Page 244 - A Knight of the White Cross

"Oh yes, he is in sight. Now do each of you fix on the one you think most
accords with your ideas of what a knight, brave in action and wise and

prudent in council, would be like."

The six ladies each fixed on one of the young knights.

"You are all wrong," said Ralph.

"How can we choose?" the countess said laughingly, "when none of them

resemble our ideal hero? Most of them are pleasant and courtly looking
youths, but as yet there is scarce a vestige of hair on their faces, and one
could not fancy any of them as the destroyer of the fleet of corsairs."

"Do you see the one speaking to the elderly lady in the recess?"

"Yes; she is the wife of Fragoso. You do not mean to say that that lad is the
commander of the galley? Why, he looks the youngest of you all."

"He is between seventeen and eighteen, and there are several others who

are no older. Yes, that is Sir Gervaise, Knight Commander of the Order of
St. John."

"But how can he possibly have served his time as a professed knight?"

"He was one of the grand master's pages, and his time in that service
counted just as it would have done had he entered as a professed knight;
and at fifteen, therefore, he stood in the same position as those three or four

years older than himself. He speaks Turkish as well as our own tongue,
and, as I told you, we received the accolade at the hands of the grand

master, a year and a half ago. He is now a knight commander, and will
assuredly one day occupy one of the highest posts in the Order."

"You do not speak as if you were jealous, Sir Ralph; and yet methinks it
cannot be pleasant for you all to have one younger than yourselves placed

at your head."