Page 34 - A Knight of the White Cross

A few minutes later Dame Tresham was conducted to a comfortable
apartment, and was given into the charge of a female attendant. The next

day she had another interview with the grand prior, to whom she handed
over her jewels and remaining money. This she prayed him to devote to the

furnishing of the necessary outfit for Gervaise. She spent the rest of the day
in the church of the hospital, had a long talk with her son in the evening,
giving him her last charges as to his future life and conduct, and that night,

as if she had now fulfilled her last duty on earth, she passed away, and was
found by her attendant lying with a look of joy and peacefulness on her

dead face.

Gervaise's grief was for a time excessive. He was nearly twelve years old,

and had never until now been separated from her even for a day. She had
often spoken to him of her end being near, but until the blow came he had

never quite understood that it could be so. She had, on the night before her
death, told him that he must not grieve overmuch for her, for that in any
case they must have soon been sundered, and that it was far better that he

should think of her as at rest, and happy, than as leading a lonely and
sorrowful life.

The grand prior, however, wisely gave him but little time to dwell upon his
loss, but as soon as her funeral had taken place, handed him over to the

knights who had the charge of the novices on probation, and instructed
them in their military exercises, and of the chaplain who taught them such

learning as was considered requisite for a knight of the Order.

The knights were surprised at the proficiency the lad had already attained in

the use of his weapons.

"By St. Agatha," one of them exclaimed, after the conclusion of his first
lesson, "you have had good teachers, lad, and have availed yourself rarely
of them. If you go on like this you will become a distinguished knight of

our Order. With a few more years to strengthen your arms I warrant me you
will bear your part well in your first tussle with the Moslem corsairs."