to why I
refused the offer of ransom; and should not have done so then, had he
not been present when it was bestowed. I regarded it not as a lightly
given favour, the result of a passing fancy by one who gave favours
freely, but as a pledge of friendship and as a guerdon for what I had
done, and therefore, more to be honoured than the gifts of a Republic
freed from a passing danger. Had you then been what you are now, I might
have been foolish enough to think of it in another light, regardless of
the fact that you are a rich heiress of one of the noblest families in
Italy, and I a knight with no possessions save my sword."

"Say not so, Sir Gervaise," she said impetuously. "Are you not a knight
on whom Genoa and Florence have bestowed their citizenship, whom the
Holy Father himself has thanked, who has been honoured by Pisa, and
whom Ferdinand of Naples has created a Knight of the Grand Cross of St.
Michael, whom the grand master has singled out for praise among all the
valiant knights of the Order of St. John, who, as my cousin tells me,
saved him and the fort he commanded from capture, and who stood alone
over the fallen grand master, surrounded by a crowd of foes. How can you
speak of yourself as a simple knight?"

Then she stopped, and sat silent for a minute, while a flush of colour
mounted to her cheeks.

"Give me my gage again, Sir Gervaise," she said gently. In silence
Gervaise removed it from his neck, wondering greatly what could be her
intention. She turned it over and over in her hand.

"Sir Knight," she said, "this was of no great value in my eyes when I
bestowed it upon you; it was a gage, and not a gift. Now it is to me of
value beyond the richest gem on earth; it is a proof of the faith and
loyalty of the knight I most esteem and honour, and so in giving it to
you again, I part with it with a pang, for I have far greater reason to
prize it than you can have. I gave it you before as a girl, proud that
a knight who had gained such honour and applause should wear her favour,
and without the thought that the trinket was a heart. I give it to you
now as a woman, far prouder than before that you should wear her gage,
and not blind to the meaning of the emblem."

Gervaise took her hand as she fastened it round his neck, and kissed
it; then, still holding it, he said, "Do you know what you are doing,
Claudia? You are raising hopes that I have never been presumptuous
enough to cherish."

"I cannot help tha