Bertrand of Brittany by Warwick Deeping

IN a green corner of the orchard, shaded towards the west by a bank of brushwood, Bertrand stood for his last trial before those Bretons who had hunted Croquart from the walls of Josselin. Behind him the brown gold of the meadows rippled like water at sunset, to touch the gnarled trunks of the flowering apple-trees. A pile of faggots had been thrown down to give Messires Geoffroi Dubois and Carro de Bodegat a seat; their esquires were grouped behind them, bearing their masters' shields and spears.

Bertrand watched the faces of these two knights; Dubois, brawny, ponderous, black faced and round shouldered as a bear, less to be feared than his sleek and mercurial brother in arms. Carro de Bodegat's face, narrow and aggressive, with its sharp brown beard and rapid eyes, reminded Du Guesclin of the face of some velvet-capped merchant who had learned to deal with all the greedy littleness of the great. Bertrand hated the man for his high-nostrilled unction, for his insinuating smoothness that was most treacherous when most suave. He knew Carro de Bodegat's nature too well to hope much from him in the way of magnanimity. He was a creature of courtly astuteness and polished persiflage, who would use a dagger where an honest man would have used a sword.