ightened. "Monday you may fight," she said. "Now I wish you would
sing."

So he sang until his voice cracked in his throat. Because it was
Christmas, and because it was freshest in his heart, he sang mostly
what he and the blacksmith and the crockery-seller had sung in the
castle yard:

"The Light of Light Divine,
True Brightness undefiled,
He bears for us the shame of sin,
A holy, spotless Child."

They lay that night in a ruined barn with a roof of earth and stones.
Clotilde eyed the manger wistfully, but the Holy Eve was past, and the
day of miracles would not come for a year.

Toward morning, however, she roused the boy with a touch.

"She may have forgotten me," she said. "She has been gone since the
spring. She may not love me now."

"She will love you. It is the way of a mother to keep on loving."

"I am still a girl."

"You are still her child."

But seeing that she trembled, he put his ragged cloak about her and
talked to comfort her, although his muscles ached for sleep.

He told her a fable of the countryside, of that Abbot who, having duly
served his God, died and appeared at the heavenly gates for admission.
"A slave of the Lord," he replied, when asked his name. But he was
refused. So he went away and laboured seven years again at good deeds
and returned. "A servant of the Lord," he called himself, and again he
was refused. Yet another seven years he laboured and came in all
humility to the gate. "A child of the Lord," said the Abbot, who had
gained both wisdom and humility. And the gates opened.

[Illustration]

[Illustration: Chapter Three]

III

All that day came peasants up the hill with their Christmas dues, of one
fowl out of eight, of barley and wheat. The courtyard had assumed the
appearance of a great warehouse. Those that were prosperous came
a-riding, hissing geese and chickens and grain in bags across the
saddle. The poorer trudged afoot.

Among the latter came the girl Joan of the Market Square. She brought
no grain, but fowls only, and of these but two. She took the steep
ascent like a thoroughbred, muscles working clean under glowing skin,
her deep bosom rising evenly, treading like a queen among that clutter
of peasants.

And when she was brought into the great hall her head went yet higher.
It pleased the young _seigneur_ to be gracious. But he eyed her much as
he had eyed the great horse that morning before he cut it with the whip.
She