At daybreak the tuba sounded through the Roman camp, summoning to departure the bands who were to share the expedition.
"Where is my nephew?" asked Ausonius, mounting the beautiful gray Cantabrian stallion, whose stirrup was held by old Prosper. "He is usually the first at my bedside to greet me."
"He hastened on with his mailed riders long ago. He started even before the Tribune."
"What zeal! I like that," said the uncle, patting the neck of his noble steed. "At home in Burdigala he devoted his time solely to--"
"To spending your money, O patron!" growled the old man.
"Pshaw, never mind, graybeard! My money--it will soon be his money."
"May the Olympians--forgive me, the saints--forbid!"
"Put no restraint on yourself on my account. I prefer them too. They have the advantage of suiting the metre better, at least most of them. Where is Saturninus?"
"Gone already. He left word that you might follow: you could not miss the way. See, there are the helmets of the last men in his rear-guard. His countryman Decius commands them."
"I see. Forward! How beautifully the morning light smiles upon us. Help me, unconquered sun-god!"
He put spurs to his horse and, followed by a brilliant train of mounted men, dashed down the hill and through the Porta Principalis Dextra eastward, toward the sun. A guide had sought the best path at the earliest dawn, marking it by placing at certain spaces small stones carried in bags by the pioneers who accompanied and watched him. The Prefect of Gaul soon reached the path trodden by Adalo a few days before, which led to Suomar's lonely forest dwelling. With a throbbing heart he recognized the familiar spot: the little hill, the broad-branched oak, the neighboring spring: nothing had changed in the few years, except that another piece of tilled land had been wrested by fire from the primeval forest.
At the fence which inclosed the court-yard he sprang from his horse; he had ordered his escort to halt at the oak-tree. The blood suffused his face, so intense was his anxiety. The narrow gate in the palisade stood ajar. Entering the yard, he uttered a cry of joyful astonishment: a little flower garden had been laid out beside the door of the house; he recognized with emotion in the gay blossoms, now in the full bloom of summer, the seeds and slips which he had given the child in Arbor, nay, even ordered from Gaul. Italian and Gallic flowers and shrubs, evidently tended by loving hands, splendid roses and evergreen yews greeted him in thick beds, and also small fruit-trees. Pontine cherries, Picentinian apples, Aquitanian pears, had grown as high as the door.
"Yes, yes," said Ausonius, smiling, "how everything has grown and blossomed in five years!" Then something whirred over his head; from openings in the stable-roof a whole flock of dainty little blue-gray doves flew across the garden to the neighboring field of oats. "See," cried Ausonius, looking after them. "My Lycian rock-doves from Burdigala! How that one pair has multiplied!"
He hesitated to enter the house. Doubtless he told himself that the hope of finding her he sought was faint, nay futile. But here everything seemed to bear witness to her presence; there on the bench before the dwelling lay--he knew them well--the delicate garden shears which he had sent to her from Vindonissa. He did not wish to cross the threshold and rob himself of every hope.
The clank of armor came from the open door: a centurion belonging to Herculanus's troop approached, bowing respectfully. "Everything is empty,vir illuster, the Tribune sends word. And we are to ask you--we are burning all the Barbarians' houses--whether this too--"
"Let it remain uninjured."
The man nodded with a look of pleasure. "I am glad to obey the order. It would have been a hard task to destroy this home. Umbrian roses, Picentinian mallows, like those which grow around my parents' house in Spoletium, in the midst of the Barbarians' marshes! Who can have wrought this miracle?"
"A poet," replied Ausonius, smiling, "and the fourth, the youngest, of the Graces. So Saturninus was here himself?"
"Yes, but even before him your nephew, with me. Herculanus searched everywhere carefully, nay, greedily. He forbade my accompanying him. I was obliged to wait at the entrance."
"The good fellow! He wanted to bring her to me himself, to surprise me--"
"Directly after Herculanus left, Saturninus dashed up."
"Where did the troop go from here?"
"Yonder into the forest, keeping to the left, steadily to the left, away from the lake. Otherwise horses and men would sink in the morass. You will find sentinels posted in the woods every three hundred paces. I, with three men, form the commencement of the chain here."
"See that the yard and garden are not injured. I'll promise in return a jug of the best wine."
