"You are a rogue, my man, an impudent and a black-
hearted rogue and vagabond. I have passed an hour with you. Oh!
believe me, I feel myself disgraced! And you have eaten and drunk
at my table. But now I am sick at your presence; the day has come,
and the night-bird should be off to his roost. Will you go before,
or after?"
"Which you please," returned the poet, rising. "I believe you to
be strictly honourable." He thoughtfully emptied his cup. "I wish
I could add you were intelligent," he went on, knocking on his head
with his knuckles. "Age, age! the brains stiff and rheumatic."
The old man preceded him from a point of self-respect; Villon
followed, whistling, with his thumbs in his girdle.
"God pity you," said the lord of Brisetout at the door.
"Good-bye, papa," returned Villon with a yawn. "Many thanks for
the cold mutton."
The door closed behind him. The dawn was breaking over the white
roofs. A chill, uncomfortable morning ushered in the day. Villon
stood and heartily stretched himself in the middle of the road.
"A very dull old gentleman," he thought. "I wonder what his
goblets may be worth."
THE SIRE DE MALETROIT'S DOOR
Denis de Beaulieu was not yet two-and-twenty, but he counted
himself a grown man, and a very accomplished cavalier into the
bargain. Lads were early formed in that rough, warfaring epoch;
and when one has been in a pitched battle and a dozen raids, has
killed one's man in an honourable fashion, and knows a thing or two
of strategy and mankind, a certain swagger in the gait is surely to
be pardoned.
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