The Poniard's Hilt Part 27

"There is someone walking in seigneur the count's room--I hear the seats pushed about."

"Oh, it is he--it is my husband!"

"Yes, madam, it is his step."

"Oh, I am afraid--remain near me!"

It was Neroweg. His latest libations had thrown him into a state of almost complete intoxication. He stepped into his wife's apartment with a drunken man's unsteady foot. At the sight of their master, all the slaves rose timidly. As to G.o.degisele, she was in such a tremor that she was hardly able to rise from her stool. The count stopped for a moment at the threshold, leaned one hand against the door-case, and, with his body swaying backward and forward, let his eyes travel over the scared slaves with a besotted and semi-libidinous look. After repeated hiccoughs he called out to his wife's confidant:

"Morise--come--come, confounded wench!"

And looking at G.o.degisele he added:

"You look pale--you seem troubled--my dove. Why so pale?"

The poor creature's mind doubtlessly ran upon the circ.u.mstances of the fateful night when her husband strangled his fourth wife, shortly after having used these very words towards his then favorite slave: 'Come, come, confounded wench!' Neroweg's words threw his wife into greater perturbation and frightened her to a degree that all she was able to say was:

"Monseigneur! Monseigneur! Mercy!"

"What! What ails you? Answer!" shouted the count brutally. "Do you, perchance, object that I told Morise to come? Dare you cross me?"

"No! Oh, no! Is not monseigneur master in this place? Are not his female slaves at his orders? And am not I, G.o.degisele, myself, his humble servant?"

And the unhappy woman, wholly losing her head in her terror, as she imagined herself on the point of being strangled like Wisigarde, who owed her death to her refusal to light her husband and his night's companion to the conjugal bed, hastened to stammer:

"On the contrary--if monseigneur wishes, I shall light him to his bed with this lamp."

"Oh, madam!" Morise whispered to her mistress. "What an unfortunate inspiration is that! It is to recall to the count's memory the murder of his other wife."

Indeed, at the last words of G.o.degisele a shudder ran through Neroweg; he brusquely stepped towards her; seized her threateningly by the arm and bellowed in a maudlin voice:

"Why do you propose to light me to bed with a lamp?"

"Mercy, monseigneur! Do not kill me!"--and she dropped upon her knees.

"Oh, do not kill me, your servant, as you killed Wisigarde."

The count suddenly grew as pale as his wife, and, stricken with a terror that stimulated his inebriety, he cried:

"She knows that I strangled Wisigarde! She is uttering the same words that Wisigarde uttered when I killed her! This is the work of some evil spirit! Wisigarde herself or her spectre will perhaps appear this night before my bed and torment me! It is a warning from heaven--or from h.e.l.l.

The devil must be conjured away!"

And turning to Morise:

"Run quick for the clerk! He shall pray at my side during the night--he shall not leave me. The spectre of Wisigarde will not dare to approach me with a priest at my side."

The count's terror increased amain while Morise ran out for the clerk, and G.o.degisele, more dead than alive with fear, clung on her knees to the beam as she felt her strength wholly leaving her. The count noticed not her distress, but also dropping on his knees smote his chest and cried:

"Lord, G.o.d! Have mercy upon a miserable sinner! I paid for my brother's death, I paid for the death of my wife Wisigarde, I shall pay still more to keep Wisigarde from haunting me! I shall to-morrow start the building of the chapel in the fastness of Allange; I shall have the villa of Bishop Cautin rebuilt! Lord! Good Lord G.o.d! Have mercy upon a miserable sinner! Deliver me from the devil and from the spectre of Wisigarde!"

And the fervent and devout believer, besotted with terror and intoxication, furiously smote his chest as, filled with frightful anxiety, he awaited the arrival of the clerk.

Such was the humanity, generousness, enlightenment of the race of the conquerors of old Gaul! What a tender attachment to their wives! What a respect for the sweet bonds of the family and for the sanct.i.ty of the domestic hearth! Oh, our mothers! Virile matrons, so venerated by our ancestors! Proud Gallic women of yore, who sat beside your husbands at the solemn councils of the state, where peace and war were decided upon!

Wives beloved, valiant and strong in arms! Holy virgins! Women emperors!

