Friend! ah, fair,
sweet friend! the man is human and must die, but love, we read, is
immortal. I am wishful to kill myself, Jehane. But, oh, Jehane! dare
you to bid me live?"
"Friend, as you love me, I entreat you to live. Friend, I crave of the
Eternal Father that if I falter in my love for you I may be denied
even the one bleak night of ease which Judas knows." The girl did not
weep; dry-eyed she winged a perfectly sincere prayer toward
incorruptible saints. Riczi was to remember the fact, and through long
years of severance.
For even now, as Riczi went away from Jehane, a shrill singing-girl
was rehearsing, yonder behind the yew-hedge, the song which she was to
sing at Jehane's bridal feast.
Sang this joculatrix:
"When the Morning broke before us
Came the wayward Three astraying,
Chattering in babbling chorus,
(Obloquies of Aether saying),--
Hoidens that, at pegtop playing,
Flung their Top where yet it whirls
Through the coil of clouds unstaying,
For the Fates are captious girls!"
And upon the next day de Lesnerac bore young Jehane from Pampeluna and
presently to Saille, where old Jehan the Brave took her to wife.
Pages:
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252