DOWN

THE AGE OF CHIVALRY.

OWN Wattling Street of a fair May morning came as picturesque and homely and altogether unromantic a cavalcade as one would fall in with throughout the length and breadth of England. The leader of it, the generalissimo, was a long, fair youth, heavy in the shoulders, guileless of countenance and adorned at hip with a clanking, ponderous sword. At his heels a little yellow dog, cock-eared and supercilious, bobbed up and down on three muddy legs, the fourth hanging in space like the fairy javelin of Midir. And last of all came a great, lumbering Clydesdale horse with a rope halter over his nose and a heavy-featured girl swaying backward and forward in the saddle. Even the charm of youth and the attractiveness of sun-tanned cheeks failed of relieving the coarse lines of her body and the drab stupidity of her face. Her dress hung clumsily about her; her hands were scarred with work. But now and again as she bent over a little bundle in her arms she smiled very gently. It was still early morning and the sky was blue as only an English sky can be. The trees were softly green above the road, and the sun was golden on the meadowlands. As he walked, the boy turned often to smile over the shoulder of his scarlet cloak.

With the rising of the sun, the broad, white street became crowded with great rumbling carts and tall gilt coaches filled with fine folk, who smiled at the unkempt horse and his swaying rider. Gay troops of horsemen cantered by with a sharp belling of bit and stirrup iron; trees gave way to crowding houses and along the open gutters children played. It was high noon when the little cavalcade drew near the river and turned down toward the wharves. The streets were fairly deserted again. From the tiled chimneys coils of blue smoke rose straight into the air, while on the pavement below shop

keepers in great white aprons lounged in the sun. A small groom standing beside a waiting horse had fallen asleep with his head on the stirrup leather; in fact, all London seemed drowsing in the heat. As they moved slowly down the long slope toward the river a file of soldiers swung out from a side street and came marching toward them four abreast. The young man took the rope bridle in his hand and stood watching the sun on the steel caps and nodding his head to the rhythm of the marching feet. A thick-set, dark-browed man was walking behind them, staring moodily at the ground, but as he passed the little group, crowded to the side of the street, he glanced up, and at once his eyes narrowed. An odd smile touched his lips.

"Halt!" he cried in a rough voice.

The soldiers stopped without so much as turning their heads; the dust rose about them. One of them swore softly. The captain looked at the youth of the scarlet cloak from head to foot. Then he nodded slowly and reached out his hand and touched the boy on the arm.

"Whence and whither?" he demanded harshly.

With a start, the other turned from his regard of the soldiers. "From the west, an' it please your worship," he stammered, flushing redly.

"Oh, as for that, it pleaseth me well enow," said the captain, with the same sly smile. "How would it please thee to be a soldier of our lord, the king?"

The boy turned and laid his hand awkwardly on the flank of the great horse.

"Indeed it would please me, but-thou must not think me ungrateful-but there are these others I must care for."

"A loyal subject, thou!" growled the captain. "A loyal subject to put an ancient nag and a slip of a girl before the honor of thy king. But a pox on this chattering in the sun! Come, say your farewells and be off. We've a good score more of honest knaves to put under arms before the sun is down."

"Nay, but thou dost not understand. Mary hath none other save only me. And the babe is ever hungry. I may not go." The boy stood trembling, with his hands out before him be

seechingly. The little dog cocked his ears and sniffed at his master's boots. The horse fell to mumbling the wood of a window casement.

For answer the captain merely pointed. "Bid her farewell and come!"

The boy's jaw set. He laid his hand on the hilt of his sword, but the soldier was before him. His great hand shut over the scarlet shoulder and with one wide sweep of his arm he flung him into the midst of the waiting soldiers. Two of them seized him. The captain muttered an order and the file moved away up the narrow street. In an agony of despair, the girl sank her head into her arms weeping, and one of the soldiers, hearing, turned and stared at her. The captain spat derisively into the dust.

Down by the wharves where the snub-nosed fishing boats came and the market barges anchored through the nights Mary found an old, deserted hut. It was not a pleasant housing place. The black river flowed oilily before it. The odor of fish and rotting vegetables hung in the air, and the mud was black underfoot; but it was safer by far than the murderous streets.

In the night as they lay on the wet earth, huddling over the sleeping child, men came blundering through the darkness to where the horse was tied. One unloosed the rope, another threatened her with his staff. She heard the little yellow dog scream with pain and run yelping down the wharves. And till dawn she cowered in her hut, numb with fright, and for two days after she lived on the scraps she found among the market stalls. Then the shopkeepers found her and drove her away-she had tried to steal, but her fingers were clumsy and only the darkness of the streets saved her from being caught. Afterwards she begged, but the fisher-folk would give her nothing and other beggars drove her from the open streets. Seven long days dragged into seven interminable nights, till she was weak with hunger and torn with suffering. All day her baby cried pitifully, and at night she would hold it in her arms and hear it moaning softly in its sleep. Once she bore it to the river bank and would have thrown herself into the vile, black water, but that the little hands reached up and

touched her cheek. And the next day, when her soul was weary unto death and all hope had left her, a cold fog crept up the river and lay like a pall over the wharves and empty market place. The fishing boats dropped down to the sea like ghosts, and the lights in the city windows flickered eerily. The river lipped the rotting posts and timbers of the wharves like the touch of death. Mary crouched in the corner of her hut rocking her baby in her arms. She had stopped crying, for her heart no longer ached and only the sharp pain of hunger drove her thoughts on and on. She must have food; the baby was dying. But she must live. She must live for this little one breathing so faintly at her breast.

With the fall of night, she laid the baby, wrapped in a coarse cloak, in a corner of the shed, and picked her way across the deserted market place. The streets were black, unlighted. Passersby loomed up like giants in the mist. Their footsteps were deadened and the sound of their voices came and went with the fog eddies like a wet wind through pine boughs. Frightened, Mary stepped into the shelter of a doorway, watching with straining eyes, listening to the beating of her heart. A window back of her threw a shaft of light into the swirling mist; elsewhere the walls of night were black. After a long time of waiting for she knew not what, she grew faint. The crying of her baby still rang in her ears, still she felt the warmth of it over her heart. With a sob that wracked her whole body she sprang out from the door, for her mind was clear again, clear as light—she would be cunning-she would wait her chance and she would not fail. A man came swiftly walking through the night. She reached out her hand and laid it gently on his arm, and with an oath he turned. An instant he stood breathing fast. Then he laughed a great, harsh laugh and reached out his arms toward her. She let him draw her into the street, till the light of the window fell on him. It was her husband. With a little, stifled cry she dropped her arms from his shoulders; she saw the first amazement on his face, the half smile of greeting, then the cold horror as the truth slowly forced itself upon him. Her hands went out to him pitifully. Her body leaned toward him. Then suddenly she turned and fled into the blinding mist. On

and on she ran. Twice she fell; many times she was jostled and struck at in the dark. But never for an instant did she stop. The beat of following footsteps was constantly in her ears, now near, now far behind. Her mind was frozen with horror. Her heart pounded chokingly. Only her feet went on and on, through the blank streets, across the empty market place, to the door of the broken hut. Here she stood swaying, listening, straining into the dark. Then she threw back her head and laughed as merrily as ever a young girl laughed when the orchards were white with Easter snow and the sun was warm in the hills. With the sound of her laughter still on her lips she sank to the floor of the little hut and lay very still.

And the baby on its bed of rags woke to cry pitifully.

A. MacLeish.