for they were to start at dawn on the morrow for Tiberias.  It was quite possible that the enemy might return in force to deliver their Emir.  A small garrison, freshly provisioned, could hold out the castle until relief could be sent; but it would be best to conduct the two important prisoners direct to the King, to say nothing of Walter’s desire to present them and to display these testimonies of his prowess before the Court of Jerusalem.

The Emir was a tall, slim, courteous Arab, with the exquisite manners of the desert.  Both he and the Sheik were invited to the meal.  Both looked startled and shocked at the entrance of the fair-haired damsel, and the Sheik crouched in a corner, with a savage glare in his eye like a freshly caught wild beast, though the Emir sat cross-legged on the couch eating, and talking in the lingua Franca, which was almost a native tongue, to the son and daughter of the Crusader.  From him Walter learnt that King Fulk was probably at Tiberias, and this quickened the eagerness of all for a start.  It took place in the earliest morning, so as to avoid the heat of the day.  How different from the departure in the dark underground passage!

Horses enough had been captured to afford the Emir and the Sheik each his own beautiful steed (the more readily that the creatures could hardly have been ridden by any one else), and their parole was trusted not to attempt to escape.  Walter, Mabel, Sigbert, and Roger were also mounted, and asses were found in the camp for the nurse, and the men who had been hurt in the night’s surprise.

The only mischance on the way was that in the noontide halt, just as the shimmer of the Lake of Galilee met their eyes, under a huge terebinth-tree, growing on a rock, when all, except Sigbert, had composed themselves to a siesta, there was a sudden sound of loud and angry altercation, and, as the sleepers started up, the Emir was seen grasping the bridle of the horse on which the Sheik sat downcast and abject under the storm of fierce indignant words hurled at him for thus degrading his tribe and all Islam by breaking his plighted word to the Christian.

This was in Arabic, and the Emir further insisted on his prostrating himself to ask pardon, while he himself in lingua Franca explained that the man was of a low and savage tribe of Bedouins, who knew not how to keep faith.

Walter broke out in loud threats, declaring that the traitor dog ought to be hung up at once on the tree, or dragged along with hands tied behind him; but Sigbert contented himself with placing a man at each side of his horse’s head, as they proceeded on their way to the strongly fortified town of the ancient Herods, perched at the head of the dark gray Lake of Galilee, shut in by mountain peaks.  The second part of the journey was necessarily begun in glowing heat, for it was most undesirable to have to spend a night in the open country, and it was needful to push on to a fortified hospice or monastery of St. John, which formed a half-way house.

Weary, dusty, athirst, they came in sight of it in the evening; and Walter and Roger rode forward to request admittance.  The porter begged them to wait when he heard that the party included women and Saracen prisoners; and Walter began to storm.  However, a few moments more brought a tall old Knight Hospitalier to the gate, and he made no difficulties as to lodging the Saracens in a building at the end of the Court, where they could be well guarded; and Mabel and her nurse were received in a part of the precincts appropriated to female pilgrims.

It was a bare and empty place, a round turret over the gateway, with a stone floor, and a few mats rolled up in the corner, mats which former pilgrims had not left in an inviting condition.

However, the notions of comfort of the twelfth century were not exacting.  Water to wash away the dust of travel was brought to the door, and was followed by a substantial meal on roasted kid and thin cakes of bread.  Sigbert came up with permission for the women to attend compline, though only strictly veiled; and Mabel knelt in the little cool cryptlike chapel, almost like the late place of her escape, and returned thanks for the deliverance from their recent peril.

Then, fresh mats and cushions having been supplied, the damsel and her nurse slept profoundly, and were only roused by a bell for a mass in the darkness just before dawn, after which they again set forth, the commander of the Hospice himself, and three or four knights, accompanying them, and conversing familiarly with the Emir on the current interests of Palestine.

About half-way onward, the glint and glitter of spears was seen amid a cloud of dust on the hill-path opposite.  The troop drew together on their guard, though, as the Hospitalier observed, from the side of Tiberias an enemy could scarcely come.  A scout was sent forward to reconnoitre; but, even before he came spurring joyously back, the golden crosses of Jerusalem had been recognised, and confirmed his tidings that it was the rearguard of the army, commanded by King Fulk himself, on the way to the relief of the Castle of Gebel-Aroun.

In a brief half-hour more, young Walter de Hundberg, with his sister by his side, was kneeling before an alert, slender, wiry figure in plain chamois leather, with a worn sunburnt face and keen blue eyes—Fulk of Anjou—who had resigned his French county to lead the crusading cause in Palestine.

“Stand up, fair youth, and tell thy tale, and how thou hast forestalled our succour.”

Walter told his tale of the blockaded castle, the underground passage, and the dexterous surprise of the besiegers, ending by presenting, not ungracefully, his captives to the pleasure of the King.

“Why, this is well done!” exclaimed Fulk.  “Thou art a youth of promise, and wilt well be a prop to our grandson’s English throne.  Thou shalt take knighthood from mine own hand as thy prowess well deserveth.  And thou, fair damsel, here is one whom we could scarce hold back from rushing with single hand to deliver his betrothed.  Sir Raymond of Courtwood, you are balked of winning thy lady at the sword’s point, but thou wilt scarce rejoice the less.”

