The Path of the King

aving made the voyage from Cyprus with a fair wind in a day and a night in a ship of Genoa flying the red and gold banner of the Temple. Weary of the palms and sun-baked stree

d was admitted straightway to an audience with the Gra

night by flares of tarry staves; and over all that rotting yet acrid flavour which is the token of the East. The young damoiseau of Beaumanoir had grown very sick of it all since the royal dromonds first swung into Limasol Bay

tly twiddling his thumbs, as if all time lay before him and not a man's brief life. And now when at long last the laggards of Burgundy and the Morea were reported on their way, Sir Ai

nstrous men with big heads that sprang straight from the shoulder, and arms that hung below the knee, and short thin legs like gnomes. For forty weeks they had been on the road, and they brought gifts such as no eye had seen before-silks like gossamer woven with wild alphabets, sheeny jars of jade, and pearls like moons. Their Khakan, they said, had espoused the grandchild of Prester John, and had been baptized into the Faith. He marched against Bagdad, and had sworn to root the here

ayer, Louis opened to them his mind. Pale from much fasting and nightly communing with God, his face was lit again with that light which had

y shall come from the east and from the west to sit down with Abraham in

e King's eyes. One alone cavilled. He was a Scot, Sir Patrick, the Coun

forty weeks to reach us, it will be a good year before his armi

the weakest confound a multitude. This far-away King asks for instruction, and I will send him holy men to fortify h

St. Pol as that stout friend enlarged on his merits. "The knight of Beaumanoir," so ran the testimony, "has more learning than any clerk.

ishman. Thence, by the favour of the Queen-mother, he had gone as squire to Alphonso's court of Castile, where the Spanish doctors had opened windows for him into the clear dry wisdom of the Saracens. He had travelled with an embassy to the Emperor, and in Sicily had talked with the learned Arabs who clustered around the fantastic Frederick. In Italy he had met adventurers of Genoa and Venice who had sh

by falling in love. The girl, Alix of Valery, was slim like a poplar and her eyes were grey and deep as her northern waters. She had been a maid of Blanche the Queen, and had a nun's devoutness joined to a merry soul. Under her guiding Aimery made his peace with the Church, and became notable for his gifts to God, for he derived great wealth from his Flemish forbears. Yet the yeast of youth still wroug

and set out on his journey. His last memory of Louis was of a boyish figure in a

an is this?" he cried, "to whom it is a journey of a lifetime to come nigh? What kind of Christian will you make of men that have blood for drink and the flesh of babes for food, and blow hither and thither on horses like sandstorms? Yours is a mad venture, y

er needed nor sought wealth, nor was he concerned about death. His feet trod the sacred soil of his faith, and up in the hills which rimmed the seaward plain lay all the holiness of Galilee and Nazareth, the three tabernacles built by St. Peter on the Mount of Transfiguration, the stone whence Christ ascended into heaven, the hut at Bethlehem which had been the Most High's cradle, the sanctuary of Jerusalem whose every stone was precious. Presently his King would win it all back for God. But for him was the sterner task-no clean blows in the mellay amo

ouis to the Khakan-a chapel-tent of scarlet cloth embroidered inside with pictures of the Annunciation and the Passion; two sumpter mules with baggage; Aimery's squire, a lad from the Boulonnais; and Aime

fangs are drawn." And when Aimery asked the cause of the impotence

erers and warriors beyond doubt, but grotesque paladins for the Cross. Men whispered their name with averted faces, and in the eyes of the travelled ones there was the terror of sights remembered outside the mortal pale. Aimery's heart was stout, but he brooded much as the road climbed into the mountains. Far off in Cyprus the Khakan had seemed a humble devotee at Christ's footstool, asking only to serve and learn; but now he h

side to darken the sky, He was as swarthy as a Saracen and had a long nose like a Jew, but he was a good Christian and

armies have eaten up the Chorasmians and the Muscovites and will presently bite their way into Christendom, unless God change their heart. By the Gospels, they are l

ther?" Aim

n as the Ilkhan is far from the Pillars of Hercules. But rumour has it that he is a clement and beneficent prince, terrible in battle, but a lover of peace and all good men. They tell wonders about his land of Cat

d under frowning snowdrifts, or across stony barrens where wretched beehive huts huddled by the shores of unquiet lakes. Presently they came into summer, and found meadows of young gra

s withers, and forded the tawny streams which brought down the snows of the hills. Now and then they would pass wandering herdsmen, who fled to some earth-burrow at their appearance. The Constable had bidden them make for the rising sun, saying that sooner or later they would foregather with the Khakan's scouts. But days passed

ngers for immortal beings and offered food on bent knees like oblations to a god. They knew where the Ilkhan dwelt, and furnished guides for each day's journey. Aimery, who had been sick of a low fever in the plains, and had stumbled on in a stupor torn by flashes of homesickness, found his spirits reviving. He had cursed many times the futility of his errand. While the F

ouis hovered before him. It needed a great king even to conceive such a mission.... He had been sent on a king's errand too. He stood alone for France and the Cross in a dark world. Alone, as kings should stand,

memories of the King: the close fair hair now thinning about the temples; the small face still contoured like a boy's; the figure strung like a bow; the quick, eager gestures; the blue dove's eyes, kindly and humble, as became one whose proudest title was to be a

