Читать книгу The Red Saint онлайн

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“Give me a red rose, my desire,

And a kiss on the mouth for an Ave.”

The words were those of Etoile of the Lute, and Gaillard hummed them under the shade of the cypresses as he rode towards the inner gate. But some hand threw a clod of turf at him that morning, and threw it so cleverly that the thing hit Gaillard on the ear, and spattered his blue surcoat over with soil.

The Gascon turned sharply in the saddle, and saw a white hand showing between two cypress trees, and a wrist that betrayed the golden threads embroidering a woman’s sleeve.

A voice laughed at him.

“Throw me a clod of turf, my desire,

Give me a blow on the ear for a greeting!”

The arm put the boughs aside, and a face appeared, wreathed by the cypress sprays, a woman’s face, white, mischievous, and alluring. Her black hair was bound up in a golden net. She showed her teeth at Gaillard, and put out the tip of a red tongue.

“Can I throw straight, dear lord?”

He turned his horse, glanced at the window in the tower, and then laughed back at her, opening his mouth wide like the beak of a hungry bird.