God Wills It! Part 19

"And what has been done against Raoul?" asked Richard.

"Nothing, lord. De Carnac is our chief; but when we knew you were coming, and heard how you had laid the Bull's brother, Louis de Valmont, on his back, great knight that he was, we waited; for, we said, 'When Sir Richard comes, we shall be led by one of St. Julien's own stock, and we shall see if he loves Raoul more than do we.'"

"You have done well, dear friend," said Richard, still very quietly.

"Now tell me, how is my grandfather; well, save for his eyes?"

"Alas! he was nigh dead when he came back, and to-day the monks declared he would slip away; only desire for revenge keeps his soul in him."

"I must see him," said Longsword, simply; then to Musa, "Ha! my brother, will you be at my side in this adventure?"

"_Allah akhbar_," cried the Spaniard, his eyes on fire, "that Raoul shall feel my cimeter!"

"Softly, softly, dear son," quoth Sebastian, who had heard all, "_Omnia licent, sed omnia non expediunt!_"

"No Latin now, good father," was the Norman's prompt retort, and he turned to Bertrand: "To the castle with speed!"

Forward they rode through the squalid little village, where ragged peasants and slatternly women opened their eyes wide, and crossed themselves as their eyes lit on the "Saracen devils"; then they clattered onto the stone bridge, and past the toll-keeper's booth at the drawbridge in the middle span. Before them across a stretch of cleared land rose the castle: not a curiously planned system of outworks, barbicans, baileys, and keeps, as Richard saw in his older days, but a single ma.s.sive tower, square, built from ponderous blocks of black basalt that could mock at battering-ram. It perched upon a rocky rising, at the foot a moat, deep, flooded by the stream, where even now the fish were leaping; outside the moat, a high wooden stockade; within this, the stables. From the crest far above, the eye could sweep to the farthest glens of the valley. Ten men could make good the hold against an army; for where was the hero that could mount to the only entrance--that door in the sheer wall thirty feet above the moat, and only a wooden drawbridge to reach it, which pulleys could lift in a twinkling?

Richard looked at the castle and shrugged his shoulders. "Is the hold of Raoul de Valmont like to this?" he asked.

"As you say, lord; only the outer wall is higher," replied Bertrand, while they left their steeds at the foot of the dizzy bridge. Richard blew through his teeth. "St. Michael," cried he, "there will be a tale to tell ere we get inside!"

When they came within the great hall, dark and sombre, with slits for the archers its only windows, there were all the castle servants waiting to do Richard honor, from the gray old chamberlain and the consequential cellarer to the "sergeants" that kept the guard. But Longsword would have none of their sc.r.a.pes and bows.

"Take me to my grandfather," he commanded, after turning down a horn of mead. So they led him up blind ladders to a room above. Here the windows were scarce larger; there was a great canopied bed, a _prie-dieu_ chair, two or three clothes-presses; on the floor new, sweet rushes. The day was sultry, but there was a hot fire roaring in the cavernous chimney-place. The glowing logs sent a red glare over all the room; in every corner lurked black shadows. Before the fire stretched two enormous wolf-hounds, meet hunters for the fiercest bear. There was a huge armchair deeply cus.h.i.+oned before the fire, the back toward the doorway. As Richard entered, the hounds sprang up, growling, with grinning teeth, and a sharp brattling voice broke out:--

"Out of the room, pestilent monk. Away to perdition with your cordials, or I set the dogs on you. Give me the head of Raoul de Valmont, then stab me if you will!"

"Grandsire, it is I!" cried Richard, and ran beside the chair, and fell on his knees. A great hairy hand reached out for him, and he saw a face, hard as a knotted old oak, beaten by storm, scorched by lightning. Strength was there, brute courage, bitter hate, and an iron will. Only the lips now were crisped, the white beard was singed to the very jowl, and across the eyes was drawn a white bandage, stained with blood.

"Mother of G.o.d!" moaned the old man, groping piteously. "Is this the welcome that I give you, sweet grandson?"

But Richard, who thought it no shame to weep, held the mighty hand to his lips and sobbed loudly, while "the water of his heart" ran down his cheeks.

"_Ai_, dear grandsire," said he, when he had his voice, "it is well I have come. I too bear no love for the race of Valmont."

The old Baron felt for the Norman's arm; caught it; ran his hands from wrist to shoulder; gripped tight on the iron muscles.

"It is true, it is true!" he half laughed; "you are of my stock, and your father was a mighty cavalier. You will be worthy to have the barony."

"Say it not, sweet sir," cried Richard; "please G.o.d, you will yet live many a year!"

