Lanval came down to breakfast to find his mother in her old rocking chair in a corner, a chair that had been handed down through the women of her family and had seen many a babe suckled and rocked to sleep. She started, looking up from a tapestry she was embroidering, surprised to see her son out of bed at such an early hour.
“Good morning, Lanval, could you not sleep?”
It was only a few days since her husband had passed away, but her sense of humour had not deserted her - on the contrary, it assisted her in coping with her grief. Lanval went over and gently kissed her head.
“What do you mean, it’s dawn, isn’t it?” He gazed at the work spread out over her lap, “That’s beautiful, mother, who is it for?”
She was known and admired throughout the town as an accomplished embroideress and, a
