The Sword Maker Part 54

"By the Three Kings!" cried the Count, "this youth, if I may venture to call him so, has bound me to him with bands stronger than chain armor. I shall vote for him whoever falters."

"His Highness," said the Archbishop, with a propitiatory smile, "has been listening to the Eastern tales which our ancestors brought from the Crusades, and I fear has filled his head with fancies."

"Really, Archbishop, you misjudge me," said the young man; "I am the most practical person in the Empire. You interrupted my boasting to her ladyship of my handiwork. I would have you know I am a capable mechanic and a sword maker. What think you of that, my Lord?" he asked, drawing forth his weapon, and handing it to Cologne.

"An excellent blade indeed," said the latter, balancing it in his hand.

"Very well, my Lord, I made it and tempered it una.s.sisted. I beg you to re-enter your palace, and write me out an order for a thousand of these weapons."

"If your Highness really wishes me to do this, and there is no concealed humorism in your request which I am too dull to fathom, you must accompany me to my study and dictate the doc.u.ment I am to indite. I shall wait till you bid farewell to the Countess."

A glance of mutual understanding flashed between the girl and himself, then Roland raised her hand to his lips, and although the onlookers saw the gallant salutation, they knew nothing of the gentle pressure with which the fingers exchanged their confidences.

"Madam," said the Prince, "it will be my pleasure and duty to wait upon my mother to-morrow. May I look forward to the happiness of presenting you to her?"

"I thank you," said the Countess simply, with a glance of appeal at her guardian. That good man sighed, then led the way into the house.

XX

THE MYSTERY OF THE FOREST

Roland left the palace with a sense of elation he had never before experienced, but this received a check as he saw standing in the middle of the square the Lieutenant of the night before. His first impulse was to avoid the officer, yet almost instinctively he turned and walked directly to him, which apparently nonplussed the brave emissary of Mayence.

"Good afternoon to you, sir," began Roland, as if overjoyed to see him.

"Will you permit me to speak to you, sir?"

"Well?" said the Lieutenant curtly.

"My forge, which has been black and cold for many a long day, will soon be alight and warm again. What think you of this?" He handed to the Lieutenant his order for a thousand swords, and the officer made a mental note of the commission as an interesting point in armament that would be appreciated by his chief.

"You did not inform me last night who was the merchant you hoped would finance your enterprise."

"Hoped?" echoed Roland, his eyes sparkling. "'Tis more than hope, Herr Lieutenant. His name is Goebel, and he is one of the richest and chiefest traffickers of Frankfort. Why, my fortune is made! Read this, written in his own hand. I got it from him before midday, on my mere word that I was certain of an order from his Lordship."

"You are indeed much to be envied," said the Lieutenant coldly, returning the two doc.u.ments.

"Ah, but I am just at the beginning. If _you_ would favor me by smoothing the way to his Lordship, the Archbishop of Mayence, I in return--"

"Out upon you for a base-born, profit-mongering churl! Do you think that I, an officer, would demean myself by partnering a bagman!"

The Lieutenant turned on his heel, strode away and left him. Roland pursued his way with bowed head, as though stricken by the rebuff.

Nearing the bridge, he saw a crowd around an empty cart, standing by which a man in rough clothing was cursing most vociferously.

At first he thought there had been an accident, but most of the people were laughing loudly; so, halting in the outskirts, he asked the cause of the commotion.

"'Tis but a fool farmer," said a man, "who came from the country with his load of vegetables. 'Tis safer to enter a lion's den unarmed than to come into Frankfort with food while people are starving. He has been plundered to the last leaf."

Roland shouldered his way through the crowd, and touched the frantic man on the shoulder.

"What was the value of your load?" he said.

"A misbegotten liar told me this morning that a market had opened in Frankfort, and that there was money to be had. No sooner am I in the town than everything I brought in is stolen."

"Yes, yes; I know all about that. My question is, How much is your merchandise worth?"

"Worth? Thirty thalers I expected to get, and now--"

"Thirty thalers," interrupted the Prince. "Here is your money. Get you gone, and tell your neighbors there is prompt payment for all the provender they can bring in."

