CHAPTER XLIII.
MALISE FETCHES A CLOUT The four men whom the Messire Gilles, by good fortune, failed to see standing in the doorway opposite the Hotel de Pornic were attired in the habit of pilgrims to the shrine of Saint James of Compostella.
Upon their heads they wore broad corded hats of brown.

Long brown robes covered them from head to foot.

Their heads were tonsured, and as they went along they fumbled at their beads and gave their benediction to the people that passed by, whether they returned them an alms or not.

This they did by spreading abroad the fingers of both hands and inclining their heads, at the same time muttering to themselves in a tongue which, if not Latin, was at least equally unknown to the good folk of Paris.
"It is the house," said the tallest of the four, "stand well back within the shade!" "Nay, Sholto, what need ?" grumbled another, a very thickset palmer he; "if the maids be within, let us burst the gates, and go and take them out!" "Be silent, Malise," put in the third pilgrim, whose dress of richer stuff than that of his companions, added to an air of natural command, betrayed the man of superior rank, "remember, great jolterhead, that we are not at the gates of Edinburgh with all the south country at our backs." The fourth, a slender youth and fresh of countenance, stood somewhat behind the first three, without speaking, and wore an air of profound meditation and abstraction.
It is not difficult to identify three out of the four.

Sholto's quest for his sweetheart was a thing fixed and settled.