The Legend of the Glorious Adventures of Tyl Ulenspiegel in the land of Flanders Part 20

And she was about to go to the a.s.sistance of her man when one of the sergeants caught hold of her, not indeed without some danger to himself. And Claes was fighting and hitting out so forcibly that he would certainly have escaped had not the two sergeants with whom Soetkin had been talking come out to aid their fellows in the nick of time. So at last they were able to tie the hands of Claes together, and to carry him back to the kitchen, whither Nele and Soetkin had already come, crying and sobbing.

"Sir Provost," Soetkin said, "what crime has he committed that you are binding my poor husband thus with cords?"

"He is a heretic," said one of the sergeants.

"Heretic!" cried Soetkin, looking towards her husband. "You a heretic! These devils are lying!"

Claes answered:

"I resign myself into G.o.d's keeping."

And they took him away. Nele and Soetkin followed behind, in tears, believing that they also would be summoned before the judge. They were joined by many of their friends and neighbours, but when these heard that it was on a charge of heresy that Claes was walking thus in chains, fear came upon them and they returned incontinently to their houses, closing their doors behind them. Only a few young girls had the courage to approach Claes and say to him:

"Whither are you going to, Charcoal-burner, in these bonds!"

"I go unto the grace of G.o.d, my girls," he answered them.

So they took him away to the town gaol, and Nele and Soetkin sat themselves down upon the threshold. And towards evening Soetkin besought Nele to leave her and to go and see if Ulenspiegel had perchance returned.

x.x.xVIII

The news spread quickly through the neighbourhood that a man had been taken prisoner on a charge of heresy, and that the inquisitor t.i.telman, Dean of Renaix, surnamed the Inquisitor without Pity, had been appointed judge. Now at this time Ulenspiegel was living at Koolkerke, in the intimate favour of a farmer's widow, a sweet and gentle person who refused him nothing of what was hers to give.

He was very happy there, petted and made much of, until one day a treacherous rival, an alderman of the village, lay in wait for him early in the morning when he was coming out of the tavern, and would have beaten him with a wooden club. But Ulenspiegel, thinking to cool his rival's anger, threw him into a duck-pond that was full of water, and the alderman scrambled out as best he could, green as a toad and dripping like a sponge.

As a result of this mighty deed Ulenspiegel found it convenient to depart from Koolkerke, and off he went to Damme as fast as his legs would carry him, fearing the vengeance of the alderman.

The night fell cold, and Ulenspiegel ran quickly. For he was longing to be home again, and already he saw in imagination Nele sewing by the fire, Soetkin getting ready the supper, Claes binding up his sticks, and Schnouffius gnawing at a bone.

A tramping pedlar met him on the road and asked him whither he was off to so fast and at that time of night.

"To my home in Damme," Ulenspiegel told him.

The tramp said:

"That town is no longer safe. They are arresting the Reformers there."

And he pa.s.sed on.

Presently Ulenspiegel arrived at the inn of the Roode Schildt and went in for a gla.s.s of dobbel kuyt. The innkeeper said to him:

"Are you not the son of Claes?"

"I am," said Ulenspiegel.

"Make haste then," said the innkeeper, "for the hour of evil fortune has sounded for your father."

Ulenspiegel asked him what he meant by these words, and the innkeeper told him that he would know soon enough. So Ulenspiegel left the inn and continued on his way, running apace.

When he arrived at the outskirts of Damme, the dogs that stood by the doorways came running round his legs, jumping up at him, yelping and barking. Hearing this noise, the women also came out of their houses, and when they saw who it was they all began talking at once.

"Whence come you?" they cried. "And have you any news of your father? And do you know where your mother is? Is she in prison too? Alas! Heaven send they do not bring him to the stake!"

Ulenspiegel ran on faster than ever. He met Nele.

"Tyl," she said, "you must not go home. They have set guards in our house in the name of His Majesty."

Ulenspiegel stopped running.

"Nele," he said, "is it true that Claes, my father, is in prison?"

"It is true," Nele said, "and Soetkin sits weeping at the gaol door."

Then the heart of the prodigal son swelled with grief, and he said: "I must go to them."