With these words he turned away, mounted his horse and, followed by his escort, rode toward the left across the tilled land and meadows surrounding the dwelling to the entrance of the neighboring wood, where the helmets and spears of the next sentinels glittered brightly in the sunshine.
But Herculanus had not been content with thoroughly searching the deserted house. He had also carefully examined the neighborhood for some trace of the vanished girl. He was soon unable to ride farther through the tangled underbrush; so, leaping from his horse, he gave his Mauritanian roan charger into the care of the only man he had permitted to accompany him, and glided on foot through the thicket. A sort of path which he had discovered with much difficulty and followed for some distance suddenly ended.
While vainly searching for the stones and bits of wood which hitherto, though at long distances, had marked the direction of the way, he saw plainly in the marshy ground of the forest the imprint of human footsteps. And the people who had passed here were not Romans: the troops had never yet pressed so far eastward. Besides, the prints were not like those made by the seeker's own heavy Roman marching shoes: he intentionally trod lightly close beside the marks he had found, but how different was the track! His deep footprints instantly filled with the reddish-yellow marsh-water, which oozed from the ground at the least pressure. But within a short time some one had walked by here barefooted with a lighter tread. Indeed, not one person, but several. For besides one mark which seemed to belong to a child, always one step behind was a somewhat heavier and broader impression, and invariably at the right of it a narrow but deep little hole filled with water, as if made by the sharp end of a staff, while partly at the left, partly two paces in advance, a man's heavier tread seemed unmistakable.
The Roman followed the footprints with eager zeal; if he did not find those whom he sought, he would have the credit of being the first to discover the direction in which the Barbarians had fled. Suddenly the traces appeared to vanish, in front of a large hawthorn bush which barred the way. From beneath the hand thrusting the thorns aside a little brown bird with a red breast flew up startled. Bending forward, the Roman peered into the bush, then a cry of glad surprise escaped his lips: "Aha! She passed here! She herself!"
Slowly, slowly he drew through his hand a shining red-gold hair which had caught on a thorn: it was at least an ell long. And beyond the thorn-bush the footprints were again visible, even more distinctly than before, on a patch of damp sand. What seemed a child's footprints were made by her steps.
The underbrush grew thinner, evidently removed by human hands; a few steps more and the pursuer stood in an open space in the forest which had been cleared by fire. Here stood a little hut, very roughly built of unhewn logs: instead of doors two low narrow holes were opposite each other. Such buildings were used by hunters for stations, by shepherds overtaken in the forest by storms for a shelter, but especially to keep quantities of hay which could not be dragged to the distant barns. That was the case here; heaps of the grass piled in stacks could be seen through the holes.
Before Herculanus had reached the hut, an indistinct sound reached his ear from the right, the shore of the lake. He drew his sword and stopped, listening intently. There it came again! Was it a cry? It seemed like the shout with which Romans on guard gave warning of the presence of a foe. Directly afterwards he heard another noise: it was like the whirring of the string in bending and releasing the wood of the bow, then came a heavy fall or plunge into the water, and all was still again. Nothing but the metallic tapping of the woodpecker broke the silence of the forest.
Cautiously raising his shield to his eyes and looking watchfully toward the right, the Roman, with his thin figure drawn to its foil height, waited several seconds longer: nothing stirred.
He now sprang in two bounds across the open ground to the hut of hay, stooped and entered through the northern hole. Something rustled under the thick grass, which seemed to be alive: something glided beneath it--was it a weasel?--toward the opposite hole: only the waving motion of the bundles of hay betrayed the direction.
Herculanus hastily grasped with his shield arm at the creature making the rustling and lifted the broad short sword in his right for a death-stroke. He seized something warm and drew it upward from the hay, which fell on the right and left as he dragged forward a girl whose face was covered with tangled red locks and blades of grass, through which she gazed in mortal terror and fiery wrath at her assailant.
So strange, so bewitchingly beautiful was the young creature that Herculanus uttered a fierce cry of pleasure. He had vowed that the first moment he had the dangerous Barbarian alone within reach of his sword, should be her last; and even now he did not really waver in the resolve. Neither pity nor passion could influence a mind fixed solely on his uncle's wealthy yet so much youthful beauty awakened a fleeting desire for it: before he stabbed the foe, he would have one kiss from those red lips. So, reserving his right hand for the death-blow, he drew her closer to him with the left. The girl struggled with the strength of despair. Turning her head as far as possible from him, she uttered a cry of terror, like a dying fawn. It was only a moment's delay of the assassin's thrust, but it saved her.
