The Legend of the Glorious Adventures of Tyl Ulenspiegel in the land of Flanders Part 47

"I see clearly enough to admire your ugly mug," said Ulenspiegel.

Suddenly he struck the stem of his wine-gla.s.s and clapped his hands together with a rhythm like that an upholsterer uses when he beats the wool of a mattress with his stick.

"'T is van te beven de klinkaert," he said; "it is time to make the gla.s.ses shiver--the gla.s.ses which resound...."

And this, in Flanders, is the signal that the drinkers make when they are angry, and when they are like to ransack and despoil in their wrath the houses of ill fame. So even now did Ulenspiegel raise his gla.s.s and drink, and then did he made it vibrate upon the table, crying yet again:

"'T is van te beven de klinkaert."

And the seven butchers did likewise.

Then a great stillness fell upon the company. La Gilline grew pale; La Stevenyne looked astonished. The constables said:

"Are the seven with them too?" But the butchers winked their eyes and rea.s.sured them; yet all the time they continued without ceasing, and louder and louder as Ulenspiegel led them:

"'T is van te beven de klinkaert. 'T is van te beven de klinkaert."

La Stevenyne took another draught of wine to give herself courage.

Then Ulenspiegel struck his fist on the table in that regular rhythm which the upholsterers use as they beat their mattresses; and the seven did likewise; and the gla.s.ses, jugs, trenchers, flagons, and goblets began to dance upon the table, slowly at first, but beginning soon to knock against each other, and to break and to heel over on one side as they fell. And all the time echoed and re-echoed, more sternly menacing, with every monotonous repet.i.tion:

"'T is van te beven de klinkaert."

"Alas!" said La Stevenyne, "they will break everything." And her teeth seemed to show farther out from her lips than ever. And the hot blood of their fury and of their anger began to flame in the souls of the seven butchers, and in the souls of Lamme and Ulenspiegel. Till at last, without ceasing once their melancholy and monotonous chant, all they that were sitting at Ulenspiegel's table took their gla.s.ses, and brake them upon the table, and at the same moment they drew their cutla.s.ses and leapt upon the chairs. And they made such a din with their song that all the windows in the house shook. Then like a band of infuriated devils they went round the room, visiting each table in turn, crying without ceasing:

"'T is van te beven de klinkaert."

And the constables rose up trembling with terror and seized their ropes and chains. But the butchers, together with Lamme and Ulenspiegel, thrust their knives quickly back into their cases, and sprang up to run nimbly through the chamber, hitting out right and left with their chairs as though they had been cudgels. And they spared nothing there except the girls, for everything else they brake in pieces--furniture, windows, chests, plates, pots, trenchers, gla.s.ses, and flagons, hitting out at the constables without mercy, and crying out all the time in the rhythm of the mattress-beaters: "'T is van te beven de klinkaert. 'T is van te beven de klinkaert." And Ulenspiegel, who had given La Stevenyne a blow on the nose with his fist, and had taken all her keys and put them into his satchel, was now amusing himself by forcing her to eat those candles of hers. And the girls laughed at the sight of her as she sneezed with anger and tried to spit out the candles--but in vain, for her mouth was too full. And all the time Ulenspiegel and the seven butchers did not cease the rhythm of their dire refrain: "'T is van te beven de klinkaert." But at last Ulenspiegel made a sign, and when silence had at last been restored he spake, saying:

"You are here, my friends, in our power. It is a dark night and the River Lys is close at hand, where a man drowns easily if he is once pushed in. And the gates of Courtrai are shut." Then turning to the seven butchers:

"You are bound for Peteghen, to join the Beggarmen?"

"We were ready to go there when the news came to us that you were here."

"And from Peteghen you were going to the sea?"

"Yes," they said.

"Do you think there are one or two among these constables whom it would be safe to release for our service?"

"There are two," they said, "Niklaes and Joos by name, who have never as yet been guilty of persecuting the poor Reformers."

"You can trust us!" said Niklaes and Joos.

"Very well then," said Ulenspiegel. "Here are twenty caroluses for you, twice as much, that is, as you would have got for an act of shameful betrayal." And at that the other five constables cried out as one man:

"Twenty florins! We will serve the Prince for twenty florins. The King's pay is bad. Only give us half as much and we will tell the judge any tale you please." But Lamme and the butchers kept muttering under their breath:

"'T is van te beven de klinkaert. 'T is van te beven de klinkaert."

"In order that you may be kept from too much talking," Ulenspiegel continued, "the seven will lead you in handcuffs to Peteghen, and there you will be given over into the hands of the Beggarmen. The florins will be handed to you at sea, and if you prove brave in battle you will have your share of the spoil. If you attempt to desert you will be hanged."

"We will serve him who pays us," they said.

"'T is van te beven de klinkaert! 'T is van te beven de klinkaert,"

murmured the seven.

"You will also take with you," said Ulenspiegel, "La Gilline, La Stevenyne and the girls. If any one of them tries to escape you will sew her in a sack and throw her into the river."

"He has not killed me yet!" cried La Gilline, jumping up from her corner and brandishing her viola in the air. And she began to sing:

Sanglant etait mon reve.

Le reve de mon coeur.

Je suis la fille d'Eve Et de Satan vainqueur.

But La Stevenyne and the others seemed as if they were going to cry.

"Do not be afraid, my sweets," said Ulenspiegel. "You are so pretty and so tender that all men will love to caress you wherever you go, and after every victory you will have your share in the spoils." But the three girls turned upon La Gilline:

"You that were her daughter, her breadwinner, sharing with La Stevenyne the shameful rewards of her espionage, do you still dare to flaunt yourself before us and to insult us with your dress of brocade? Verily it is the blood of the victims and nothing else that has clothed you so richly. But now let us take her dress from her, so she may be like to us."

"That shall not be," said Ulenspiegel.

And the girls looked jealously at Ulenspiegel, saying:

"He is mad about her, like all the rest."

And La Gilline played upon her viola and sang, and the seven butchers departed for Peteghen, taking with them the constables and the girls. And they pa.s.sed along by the River Lys. And as they went they kept muttering:

"'T is van te beven de klinkaert! 'T is van te beven de klinkaert!" And at break of day they came to the camp, and sang out like the lark and were answered straightway by a c.o.c.kcrow. The girls and the constables were put under a strong guard, but in spite of these precautions La Gilline was found dead at noon on the third day, her heart pierced by a long needle. The three girls accused La Stevenyne of having done this deed, and she was brought before the captain. There she confessed that she had committed the crime out of jealousy and anger at the way the girl had treated her. And La Stevenyne was hanged and buried in the wood.

La Gilline also was buried, and prayers were said over her sweet body.

XXIV

Warm was the air, and not a breath of wind was wafted from the calm sea. The trees on the Damme ca.n.a.l were motionless, and the gra.s.shoppers were busy in the meadows, while from many a church and abbey the men came into the fields to fetch that "thirteenth part of the harvest" which was claimed by the cures and the abbes who lived round about. From the depths of a blue and blazing sky the sun poured down his heat, and Nature slept beneath that radiance like some beautiful girl that has swooned away beneath the caresses of her lover.

From far off, Lamme and Ulenspiegel descried the high, square, ma.s.sive tower of Notre Dame, and Lamme said: