So
you have neither kith nor kin, nor lands nor goods, beyond your horse
and your sword; wherefore I say, it were as well for you to stay with
us altogether."
Gilbert was silent for some time after the abbot had ceased speaking.
He seemed to be utterly overcome by the news that he was disinherited,
and his hands lay upon his knees, loosely weak and expressive of utter
hopelessness. Very slowly he raised his face at last and turned his
eyes upon the only friend that seemed left to him in his destitution.
"So I am an outcast," he said, "an exile, a beggar--"
"Or a monk," suggested the churchman, with a smile.
"Or an adventurer," said Gilbert, smiling also, but more bitterly.
"Most of our ancestors were that," retorted the abbot, "and they have
picked up a fair living by it," he added. "Let me see: Normandy, Maine,
Aquitaine, Gascony--and England. Not a bad inheritance for a handful of
pirates matched against the world."
"Yes, but the handful of pirates were Normans," said Gilbert, as if
that statement alone should have explained the conquest of the
universe. "But the world is half won," he concluded, with a rather
hopeless sigh.
"There is enough to fight for yet," answered the abbot, gravely. "The
Holy Land is not half conquered, and until all Palestine and Syria
shall be one Christian kingdom under one Christian king, there is earth
for Norman feet to tread, and flesh for Norman swords to hack."
Gilbert's expression changed a little, and a light came into his eyes.
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