O, Margarid, Hena, Meroe, Loyse, Genevieve, Ellen, Sampso, Victoria the Great--rejoice! Rejoice that you have quitted this world for the mysterious worlds where we shall live forever! Rejoice at the strongness of your hearts! What indignation, what shame, what a grief to your souls at the sight of your sisters--although of a different race from your own and hostile--at the sight of women--the wives of kings, seigneurs and warriors--treated, the wicked and the good alike, with such contempt and ferocity by their barbarous husbands!

Such are those Franks whom the bishops invited to the quarry of Gaul!

Such are the conquerors whom the priests of Christ fondle, caress, flatter and bless!

CHAPTER IV.

THE LION OF POITIERS.

Seigneur count! Seigneur count Neroweg! Wake up! Instead of having spent the night, as you expected, in the arms of one of your female slaves, out of fear for the devil you spent it on your knees, close to your clerk, and repeating in a maudlin and besotted voice the prayers that the holy man mumbled, half asleep, into your ears. After having eaten and drunk his fill he would have by far preferred his own bed to your company. Finally rea.s.sured by the first peep of day--a time that bars out the demons--you fell asleep on your couch, furnished with bear-skins, the trophies of the chase. Seigneur count Neroweg, awake!

One of the five sons of your good King Clotaire, to-day the sole master of Gaul--all the other sons and grandsons of the pious Clovis, who rests in consecrated ground in the basilica of the venerated apostles at Paris, having died--one of the five sons of that King Clotaire, Chram by name, a b.a.s.t.a.r.d son--but what does that matter!--and governor of Auvergne in his father's name, Chram is approaching! He comes, a signal favor, with his three favorites, a goodly number of leudes in the train of his _antrustions_, as the royal favorites proudly style themselves.

Awake, Neroweg! Awake, seigneur count! There is Chram, coming to pay you a visit. Brilliant and numerous is the cavalcade of his suite. The three dear friends of Chram, still dearer friends of pillage, of murder and of rape, accompany the royal personage, do you not hear? Their names are Imnachair, Spatachair, and the "Lion of Poitiers," the renegade Gaul, who, like so many others of his stripe, rallied to the conquering Franks. The "Lion of Poitiers" earned his name by reason of his carnivorous taste for rapine and flesh dripping blood.

Seigneur count! Seigneur count Neroweg! Will you not wake up? Wake up also your wife G.o.degisele, who spent the night dreaming of strangled wives. Be up and doing. Let G.o.degisele array herself in the most resplendent jewels of your fourth wife Wisigarde! Hurry, hurry, seigneur count! Let G.o.degisele don her most attractive raiment! She may be to the taste of Chram or of his favorites. He is a gracious king, an accommodating king. There is none more so. Is a woman, whether free or slave, pleasing to the eye of any friend of his, he forthwith equips his favorite with a _royal diploma_, by virtue of which he takes the woman that he covets.

Quick, quick, seigneur count! Order your leudes to take horse and your foot soldiers to put on their gala armors, and yourself, seigneur count, head your band, cased in your parade armor and carrying on your side the magnificent gold-hilted Spanish sword, which you stole on the occasion of the plundering of the land of the Visigoths, the "d.a.m.ned Arians" and "accursed heretics," upon whom the Catholic bishops let you loose with the f.a.got in one hand, the sword in the other, exactly as you let loose your pack of hounds upon the wild beasts of the forest! Be quick, be quick, leap upon your roan horse harnessed in its saddle and bridle of red leather, with bit and stirrups of silver! Quick! Ride out at a gallop to meet your glorious Prince Chram; ride out at the head of your hors.e.m.e.n and footmen! Already your royal guest and his suite, whose approach one of their forerunners has announced, are only at a little distance from your burg. Seigneur count, hasten to greet him and lead him into your seigniorial residence! You hardly expected to hear such auspicious tidings; moreover your good friend and protector, Bishop Cautin accompanies Prince Chram.

"A curse upon the arrival of this Chram," said Neroweg. "However short the stay of him and his men at my burg, they will drink up my wine, eat up all my provisions, and who knows but also pilfer some of my gold and silver vases. Neither I nor my companions have any love for these court leudes, who always have the air of looking down upon us because they quarter in palaces and cities."

Thus spoke count Neroweg as, followed by his warriors, he rode out to meet Prince Chram, whom he found, together with his suite, within two bows' shot of the fosse that girded the burg.

