The Outlaw of Torn Part 30

"What dost thou here, Norman of Torn?" cried De Montfort, angrily.

"Where be my daughter, Bertrade?"

"I be here, My Lord Earl, to attend to mine own affairs," replied Norman of Torn, "which be the affair of no other man. As to your daughter: I know nothing of her whereabouts. What should she have to do with the Devil of Torn, My Lord?"

De Montfort turned toward the little gray man.

"He lies," shouted he. "Her kisses be yet wet upon his lips."

Norman of Torn looked at the speaker and, beneath the visor that was now partly raised, he saw the features of the man whom, for twenty years, he had called father.

He had never expected love from this hard old man, but treachery and harm from him? No, he could not believe it. One of them must have gone mad. But why Flory's armor and where was the faithful Flory?

"Father!" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, "leadest thou the hated English King against thine own son?"

"Thou be no son of mine, Norman of Torn," retorted the old man. "Thy days of usefulness to me be past. Tonight thou serve me best swinging from a wooden gibbet. Take him, My Lord Earl; they say there be a good strong gibbet in the courtyard below."

"Wilt surrender, Norman of Torn?" cried De Montfort.

"Yes," was the reply, "when this floor be ankle deep in English blood and my heart has ceased to beat, then will I surrender."

"Come, come," cried the King. "Let your men take the dog, De Montfort!"

"Have at him, then," ordered the Earl, turning toward the waiting men-at-arms, none of whom seemed overly anxious to advance upon the doomed outlaw.

But an officer of the guard set them the example, and so they pushed forward in a body toward Norman of Torn; twenty blades bared against one.

There was no play now for the Outlaw of Torn. It was grim battle and his only hope that he might take a fearful toll of his enemies before he himself went down.

And so he fought as he never fought before, to kill as many and as quickly as he might. And to those who watched, it was as though the young officer of the Guard had not come within reach of that terrible blade ere he lay dead upon the floor, and then the point of death pa.s.sed into the lungs of one of the men-at-arms, scarcely pausing ere it pierced the heart of a third.

The soldiers fell back momentarily, awed by the frightful havoc of that mighty arm. Before De Montfort could urge them on to renew the attack, a girlish figure, clothed in a long riding cloak, burst through the little knot of men as they stood facing their lone antagonist.

With a low cry of mingled rage and indignation, Bertrade de Montfort threw herself before the Devil of Torn, and facing the astonished company of king, prince, n.o.bles and soldiers, drew herself to her full height, and with all the pride of race and blood that was her right of heritage from a French king on her father's side and an English king on her mother's, she flashed her defiance and contempt in the single word:

"Cowards!"

"What means this, girl?" demanded De Montfort, "Art gone stark mad? Know thou that this fellow be the Outlaw of Torn?"

"If I had not before known it, My Lord," she replied haughtily, "it would be plain to me now as I see forty cowards hesitating to attack a lone man. What other man in all England could stand thus against forty?

A lion at bay with forty jackals yelping at his feet."

"Enough, girl," cried the King, "what be this knave to thee?"

"He loves me, Your Majesty," she replied proudly, "and I, him."

"Thou lov'st this low-born cut-throat, Bertrade," cried Henry. "Thou, a De Montfort, the daughter of my sister; who have seen this murderer's accursed mark upon the foreheads of thy kin; thou have seen him flaunt his defiance in the King's, thy uncle's, face, and bend his whole life to preying upon thy people; thou lov'st this monster?"

"I love him, My Lord King."

"Thou lov'st him, Bertrade?" asked Philip of France in a low tone, pressing nearer to the girl.

"Yes, Philip," she said, a little note of sadness and finality in her voice; but her eyes met his squarely and bravely.

Instantly, the sword of the young Prince leaped from its scabbard, and facing De Montfort and the others, he backed to the side of Norman of Torn.

"That she loves him be enough for me to know, my gentlemen," he said.

"Who takes the man Bertrade de Montfort loves must take Philip of France as well."

Norman of Torn laid his left hand upon the other's shoulder.

"No, thou must not do this thing, my friend," he said. "It be my fight and I will fight it alone. Go, I beg of thee, and take her with thee, out of harm's way."

As they argued, Simon de Montfort and the King had spoken together, and, at a word from the former, the soldiers rushed suddenly to the attack again. It was a cowardly strategem, for they knew that the two could not fight with the girl between them and their adversaries. And thus, by weight of numbers, they took Bertrade de Montfort and the Prince away from Norman of Torn without a blow being struck, and then the little, grim, gray, old man stepped forward.