e signs to Aimery to dismount. The Constable had procured for him a letter in Tartar script, setting out the purpose of his mission. This the outpost could not read, but they recognised some word among the ch

elt in villages. They passed encampments of riders like themselves, and little scurries of horsemen would ride athwart their road and exchange greetings. On the second morning they reache

am. These men were no allies of the West. They were children of the Blue Wolf, as the Constable had said, a monstrous brood, swarming from the unknown to blight the gardens of the world. A Saracen

porridge of rye and sour spiced milk, and left them to sleep

ilver, springing from a pedestal of four lions whose mouths poured streams of wine, syrup, and mead into basins, which were emptied by a host of slaves, the cup-bearers of the assembly. There were two thrones side by side, on one of which sat a figure so motionless that it might have been wrought of

e," thought Aimery as he

light in them. A passionless power lurked in the low broad forehead, and the mighty head sunk deep between the shoulders; but the power not of a man, but o

in that hall its devout phrases seemed a mockery. The royal gifts were produced, the tent-chapel with its woven pictures an

them talk with my priests and then go their o

reminded Houlagou of the Tartar envoys who had sought from his King

er. "Maybe 'twas some whim of my broth

he pinning of the Saracens between two fires. He spoke as he had been ordered, but with

ce showed no fli

is for my own table. As for allies, I have need of non

fixed Aimery with his agate eyes. It wa

our. A tribute will be fixed in gold and silver, and while it is duly paid your King's lands will be safe

ay, and the drunken gathering stood up with a howling like wild beasts to acclaim

uis shone like a star. He must attempt to reach Kublai, of whom men spoke well, though the journey cost him his youth and his life. It might mean years of wandering, but there was a spark of hope in it. There, in the bleak hut, he suffered the extreme of mental anguish. A heavy

for Muscovy, whence by ship they might come to Constantinople. The Tartars made no objection to their journey, for they had some awe of these pale men and were glad to be quit of foreign priestcraft. With them Aimery sent a letter in which he told the King that the immediate errand had been done, but that no good could be looked for from this western Khakan. "I go," he said, "to Kublai the Great, in Cathay, who

or a little, and into his set face seemed to creep an ill-boding shadow of a smile. "Who am I," he said

tiers rose a hubbub of mirth which chilled his gratitud

from the journey. "It is a matter of years," he told him, "and the road leads through deserts greater than all Europe and over mountains so high and icy that birds are frozen in the c

he set out from the Tartar city, his squire from the Boulonnais by his side, and at his back a wild

hat he was their prisoner. Judging from the chart of the Genoese, they were not following any road to Cambaluc, and the sight of the sky told him that they were circling round to the south. The few Tartar words he had learned were not enough to communicate with them, and in any case it was clear that they would take no or

ied to question them, only laughed and pointed westward.

line, and they rode before and behind him, so that his captivity was made patent. On a ridge far to the west he saw a great ca

reek scribe was with him, so the meeting had been foreseen. The King'

otten. When a stranger warrior visits us it is our fashion to pit him in a bout against o

Aimery. "I have but

" said the Ilkhan. "I would fa

showed there was Saracen blood in him. He had a heavy German blade, better suited for fighting on horseba

found that he had a formidable foe, but one who lacked the finer arts of the swordsman. The Tartar wasted his strength in the air against the new French parries and guards, though he drew first blood and gashed his oppo

m," said t

, "it is not our custom

sword. The defeated man seemed to know his fate, and stretched

to my brother Kublai. I had purposed to slay you, for you have defied my majesty. You sought to travel to Cathay instead of bearing my commands f

refuse?" A

die ere

her majesty, and of such it is th

is no brother majesty save Kubla

his heart. "I am a knight of the Sire Christ and of the most noble King Louis, and I can own

t," said

le against your warriors. And let me spend the hours till

Houlagou, and tur

. . . . . .

es the snow-sprinkled uplands. The hum of the Tartars came faint fr

heart had risen to a nobler song. For now, as it seemed to him, he stood beside his King, and had found a throne in the desert. Alone among all Christian men he ha

nche, where all day long the slow river made a singing among the reeds. He saw Alix his wife, the sun on her hair, playing in the close with his little Philip. Even now in the pleasant autumn weather that curly-pate would be scrambling in the orchard for the ripe apples which his mother rolled to him. He had thought himself born for a hig

lly the darkness, that was the answer he had got. In the morning, when he had knelt in snow-white linen and crimson and steel before the high altar and received back his sword from God, the message had been whispered to his heart. In the June dawn when, barefoot, he was given the pilgrim's staff

it irked him that his father's jewel should fall to his enemies. Bu

sed in to carry him to his last fight.... He had with him a fragment of rye-cake and beside him on the ridge was a little spring. In his helmet he filled a draught, an

was setting in fierce scarlet and gold. The hollow of the sky seemed a v

. . . . . .

elled arm of this knight, with a gold ring on the third finger. Maffeo was a man of sentiment, and begged for and was given the poor fragment, meaning to accord it burial in consecrated ground when he should arrive in Europe. He travelled to Bussorah, whence he came by sea to Venice. Now at Venice there presently arrived the Count of St. Pol with a company of Frenchmen, bound on a mission to the Emperor. Maffeo, of whom one may still read in the book of Messer Marco Polo, was become a famo