“Ha!  Madame, don’t cry out,” said the servant, “let us keep our senses together and save this pretty knight.  I will go and seek La Fallotte, in order not to let any physician or surgeon into the secret, and as she is a sorceress she will, to please Madame, perform the miracle of healing this wound so not a trace of it shall remain.

“Run!” replied Bertha.  “I will love you, and will pay you well for this assistance.”

But before anything else was done the lady and her maid agreed to be silent about this adventure, and hide Jehan from every eye.  Then the servant went out into the night to seek La Fallotte, and was accompanied by her mistress as far as the postern, because the guard could not raise the portcullis without Bertha’s special order.  Bertha found on going back that her lover had fainted, for the blood was flowing from the wound.  At the sight she drank a little of his blood, thinking that Jehan had shed it for her.  Affected by this great love and by the danger, she kissed this pretty varlet of pleasure on the face, bound up his wound, bathing it with her tears, beseeching him not to die, and exclaiming that if he would live she would love him with all her heart.  You can imagine that the chatelaine became still more enamoured while observing what a difference there was between a young knight like Jehan, white, downy, and agreeable, and an old fellow like Imbert, bristly, yellow, and wrinkled.  This difference brought back to her memory that which she had found in the pleasure of love.  Moved by this souvenir, her kisses became so warm that Jehan came back to his senses, his look improved, and he could see Bertha, from whom in a feeble voice he asked forgiveness.  But Bertha forbade him to speak until La Fallotte had arrived.  Then both of them consumed the time by loving each other with their eyes, since in those of Bertha there was nothing but compassion, and on these occasions pity is akin to love.

La Fallotte was a hunchback, vehemently suspected of dealings in necromancy, and of riding to nocturnal orgies on a broomstick, according to the custom of witches.  Certain persons had seen her putting the harness on her broom in the stable, which, as everyone knows is on the housetops.  To tell the truth, she possessed certain medical secrets, and was of such great service to ladies in certain things, and to the nobles, that she lived in perfect tranquillity, without giving up the ghost on a pile of fagots, but on a feather bed, for she had made a hatful of money, although the physicians tormented her by declaring that she sold poisons, which was certainly true, as will be shown in the sequel.  The servant and La Fallotte came on the same ass, making such haste that they arrived at the castle before the day had fully dawned.

The old hunchback exclaimed, as she entered the chamber, “Now then, my children, what is the matter?”

This was her manner, which was familiar with great people, who appeared very small to her.  She put on her spectacles, and carefully examined the wound, saying—­