"Ho!" roared the Baron, in anger, "would you have me live as a blind cow! What is life without hawks or hounds or tourneys or war! G.o.d willing, I shall die soon. h.e.l.l were nothing worse than this. I do not fear it!"

"Christ forbid you should speak sincerely!" protested Richard, crossing himself.

"No; it is true," raged the old man; "there is good company down below. Do not say Bernard the Devil is not there, these seven years, and he was my good friend. I am as bad as he. Fire can't hurt a man, if he can only _see_. What have I to do with your saints and prayers and priests' prattle! Heaven for them; and for men who love good sword-play and a merry la.s.s--"

But Richard cut him short.

"Don't blaspheme! How know you that this is not a reward for all your sins?"

"Raoul used by the saints to reward me? Ha, ha--" and the Baron this time bellowed a wild laugh in earnest.

"Grandfather," said Richard, very gently, "you are in no mood for further talk. I will leave you, and come again."

"Come, and say that Raoul has gone to the imps!" raged the Baron; then, as Richard's steps sounded departing, "and if you take John of the Iron Arm, Raoul's chief under-devil, alive, give him a bath in boiling lard to remind him of what awaits him yonder!"

Barely had Richard reached the great hall when Bertrand was at him again:--

"Their reverences, the abbot of Our Lady of St. Julien, the prior, and the sub-prior, come to see your lords.h.i.+p."

So the three monks in their black Benedictine habits came in before Richard, who bowed very low, remembering the wise maxim: "Honor all churchmen, but look well to your money." The abbot was short and fat, the prior short but less fat, the sub-prior leaner still. Otherwise they seemed children of one mother, with their pale, flabby faces, their long gray beards, and black cowls and ca.s.socks.

"_Benedicte_, fair son," began the abbot; "we trust the true love of G.o.d and Holy Church is in your heart."

"Of G.o.d and Holy Church," repeated the prior.

"Of G.o.d and Holy Church," chanted the sub-prior.

"I am a great sinner, holy father," quoth Richard, dutifully, "yet I hope for forgiveness. What may I do for you?"

Then the abbot ran off into a long, winding discourse as to how the barons of St. Julien had ever been the protectors and "advocates" of the abbey, and how of late "that man of Belial, Raoul de Valmont," had oppressed the monks in many ways. "And even now G.o.d has mysteriously deigned," continued the prelate, "that he should commit a sin, the like whereof have been few since the days of Judas called Iscariot."

"And what may this be?" asked Richard, soberly.

"When our _refectarius_," solemnly went on the abbot, "pa.s.sed over the Valmont lands, driving three black pigs, and with twelve fair round Auvergne cheeses amongst other gifts of the pious in his cart, this man of blood cruelly possessed himself of the pigs and cheeses, saying, 'The holy brethren will find prayers rise strongest when they have pulse in their bellies'--blasphemous sinner!"

"Accursed robber!" cried the prior.

"Friend of the fiends!" echoed the sub-prior.

"And therefore," wound up the abbot, "we do warn you, on the peril of your soul, to cut off this child of perdition root and branch; to call forth to arms the _ban_ and the _arriere-ban_; to make his castle a dunghill and his name a byword and a hissing!"

Richard was smiling. When the abbot finished, he gave the holy fathers a merry laugh that made them half feel their weighty mission a failure. But Musa, as he looked upon his friend, trembled, for he did not like that kind of smile or laugh. Richard flashed forth Trenchefer, and laid his hand on the k.n.o.b that contained such holy relics.

"See you, holy fathers, gentlemen and va.s.sals all. I, Richard Longsword, setting my hand on the holy relics of the blessed Matthias and the blessed Gereon, do swear before G.o.d Most High, that I will have the life of Raoul de Valmont, and of every man or lad of his sinful race; and G.o.d and these holy saints do so to me, if I show mercy!"

And all the men-at-arms, and Bertrand and De Carnac, saw that they had to do with a born leader of warriors, and cried out "Amen!" with a mighty shout, so that the solid rafters quaked and reechoed. But Sebastian as well as Musa shuddered when he beheld Longsword; for the Norman's words rang hard and sharp as whetted steel, and the good churchman's heart was heavy with new foreboding.

"This is a cruel vow, my son," he broke in. "Raoul de Valmont must suffer for his sin; but Louis,--he whom you spared when at your feet,--will you seek his life also, and that of the lad Gilbert, the younger brother?"

But Richard flung out hotly:--

"Silence, Sebastian; cursed am I for sparing Louis de Valmont. Cursed for sparing an accursed race! I will have the lives of all--all; and will right my grandsire and myself also. So help me G.o.d!"

Sebastian had one last appeal.