Page 369 - A Knight of the White Cross

had said, he was prepared to find that she had grown out of her girlhood,
and had altered much. She had, however, changed even more than he had

expected, and had become, he thought, the fairest woman that he had ever
seen. The countess greeted him with great cordiality; but Claudia came

forward with a timidity that contrasted strangely with the outspoken
frankness he remembered in the girl. For a time they all chatted together of
the events of the siege, and of his captivity.

"The news that you had been captured threw quite a gloom over us, Sir

Gervaise," the countess said. "We at first consoled ourselves with the
thought that you would speedily be ransomed; but when months passed by,
and we heard that all the efforts of the grand master had failed to discover

where you had been taken, I should have lost all hope had it not been that
my cousin had returned after an even longer captivity among the Moors. I

am glad to hear that you did not suffer so many hardships as he did."

"I am in no way to be pitied, Countess," Gervaise said lightly. "I had a kind

master for some months, and was treated as a friend rather than as a slave;
afterwards, I had the good fortune to be made the head of the labourers at

the buildings in the sultan's palace, and although I certainly worked with
them, the labour was not greater than one could perform without distress,
and I had naught to complain of as to my condition."

After talking for upwards of an hour, the countess told Caretto that she had

several matters on which she needed his counsel, and retired with him to
the next room of the suite opening from the apartment in which they had
been sitting. For a minute or two the others sat silent, and then Claudia said,

"You have changed much since I saw you last, Sir Gervaise. Then it

seemed to me scarcely possible that you could have performed the feat of
destroying the corsair fleet; now it is not so difficult to understand."

"I have widened out a bit, Lady Claudia. My moustache is really a
moustache, and not a pretence at one; otherwise I don't feel that I have

changed. The alteration in yourself is infinitely greater."