A dark-eyed, slender young knight, in bright armour, drew towards Mabel, and she let him take her hand; but she was intent on something else, and exclaimed—

“Oh, sir, Sir King, let me speak one word!  The guerdon should not be only my brother’s.  The device that served us was—our squire’s.”

The Baron of Courtwood uttered a fierce exclamation.  Walter muttered, “Mabel, do not be such a meddling fool”; but the King asked, “And who may this same squire be?”

“An old English churl,” said Walter impatiently.  “My father took him as his squire for want of a better.”

“And he has been like a father to us,” added Mabel

“Silence, sister!  It is not for you to speak!” petulantly cried Walter.  “Not that the Baron of Courtwood need be jealous,” added he, laughing somewhat rudely.  “Where is the fellow?  Stand forth, Sigbert.”

Travel and heat-soiled, sunburnt, gray, and ragged, armour rusted, leathern garment stained, the rugged figure came forward, footsore and lame, for he had given up his horse to an exhausted man-at-arms.  A laugh went round at the bare idea of the young lady’s preferring such a form to the splendid young knight, her destined bridegroom.

“Is this the esquire who hath done such good service, according to the young lady?” asked the King.

“Ay, sir,” returned Walter; “he is true and faithful enough, though nothing to be proud of in looks; and he served us well in my sally and attack.”

“It was his—” Mabel tried to say, but Sigbert hushed her.

“Let be, let be, my sweet lady; it was but my bounden duty.”

“What’s that?  Speak out what passes there,” demanded young Courtwood, half-jealously still.

“A mere English villein, little better than a valet of the camp!” were the exclamations around.  “A noble damsel take note of him!  Fie for shame!”

“He has been true and brave,” said the King.  “Dost ask a guerdon for him, young sir?” he added to Walter.

“What wouldst have, old Sigbert?” asked Walter, in a patronising voice.

“I ask nothing, sir,” returned the old squire.  “To have seen my lord’s children in safety is all I wish.  I have but done my duty.”

King Fulk, who saw through the whole more clearly than some of those around, yet still had the true Angevin and Norman contempt for a Saxon, here said: “Old man, thou art trusty and shrewd, and mayst be useful.  Wilt thou take service as one of my men-at-arms?”

“Thou mayst,” said Walter; “thou art not bound to me.  England hath enough of Saxon churls without thee, and I shall purvey myself an esquire of youthful grace and noble blood.”

Mabel looked at her betrothed and began to speak.

“No, no, sweet lady, I will have none of that rough, old masterful sort about me.”

“Sir King,” said Sigbert, “I thank thee heartily.  I would still serve the Cross; but my vow has been, when my young lord and lady should need me no more, to take the Cross of St. John with the Hospitaliers.”

“As a lay brother?  Bethink thee,” said Fulk of Anjou.  “Noble blood is needed for a Knight of the Order.”

Sigbert smiled slightly, in spite of all the sadness of his face, and the Knight Commander who had ridden with them, a Fleming by birth, said—

“For that matter, Sir King, we are satisfied.  Sigbert, the son of Sigfrid, hath proved his descent from the old English kings of the East Saxons, and the Order will rejoice to enrol in the novitiate so experienced a warrior.”

“Is this indeed so?” asked Fulk.  “A good lineage, even if English!”

“But rebel,” muttered Courtwood.

“It is so, Sir King,” said Sigbert.  “My father was disseised of the lands of Hundberg, and died in the fens fighting under Hereward le Wake.  My mother dwelt under the protection of the Abbey of Colchester, and, by and by, I served under our Atheling, and, when King Henry’s wars in Normandy were over, I followed the Lord of Hundberg’s banner, because the men-at-arms were mine own neighbours, and his lady my kinswoman.  Roger can testify to my birth and lineage.”

“So, thou art true heir of Hundberg, if that be the name of thine English castle?”

“Ay, sir, save for the Norman!  But I would not, if I could, meddle with thee, my young lord, though thou dost look at me askance, spite of having learnt of me to ride and use thy lance.  I am the last of the English line of old Sigfrid the Wormbane, and a childless man, and I trust the land and the serfs will be well with thee, who art English born, and son to Wulfrida of Lexden.  And I trust that thou, my sweet Lady Mabel, will be a happy bride and wife.  All I look for is to end my days under the Cross, in the cause of the Holy Sepulchre, whether as warrior or lay brother.  Yes, dear lady, that is enough for old Sigbert.”

And Mabel had to acquiesce and believe that her old friend found peace and gladness beneath the eight-pointed Cross, when she and her brother sailed for England, where she would behold the green fields and purple heather of which he had told her amid the rocks of Palestine.

Moreover, she thought of him when on her way through France, she heard the young monk Bernard, then rising into fame, preach on the beleaguered city, saved by the poor wise man; and tell how, when the city was safe, none remembered the poor man.  True, the preacher gave it a mystic meaning, and interpreted it as meaning the emphatically Poor Man by Whom Salvation came, and Whom too few bear in mind.  Yet such a higher meaning did not exclude the thought of one whose deserts surpassed his honours here on earth.

THE BEGGAR’S LEGACY

An Alderman bold, Henry Smith was enrolled,
Of the Silversmiths’ Company;
Highly praised was his name, his skill had high fame,
And a prosperous man was he.

Knights drank to his health, and lauded his wealth;