The Pilgrim's Shell or Fergan the Quarryman Part 28

Noticing the circ.u.mstance, Fergan hastened to profit by it. "My friends!" cried he, "let's finish the work begun by little Crumb-cracker! That cloud of smoke will mask our movements from the episcopals. Let's make a sortie. Form into a column of armed men, and let's take the episcopal palace by storm. Death to the episcopals!"

"Fall to!" was the insurgents' response. "To the a.s.sault! Commune!

Commune!"

"One-half of our troops will remain here with Colombaik to guard the walls," Fergan proceeded. "They are fighting in the village. The episcopals might try to attack the ramparts from behind. Let those follow me who are ready to storm the episcopal palace. Forward, march!"

A large number of communiers hastened upon the heels of Fergan. Among them was Bertrand, the son of Bernard des Bruyeres, the ill-starred victim of Gaudry's murderous nature. Bertrand was silent, almost impa.s.sible in the midst of the seething effervescence of the people. His only thought was to avoid dropping his heavy axe that weighed down his shoulder. Fergan had cleverly led the sortie of the insurgents. Masked for a sufficient s.p.a.ce of time to the eyes of the enemy by the flames and smoke of the burning wagon and its load, they soon reached the walls of the episcopal palace, found the gate open, and a crowd of armed serfs standing under the arch. Under the lead of several knights, they were preparing to march on the a.s.sault of the postern, their chief, as well as Fergan, having relied upon masking their attack behind the burning chariot. At the unexpected sight of the insurgents, the episcopals only thought of barring the entrance to the palace. It was too late. A b.l.o.o.d.y hand-to-hand encounter took place under the arch that joined the two towers on either side of the gate. The communiers, warming to the conflict, fought with fury. Many were killed, others wounded. Fergan received from a knight a blow with an axe that broke his casque and struck his forehead. After a stubborn struggle, the inhabitants of Laon threw the episcopals back and entered the vast yard where the combat proceeded with redoubled fury. Fergan, still in the hottest of the fight, despite his wound, for a moment thought himself and his men lost.

Just as the fight was at its hottest, Thiegaud came in from the green of the bishopric at the head of a large body of woodmen serfs, armed with stout hatchets, and threw himself into the fray. The re-inforcement was intended to crush the insurgents. What was not the surprise of these, when they heard the serf of St. Vincent and his men set up the cry: "Death to the bishop! To the sack of the palace! To the sack! Commune!"

The combat changed its aspect on the spot. The larger number of the bishop's serfs who had taken part in the struggle, hearing the woodmen cry: "Commune! Death to the bishop! To the sack of the palace!" dropped their arms. Deserted by a part of their men, the knights redoubled their efforts of valor, but in vain; they were all killed or disabled. Soon masters of the palace, the insurgents spread in all directions, yelling: "Death to the bishop!"

Thiegaud approached Fergan with a mien of triumphant hatred brandishing his cutla.s.s. "I answered Gaudry for the faithfulness of the woodmen of the abbey," cried the serf of St. Vincent, "but in order to revenge myself upon the wretch for having debauched my daughter, I caused our men to mutiny against him and his tonsured fellow devils!"

"Where is the bishop?" the insurgents shouted, brandishing their weapons. "To death with him!"