"No," said Nele. "First you must do what Claes told me, just before he was taken away. 'Look to the money,' he said, 'it is hidden at the back of the grate. You must make sure of that first of everything, for it is the inheritance of poor Soetkin.'"

But Ulenspiegel would not hear aught and ran on quickly to the gaol. There he found Soetkin sitting at the gate. She embraced him with many tears, and they cried on one another's neck.

Knowing that they were there, the populace began to crowd in front of the prison. Then the sergeants arrived and told Soetkin and Ulenspiegel that they were to go away at once. So mother and son returned to Nele's cottage, which was next door to their own, and was being guarded by one of the foot-soldiers who had been sent for from Bruges in case there might be trouble during the trial and execution of Claes. For it was well known that the people of Damme loved him exceedingly.

The soldier was sitting on the pavement in front of the door, draining the last drops of brandy from a flask. Finding it was all gone he threw the flask away and was amusing himself by dislodging the stones on the path with the point of his dagger.

Soetkin went in to Katheline, crying most bitterly.

But Katheline said: "Fire! Fire! Make a hole! My soul wants to get out!" And she kept wagging her head.

x.x.xIX

Borgstorm, the great bell of Damme, had summoned the judges to judgment. It was four o'clock, and now they were collected together at the Vierschare, around the Tree of Justice.

Claes was brought before them. Seated upon the dais was the high bailiff of Damme, and by his side, opposite Claes, the mayor, the alderman, and the clerk of the court.

The populace ran together at the sound of the bell. A great crowd they were, and many of them were saying that the judges were there to do--not justice--but merely the will of His Imperial Majesty....

After certain preliminaries, the high bailiff began to make proclamation of the acts and deeds for which Claes had been summoned before that tribunal.

"The informer," he said, "had been staying by chance at Damme, not wishing to spend all his money at Bruges in feasting and festivity as is too often the case during these sacred occasions. On a time, then, when he was taking the air soberly on his own doorstep, he saw a man walking towards him along the rue Heron. This man Claes also saw, and went up to him and greeted him. The stranger, who was dressed all in black, entered the house of Claes, leaving the door into the street half open. Curious to find out who the man was, the informer went into the vestibule, and heard Claes talking to the stranger in the kitchen. The talk was all about a certain Josse, the brother of Claes, who it seems had been made prisoner among the army of the Reformers, and had suffered the punishment of being broken alive on the wheel of torture, not far from Aix. The stranger said that he had brought Claes a sum of money which his brother had desired to leave him, which money having been gained from the ignorant and poverty-stricken, it behoved Claes to spend it in bringing up his own son in the Reformed Faith. He also urged Claes to quit the bosom of our Holy Mother Church, and spake also many other impious words to which the only reply vouchsafed by Claes was this: 'The cruel brutes! Alas, my poor Josse!' So did the prisoner blaspheme against our Holy Father the Pope and against His Royal Majesty, accusing them of cruelty in that they rightly had punished heresy as a crime of treason against G.o.d and man. When the stranger had finished the meal that Claes put before him, our agent heard Claes cry out again: 'Alas, poor Josse! May G.o.d keep thee in his glory! How cruel they were to thee!' And thus did he accuse G.o.d himself of impiety by this suggestion that He could receive a heretic into His heaven. Nor did Claes ever cease to cry aloud: 'Alas! Alas! My poor Josse!' The stranger then, launching out into a frenzy, like a preacher beginning his sermon, fell to revile most shamefully our Holy Mother the Church. 'She will fall,' he shouted, 'she will fall, the mighty Babylon, the wh.o.r.e of Rome, and she will become the abode of demons, and the haunt of every bird accursed.' And Claes meanwhile continued the same old cry: 'Cruel brutes! Alas, poor Josse!' And the stranger went on in the same way as he had begun, saying: 'Verily an angel shall appear that shall take a stone that is great as a millstone, and shall cast it into the sea, crying: "Thus shall it be done to Babylon the mighty, and she shall be no more seen."' Whereupon, 'Sir,' says Claes, 'your mouth is full of bitterness; but tell me, when cometh that kingdom in which they that are gentle of heart shall be able to dwell in peace upon the earth?' 'Never,' answered the stranger, 'while yet my Lord Antichrist rules, that is the Pope, who is to-day the enemy to all truth.' 'Ah,'