He had fancied the
words and the rhymes when he wrote them, but now they seemed to
sound on his ears with the married music of all the falling waters
and all the blowing winds of the world. It was a shining face that
he turned to the girl as he jeered, denying the thought in his
heart:
"What doggerel!"
The girl flashed scorn at him.
"Doggerel! It is divinity," she insisted, flinging a kiss from her
finger-tips in Godspeed, as it were, to the banished ballad-maker,
as she moved a little further up the steps. Villon followed her. Let
come what might come, he was the maid's equal for the moment and
would press his suit if he died for it.
"Tell me what I may do," he said, "to win your favour."
The girl's smiling face grew graver as she looked down on the
imploring poet.
"A trifle," she said lightly, as a child might bid for a doll; and
then, as Villon's eyes glowed questions, her voice rang out like the
call of a clarion. "Save France!" she trumpeted.
Villon caught fire from both her moods.
"No more?" he said, and though the sound of his voice jested, the
look in his eyes was earnest.
The girl responded to jest and earnest royally.
Pages:
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142