"Friends, your vengeance shall be satisfied, and mine also. Gaudry will not escape us," replied Thiegaud. "I know where the holy man lies in hiding. The moment you forced the gate of the palace, and fearing the issue of the fight, Gaudry put on the coat of one of the servants, in the hope of fleeing under cover of the disguise. But I advised him to lock himself up in his storeroom, and to crawl into the bottom of one of the empty hogsheads. Come, come!" he proceeded with savage laughter, "We shall stave in the head and draw red wine." Saying which, the serf of St. Vincent, followed by the mob of the insurgents who were exasperated at the bishop, wended his way to the storeroom. Among the furious crowd was the son of Bernard des Bruyeres. Having by the merest chance escaped unscathed from the melee, the frail youth marched close behind Thiegaud, endeavoring, despite the smallness of his stature and his feebleness, not to lose the post he had taken. His pale and sickly features were rapidly regaining their color; a feverish ardor illumined his eyes and imparted to him fict.i.tious strength. No longer did his heavy battle axe seem to weigh on his puny arm. From time to time he lovingly contemplated the weapon, while he pa.s.sed his finger along its sharp edge. At such times he would emit a sigh of repressed joy, while he raised his flashing eyes to heaven. Guiding the communiers, the serf of St. Vincent, threaded his way to the storeroom, a s.p.a.cious chamber located at one of the corners of the first yard. Before reaching it, the inhabitants of Laon, having stumbled against the corpse of Black John that lay riddled with wounds, they threw themselves in a paroxysm of fury upon the lifeless body of the savage executor of Gaudry's cruelties. In the tumult that ensued upon these acts of reprisal, the son of Bernard des Bruyeres was, despite all stubborn resistance on his part, separated from Thiegaud, at the moment when the latter, helped by several of the insurgents, broke down and forced the door of the storeroom, that, for greater precaution, the prelate had bolted and barred from within. The ma.s.s emptied itself into the vast chamber that was barely lighted by narrow skylights and crowded with full and empty vats. A kind of alley wound its way between the numerous hogsheads.

Thiegaud made a sign to the insurgents to halt and stay at a distance.

Wishing to prolong the bishop's agony, he struck with the flat of his cutla.s.s the head of several vats, calling out each time: "Anyone inside?" Of course he received no answer. Arriving finally near a huge hogshead that stood on end he turned his head to the communiers with the slyness of a wolf, and removing and throwing down the cover that had been lightly placed upon it, asked again: "Any one inside?"

"There is here an unhappy prisoner," came from the trembling voice of the bishop. "Have mercy upon him in the name of Christ!"

"Oho! my friend Ysengrin!" said Thiegaud, now taking his turn in giving the nickname to his master. "Is it you who are cowering down in that barrel? Come out! Come out! I want to see whether, perhaps, my daughter is there in hiding with you." Saying which, the serf of St. Vincent seized the prelate by his long hair with a vigorous clutch, and forced him, despite his resistance, to rise by little and little from the bottom of the ton into which he had crawled. It was a frightful spectacle. For a moment, always holding the bishop by the hair as the latter rose on his feet in the barrel, Thiegaud seemed to hold in his hand the head of a corpse, so livid was Gaudry's face. For a moment Gaudry stood upon his legs inside of the barrel, with his head and shoulders above the edge. But his limbs shook so that, wishing to support himself inside of the barrel, it tumbled over and the Bishop of Laon rolled at the feet of the serf. Stooping down, while the prelate was painfully trying to rise, Thiegaud affected to look into the bottom of the barrel, and cried out: "No, friend Ysengrin, my daughter is not there. The jade must have stayed in your bed."

"Beloved sons in Jesus Christ!" stammered Gaudry, who, upon his knees, extended his hands towards the communiers. "I swear to you upon the gospels and upon my eternal salvation, I shall uphold your Commune! Have pity upon me!"

"Liar, renegade!" yelled back the enraged communiers. "We know what your oath is worth. Swindler and hypocrite!"

"You shall pay with your life for the blood of our people that has flowed to-day! Justice! Justice!"

"Yes, justice and vengeance in the name of the women, who this morning had husbands, and this evening are widows!"

"Justice and vengeance in the name of the children, who this morning had fathers, and this evening are orphans!"

"Oh, Gaudry, you and yours have by dint of perjuries and untold outrages tired the patience of the people! Your hour has sounded!"

"Which of us is it that wanted war, you or we? Did you listen to our prayers? Did you have pity for the peace of our city? No! Well, then, neither shall there be pity for you! Death to the bishop!"

"My good friends ... grant me my life," repeated the bishop, whose teeth chattered with terror. "Oh! I pray you!... Grant me my life! I ... I shall renounce the bishopric.... I shall leave this city.... You shall never see my face again.... Only leave me my life!"

"Did you show mercy to my brother Gerhard, whose eyes were put out by your orders?" cried a communier, seizing the prelate by the collar and shaking him with fury. "Infamous criminal! Did you have pity for him?"

"Did you have mercy for my friend Robert of the Mill, who was stabbed to death by Black John?" added another insurgent. And the two accusers seized the prelate, who quietly allowed himself to be dragged upon his knees, "You shall die in the face of the sun that has witnessed your crimes!"

