nd you a horse and pay you--the enterprise
is a hazardous one, and I take that into account--two gold crowns a day,
and ten more if we succeed in reaching a place of safety.'

'Such a place as--'

'Never mind that,' I replied. 'The question is, do you accept?'

He looked down sullenly, and I could see he was greatly angered by my
determination to keep the matter to myself. 'Am I to know no more than
that?' he asked, digging the point of his scabbard again and again into
the ground.

'No more,' I answered firmly. 'I am bent on a desperate attempt to mend
my fortunes before they fall as low as yours; and that is as much as
I mean to tell living man. If you are loth to risk your life with your
eyes shut, say so, and I will go to someone else.'

But he was not in a position, as I well knew, to refuse such an offer,
and presently he accepted it with a fresh semblance of heartiness. I
told him I should want four troopers to escort us, and these he offered
to procure, saying that he knew just the knaves to suit me. I bade him
hire two only, however, being too wise, to put myself altogether in his
hands; and then, having given him money to buy himself a horse--I made
it a term that the men should bring their own--and named a rendezvous
for the first hour after noon, I parted from him and went rather sadly
away.

For I began to see that the king had not underrated the dangers of an
enterprise on which none but desperate men and such as were down in the
world could be expected to embark. Seeing this, and also a thing which
followed clearly from it--that I should have as much to fear from my
own company as from the enemy--I looked forward with little hope to a
journey during every day and every hour of which I must bear a growing
weight of fear and responsibility.

It was too late to turn back, however, and I went about my preparations,
if with little cheerfulness, at least with steadfast purpose. I had
my sword ground and my pistols put in order by the cutler over whom I
lodged, and who performed this last office for me with the same goodwill
which had characterised, all his dealings with me. I sought out and
hired a couple of stout fellows whom I believed to be indifferently
honest, but who possessed the advantage of having horses; and besides
bought two led horses myself for mademoiselle and her woman. Such other
equipments as were absolutely necessary I purchased, reducing my stock
of money in this way to two hundred a