"There be but one sword in all England, nay in all the world that can, alone, take Norman of Torn," he said, addressing the King, "and that sword be mine. Keep thy cattle back, out of my way." And, without waiting for a reply, the grim, gray man sprang in to engage him whom for twenty years he had called son.

Norman of Torn came out of his corner to meet his new-found enemy, and there, in the apartment of the Queen of England in the castle of Battel, was fought such a duel as no man there had ever seen before, nor is it credible that its like was ever fought before or since.

The world's two greatest swordsmen: teacher and pupil--the one with the strength of a young bull, the other with the cunning of an old gray fox, and both with a lifetime of training behind them, and the l.u.s.t of blood and hate before them--thrust and parried and cut until those that gazed awestricken upon the marvellous swordplay scarcely breathed in the tensity of their wonder.

Back and forth about the room they moved, while those who had come to kill pressed back to make room for the contestants. Now was the young man forcing his older foeman more and more upon the defensive. Slowly, but as sure as death, he was winning ever nearer and nearer to victory.

The old man saw it too. He had devoted years of his life to training that mighty sword arm that it might deal out death to others, and now--ah! The grim justice of the retribution he, at last, was to fall before its diabolical cunning.

He could not win in fair fight against Norman of Torn; that the wily Frenchman saw; but now that death was so close upon him that he felt its cold breath condensing on his brow, he had no stomach to die, and so he cast about for any means whereby he might escape the result of his rash venture.

Presently he saw his opportunity. Norman of Torn stood beside the body of one of his earlier antagonists. Slowly the old man worked around until the body lay directly behind the outlaw, and then with a final rally and one great last burst of supreme swordsmanship, he rushed Norman of Torn back for a bare step--it was enough. The outlaw's foot struck the prostrate corpse; he staggered, and for one brief instant his sword arm rose, ever so little, as he strove to retain his equilibrium; but that little was enough. It was what the gray old snake had expected, and he was ready. Like lightning, his sword shot through the opening, and, for the first time in his life of continual combat and death, Norman of Torn felt cold steel tear his flesh. But ere he fell, his sword responded to the last fierce command of that iron will, and as his body sank limply to the floor, rolling with outstretched arms, upon its back, the little, grim, gray man went down also, clutching frantically at a gleaming blade buried in his chest.

For an instant, the watchers stood as though petrified, and then Bertrade de Montfort, tearing herself from the restraining hand of her father, rushed to the side of the lifeless body of the man she loved.

Kneeling there beside him she called his name aloud, as she unlaced his helm. Tearing the steel headgear from him, she caressed his face, kissing the white forehead and the still lips.

"Oh G.o.d! Oh G.o.d!" she murmured. "Why hast thou taken him? Outlaw though he was, in his little finger was more of honor, of chivalry, of true manhood than courses through the veins of all the n.o.bles of England.

"I do not wonder that he preyed upon you," she cried, turning upon the knights behind her. "His life was clean, thine be rotten; he was loyal to his friends and to the downtrodden, ye be traitors at heart, all; and ever be ye trampling upon those who be down that they may sink deeper into the mud. Mon Dieu! How I hate you," she finished. And as she spoke the words, Bertrade de Montfort looked straight into the eyes of her father.

The old Earl turned his head, for at heart he was a brave, broad, kindly man, and he regretted what he had done in the haste and heat of anger.

"Come, child," said the King, "thou art distraught; thou sayest what thou mean not. The world is better that this man be dead. He was an enemy of organized society, he preyed ever upon his fellows. Life in England will be safer after this day. Do not weep over the clay of a nameless adventurer who knew not his own father."

Someone had lifted the little, grim, gray, old man to a sitting posture.

He was not dead. Occasionally he coughed, and when he did, his frame was racked with suffering, and blood flowed from his mouth and nostrils.

At last they saw that he was trying to speak. Weakly he motioned toward the King. Henry came toward him.

"Thou hast won thy sovereign's grat.i.tude, my man," said the King, kindly. "What be thy name?"

The old fellow tried to speak, but the effort brought on another paroxysm of coughing. At last he managed to whisper.

"Look--at--me. Dost thou--not--remember me?

The--foils--the--blow--twenty-long-years. Thou--spat--upon--me."