Overwhelmed with blows and insults, Gaudry was pushed out of the storeroom. In vain did he cry: "Have pity upon me!... I shall restore your Commune!... I swear to you!... I swear!--"

"Will you restore their husbands to the widows, their fathers to the orphans you have made?"

"After having lived the life of a traitor and a homicide; after exasperating an inoffensive people that only asked to be allowed to live in peace in accordance with the pledge that was sworn, it is not enough to cry 'Pity!' in order to be absolved."

"Clemency is holy, but impunity is impious! Death to the bishop!"

"Heaven and earth!" cried Fergan. "The justice of the people is the justice of G.o.d! Death to the bishop! Death!"

"Yes, yes! To death with the bishop!"

The prelate was dragged in the midst of these furious cries outside of the storeroom. Suddenly a tremulous voice dominated the uproar: "What, shall not the son of Bernard des Bruyeres be allowed to avenge his father!" Immediately, by a simultaneous movement, the insurgents opened a path to the son of the victim. His face radiant, his eyes flashing, Bertrand rushed upon the prostrate bishop, and raising his heavy axe with his weak hands, cleaved the skull of Gaudry; then, casting off the blood-stained weapon, he cried: "You are avenged, my father!"

"Well done, my lad! The death of your father and the dishonor of my daughter are avenged at one blow!" cried Thiegaud; and seeing the episcopal ring on the bishop's finger, he added: "I take my daughter's token of marriage!" Unable, however, to tear the ring off the prelate's finger, the serf of St. Vincent cut it off with a blow of his cutla.s.s and stuck both finger and ring in his pocket.

So legitimate was the hatred that Gaudry inspired the communiers, that it survived even the man's death. His corpse was riddled with wounds and covered with curses. The insurgents were in the act of throwing his lifeless body into a sewer close to the storeroom, when from another side the cry fell upon their ears: "Commune! Commune! Death to the episcopals!"

CHAPTER IX.

RESTING ON THEIR ARMS.

While this tragic scene was enacting, another body of the people of Laon, led by Ancel Quatre-Mains and his sprightly wife, invaded the episcopal palace from another side. Fergan was running to meet them the moment he saw them enter the green, when he caught sight of Archdeacon Anselm, who, having so far kept aloof from the theater of the conflict, was now hastening to the spot, informed of the bishop's fate by one of his domestics. The archdeacon succeeded in inducing the communiers to refrain from submitting the remains of their enemy to the idle and last disgrace contemplated by them. Helped by two servants, the worthy priest of Christ was carrying the corpse of the bishop, when he noticed Fergan, and said to him in a voice deeply moved, with the tears running down his cheeks: "I wish to bury the body of this unfortunate man, and to pray for him. My sad forecasts have been verified. Only yesterday, warning him in the midst of his braggart and fatal illusion of security, I expressed the hope that I may not soon have to pray over his grave. Oh, Fergan, civil war is a terrible scourge!"

"A curse upon those who provoke these execrable strifes, that carry mourning into the camp of both the vanquishers and the vanquished!"

answered the quarryman, and leaving the archdeacon to fulfil his pious office, he proceeded to join Quatre-Mains, who commanded the other troop of the invaders.

The worthy Councilman, ever hampered and incommoded by his military equipment, had rid himself of it in the moment of battle. Replacing his iron casque with a woolen cap and keeping on his leather jerkin only, with his coat sleeves rolled back, as he was wont when kneading his dough, he had armed himself with the poker of his oven, a long and heavy iron implement, bent at one end. His stout-hearted little wife Simonne, her cheeks in a glow and her eyes aflame, carried in her skirt a bundle of lint and bandages ready for use, together with a wicker-covered flask, containing a decoction, p.r.o.nounced marvelous by her for checking the flow of blood. Joy and the excitement of triumph radiated from the charming features of the baker's wife. At the sight of Fergan, however, whose face was clotted with the blood of the wound he had received on his head, she cried out sadly: "Neighbor Fergan, you are wounded! Let me tend you, the fight is over; be not alarmed about your son; we have just seen him at his post on the ramparts; he is safe and sound, although there was a sharp encounter at that spot; sit down on this bench, I shall nurse you the same as I would have done Ancel, had he been wounded. Upon the faith of a Picardian woman, if he escaped being hurt, it was not his fault; he merited anew his surname of Quatre-Mains, the way he belabored the heads and backs of the episcopals."