What a beautiful, n.o.ble, glorious, luminous sight is that of a longhaired prince, especially when his hair consists of a long tangled mop, that scissors have never touched, such being one of the distinctive attributes of the royal Frankish family. Unfortunately, although still young, Prince Chram, being worn by drunkenness and all manner of enervating excesses, was almost wholly bald. Only from his neck and temples did a few long and straggling locks of light hair tumble down upon his chest and arched back. His long dalmatica of purple fabric, slit on the side at the height of his knees, half hid the shoulders and crupper of his black horse. Bandelets of gilt leather criss-crossed his tight-fitting hose from his ankles up to his knees. His spurred shoes rested upon gilt stirrups; his long gold-hilted sword was sheathed in white cloth and hung from a superbly ornamented belt. In lieu of a whip, he carried a cane of precious wood with a head of chiseled gold, upon which, when the worn-out debauchee walked, he leaned heavily. Prince Chram's face was villainous. On his right Bishop Cautin rode as proudly as a man of war. From time to time the prelate cast an uneasy glance at Chram, because, though he sufficiently detested Chram, he was well aware that Chram detested him still more. At the Prince's right rode the "Lion of Poitiers," the hardened criminal who, together with Imnachair and Spatachair, both of whom rode close behind him in the second rank, const.i.tuted a trinity of perdition ample enough to d.a.m.n Chram, had not Chram been d.a.m.ned in his very mother's womb, as the priests express it.

Insolence and profligacy, haughty disdain and cruelty were so profoundly graven on the features of the "Lion of Poitiers," the renegade Gaul, that even a hundred years after his death it should not have been difficult still to trace upon the bones of his face the words "profligacy, insolence and cruelty."

After the Frankish fashion these three seigneurs wore rich short-sleeved tunics over their jackets, tight-fitting hose, and gaiters of cured leather with the fleece on the outside. Behind Chram and his three friends rode his seneschal, the count of his stables, the mayor of his palace, his butler, and other officers of the first rank, because the Prince kept a royal establishment. A little distance behind these distinguished personages came his bodyguard which consisted of leudes and other warriors armed cap-a-pie. Their tufted casques, their polished and brilliant cuira.s.ses and greaves glittered in the sun. Their spirited horses pranced under their rich caparisons. The streamers at the head of their lances fluttered on the breeze, while their painted and gilded bucklers dangled from the pommels of their saddles. As showy and imposing as was the appearance of the princely suite, so miserably shabby and grotesque was the aspect presented by the leudes of the count. A considerable number of his suite wore incomplete and rough, dented armor; others, the possessors of cuira.s.ses, had their heads covered with woolen caps; the swords, no less ill-kept than the cuira.s.ses, were mostly orphaned of their sheaths, and in several instances the implement of war was held to its rider's belt by cords, while the shaft of more than one lance was crooked, and was still as rough as when first taken from the brush. Most of the horses of the count's leudes matched their riders in their appearance. It was not yet the hour for the slaves to proceed to the fields, and a goodly number of Neroweg's companions, in default of battle steeds, sat astride of draft and plow horses bridled with ropes. By the faith of a Vagre, it was a joyful sight to watch the wild and envious looks that the leudes of the count cast at the suite of Chram, and the insolent and mocking looks that the princely retinue threw upon the count's ramshackle troop.

Behind the Prince's men, came the pages, the servants and the slaves who were on foot and led the ox-teams and dray-horses that drew heavy laden carts which the inhabitants of the regions crossed by the Prince and his suite were honored with the privilege of filling up gratuitously.

Count Neroweg advanced alone on horseback towards his royal guest, who, reining in his mount, said to Neroweg:

"Count, on my way from Clermont to Poitiers, I thought I would stop at your burg."

"Your glory is welcome on my domain. It is partly made up of salic lands; these I hold of my father, who held them both of his sword and the bounty of your grandfather, Clovis. It is your right to lodge, when journeying, at the houses of the counts and beneficiaries of the King, and to them it is a pleasure to extend to you hospitality."

"Count," insolently put in the Lion of Poitiers, "is your wife young and handsome? Is she worth the trouble of courting?"

"My favorite," observed Chram, making a sign to the renegade Gaul that he moderate his language, "who asks to know whether your wife is young and handsome, my favorite, the Lion of Poitiers, loves to joke, by nature."

"I shall then answer the Lion of Poitiers that neither he nor you will be able to decide whether my wife is young and handsome or old and ugly; she is with child and unwell, and will not leave her apartments."

"If your wife is with child," replied the Lion of Poitiers, "who may the father be?"

"Count, do not mind his raillery. I told you, my friend is a joker by nature."