The man calmed down as if a bucket of water had been thrown on him. He counted the payment with miserly care, testing each coin between his teeth, then mounted his cart without a word of thanks, and, to the disappointment of the gathering mob, drove away. Roland, seething with anger, walked directly to the house of Herr Goebel, and found that placid old burgher seated at his table.

"Ten thousand curses on your indolence!" he cried. "Where are your committee, and the emissaries empowered to carry out this scheme of relief I have ordered?"

"Committee? Emissaries?" cried the astonished man. "There has been no time!"

"Time, you thick-headed fool! I'll time you by hanging you to your own front door. There has been time for me to send my men out into the country; time for a farmer to come in with a cartload of produce, and be robbed here under your very nose! Maledictions on you, you sit here, well fed, and cry there is no time! If I had not paid the yeoman he would have gone back into the country crying we were all thieves here in Frankfort. Now listen to me. I drew my sword once upon you in jest.

Should I draw it a second time it will be to penetrate your lazy carca.s.s by running you through. If within two hours there is not a paymaster at every gate in Frankfort to buy and pay for each cartload of produce as it comes, and also a number of guides to tell that farmer where to deliver his goods, I'll give your town over to the military, and order the sacking of every merchant's house within its walls."

"It shall be done; it shall be done; it shall be done!" breathed the merchant, trembling as he rose, and he kept repeating the phrase with the iteration of a parrot.

"You owe me thirty thalers," said the Prince calming down; "the first payment out of the relief fund. Give me the money."

With quivering hands Herr Goebel, seeing no humor in the application, handed over the money, which the Prince slipped into his wallet.

Dusk had fallen when at last he reached his room in Sachsenhausen, and there he found awaiting him Joseph Greusel, in semi-darkness and in total gloom.

"Your housekeeper let me in," said the visitor.

"Good! I did not expect you back so soon. Have the others returned?"

"I do not know. I came direct here. I carry very ominous news, Roland, of impending disaster in Frankfort."

"Greater than at present oppresses it?"

"Civil war, fire, and bloodshed. Close the door, Roland; I am tired out, and I do not wish to be overheard."

The Prince obeyed the request, locking the door. Going to a cupboard, he produced a generous flagon of wine and a tankard, setting the same on a small table before Greusel, then he threw himself down in the one armchair the room possessed. Greusel filled the tankard, and emptied it without drawing breath. He plunged directly into his narrative.

"I had penetrated less than half a league into the forest when I was stopped by an armed man who stepped out from behind a tree. He wore the uniform of Mayence, and proclaimed me a prisoner. I explained my mission, but this had no effect upon him. He asked if I would go with him quietly, or compel him to call a.s.sistance. Being helpless, I said I would go quietly. Notwithstanding this, he bound my wrists behind me, then with a strip of cloth blindfolded me. Taking me by the arm, he led me through the forest for a distance impossible to calculate. I think, however, we walked not more than ten minutes. There was a stop and a whispered parley; a pause of a few minutes, and a further conference, which I partially heard. The commander before whom I must be taken was not ready to receive me. I should be placed in a tent, and a guard set over me.

"This was done. I asked that the cord, which hurt my wrists, might be removed, but instead, my ankles were tied together, and I sat there on the ground, leaning against a pole at the back of the tent. Here my conductor left me, and I heard him give orders to those without to maintain a strict watch, but to hold no communication with me.

"I imagine that the tent I occupied stood back to back with the tent of the commander, for after some time I heard the sound of voices, and it seemed to me voices of two men in authority. They had come to the back part of their tent, as if to speak confidentially, and their voices were low, yet I could hear them quite distinctly, being separated from them merely by two thicknesses of cloth. What I learned was this. There is concealed in the forest, within half an hour's quick march of the southern gate, a force of seven thousand soldiers. These soldiers belong to the Archbishop of Mayence, who commands an additional three thousand within the walls of Frankfort. Mayence holds the southern gate, as Treves holds the western and Cologne the northern. You see at once what that implies. Mayence can pour his troops into Frankfort, say, at midnight, and in the morning he has ten thousand soldiers as compared with the three thousand each commanded by the Archbishops of Treves and Cologne. That means civil war, and the complete crushing of the two northern Archbishops."

"I think you take too serious a view of the matter," commented Roland.