Fergan accepted Simonne's offer and sat down upon a bench, while the young woman looked for the lint in her pockets. The baker himself stopped a few steps behind to gather the details of the capture of the bishop. He then approached his wife, and seeing her engaged upon Fergan, hastened his steps, asking with deep interest: "What, neighbor, wounded?

Nothing serious?"

"I was struck with an axe on my casque," and raising his head which he had inclined to facilitate the nursing of Simonne, Fergan noticed the rather unmilitary accoutrement of his friend: "Why did you take off your armor in the middle of the fight?"

"Upon my faith, the casque kept dropping on my nose, the corselet took the breath from me, the sword enc.u.mbered my legs. Accordingly, when the fight started, I made myself comfortable, just as I do when I am kneading dough. I rolled up my sleeves, and instead of that devil of a sword, which I cannot handle, I armed myself with my iron poker, the use of which is familiar to me."

"But what could you do with a poker? It is a rather singular implement of war."

"What could he do with it?" put in Simonne, saturating a bandage with the contents of the wicker-covered flask, and applying the same to the quarryman's wound. "Oh, Ancel is quick with his hands. If a n.o.bleman on horseback came near, armed to the teeth, my husband grappled his throat with the hook of his long poker and then pulled with all his might; I helped when necessary. In almost every instance we unhorsed the knight, and throwing him to the ground he was at our mercy."

"After which," added the baker calmly, "and after beating my man with the hook of my poker, I dispatched him with the handle. I settled more than one of them. One does what he can!"

"Oh, neighbor!" Simonne proceeded with enthusiasm; "it was especially at the siege of the house of the knight of Haut-Pourcin that Ancel made a famous use of his poker. Several episcopals and their servants, entrenched upon a crenelated terrace, fired down upon us with cross-bows. They had killed or wounded so many communiers, that none dared come near the accursed house, and our people had retired to the end of the street. Presently, we saw the wicked knight of Haut-Pourcin, cross-bow in hand, leaning half over the battlement of the terrace, to see if there was any of ours that he could hit. At that instant--," but interrupting herself, Simonne said to her husband: "Tell your own story, Ancel; while I speak I cannot pay proper attention to the bandage of our neighbor."

While Simonne finished attending to Fergan, the baker continued the narrative that his wife had commenced: "Noticing that the knight of Haut-Pourcin leaned over the terrace several times, I profited by a moment when he had withdrawn; I slided along the wall to the foot of the house; as the projection of the balcony prevented him from seeing me, I watched for my man; the instant he again put out his head I s.n.a.t.c.hed him up with the hook of my poker exactly at the jointure of his casque and his cuira.s.s with might and main; Simonne came and helped; and we had the satisfaction of making that n.o.ble personage turn a somersault from the height of the terrace down to the street; our communiers ran by; the episcopals rushed out of the knight's house to deliver him; they were driven back and we stormed the building!"

"And lo!" cried Simonne heroically, "I, who did not leave the heels of Ancel, find myself face to face with that old hag of the dame of Haut-Pourcin, who was yelling like a fury: 'Kill! Kill! No quarter for those vile clowns! Exterminate them!' I was seized with rage, and recalling the insults that the harpy had poured upon me shortly before I threw her down, grabbed her by the throat, and, as true as Ancel is called Quatre-Mains, I slapped her face as thoroughly as if I was endowed with six hands, all the while saying to her: 'Take this! and that! you proud dame of Haut-Pourcin. Take this, and that, and still another, you wicked old hag! Oh, my gallants pay for my skirts, do they!

Very well, I pay cash, and in round sums for the insults I receive!'

Upon the faith of a Picardian woman, had her hair not been gray, like my mother's, I would have strangled the she-devil!"

Fergan could not help smiling at the exaltation of Simonne. He then said to Ancel: "When I heard the large bell of the cathedral ringing in a peculiar way, I concluded it was the signal agreed upon between the bishop and his partisans to attack our people simultaneously from within and from without the city."