Of me Elliot made ofttimes not much more account than of her jackanapes,
which was now in very high favour, and waxing fat, so that, when none but
her father could hear her, she would jest and call him La Tremouille.

Yet I, as young men will, was forward in all ways to serve her, and to
win her grace and favour. She was fain to hear of Scotland, her own
country, which she had never seen, and I was as fain to tell her. And
betimes I would say how fair were the maidens of our own country, and how
any man that saw her would know her to be a Scot, though from her tongue,
in French, none might guess it. And, knowing that she loved wildflowers,
I would search for them and bring them to her, and would lead her to
speak of romances which she loved, no less than I, and of pages who had
loved queens, and all such matters as young men and maids are wont to
devise of; and now she would listen, and at other seasons would seem
proud, and as if her mind were otherwhere. Young knights many came to
our booth, and looked ill-pleased when I served them, and their eyes were
ever on the inner door, watching for Elliot, whom they seldom had sight
of.

So here was I, in a double service, who, before I met Brother Thomas, had
been free of heart and hand. But, if my master's service irked me, in
that other I found comfort, when I could devise with Elliot, as
concerning our country and her hopes for the Maid. But my own hopes were
not high, nor could I mark any sign that she favoured me more than
another, though I had the joy to be often in her company. And, indeed,
what hope could I have, being so young, and poor, and in visible station
no more than any 'prentice lad? My heart was much tormented in these
fears, and mainly because we heard no tidings that the Maid was accepted
by the Dauphin, and that the day of her marching, and of my deliverance
from my base craft of painting, was at hand.