Before Herculanus could press his lips on her averted face a shadow fell from outside upon the opening toward the lake, where the struggling figures were now standing. "Murderer!" cried a deep voice; and Herculanus, receiving a severe blow on the breast, staggered back, loosing his hold upon his captive. Swiftly as the trout glides away, the girl tried to slip through the opening; but she felt her arm seized in the iron grasp of a much stronger hand, and looked up at another helmeted Roman.
"Is it you, Tribune?" stammered Herculanus, hastily thrusting his sword into the sheath.
The latter did not vouchsafe him a single word. "You are Bissula, little one, are you not?" he asked, gazing with wondering eyes at the strange vision. A sweet rapture ran through his veins as he saw the lovely little face, the delicate, graceful limbs, the bare white feet, and felt the pulsing of the young life through the round arm his hand held so firmly.
The prisoner made no reply, but she looked up trustfully into the Illyrian's handsome, manly face. Then she cast a strange glance, as if seeking for some one, back into the hut,--Saturninus had dragged her from the doorway into the open air,--and seemed to be listening anxiously.
"Yes, it is Bissula," said Herculanus, now also coming out. "What made you imagine that I wanted to kill her? I have been searching for her since the earliest dawn."
"So I thought."
"Not for myself; I was only holding her firmly to prevent her escape."
"With a quivering sword uplifted to strike?"
"Only to frighten her."
But Bissula cast a reproachful glance at him.
"However that may be," the Illyrian continued, "she is my captive." His glowing eyes rested on her; the girl lowered her long lashes in embarrassment.
"No, no! I discovered her."
"But before you seized her a second time--for she was free again--I captured her. Dare to contradict it, you murderer of girls!" and he advanced threateningly toward him.
The sound of a tuba rang from the forest.
"We must return. The tuba gives a sign of warning," said Saturninus. "The first trace of the foe has been found--not only the child--a man."
Bissula looked up anxiously.
"He lay covered with skins," the other added, as they moved forward, "hidden among the rushes so that he could not be distinguished from a fallen tree. Before we could seize him--"
Bissula uttered a sigh of relief.
"He had vanished in the sedges. A Batavian archer shot an arrow after him. Hark! the Prefect is giving the signal again. Come without fear, child."
He led her by the wrist, carefully trying not to hurt her; but she often stopped, glancing back at the hut, and once also at the lake. After a few steps they heard the neighing of a horse and soon entered an opening in the forest, where Ausonius had halted his mounted escort.
"Father Ausonius!" cried the captive joyously, struggling to release herself to rush to him.
But the Illyrian's grasp on her arm became like iron. Approaching the Prefect, who held out both arms to Bissula, he made a military salute, saying sternly: "The first encounter with the enemy! A man has escaped: a girl--this one--became my prisoner: my slave."
During those days the vicinity of the Holy Mountain, where a large number of fugitives had taken refuge, was full of busy life, and from the north, the quarter not threatened by the Romans, reinforcements were constantly arriving from other provinces.
The Tribune's efforts to discover the retreat of the fugitives had been baffled hitherto; neither those in the marshes nor on Odin's Mountain had been overtaken by the spies and reconnoitring parties of the Roman General. Marshes and impenetrable primeval forests surrounded the Roman camp on the Idisenhang on every side except southward toward the lake.
In the last few days, after a tremendous thunder storm, a southwest wind had sprung up, bringing on its dripping wings pouring torrents of rain; then the forests became absolutely impassable for the heavy tread of the legions: the few fords were buried in marshes or overflowed; the tiniest rivulet became a raging river. Sulky and shivering, the intruders, principally natives of the south, remained in the camp under plank roofs and leather tents, fanning day and night the flames of huge fires which, however, as all the wood was wet, diffused more smoke than warmth.
For long distances from the foot of the mountain the few and narrow openings which led to the interior of the immense forests were blocked and barricaded by felled trees. Huge oaks, ashes, and pine-trees had been felled and piled one above another more than the height of a man, strengthened by earth and turf, and held together at regular distances by enormous posts driven into the ground or by trees which had been left standing. Thus an almost insurmountable breastwork was formed, on whose summit, and in the tops of the trees towering above it, the best archers were stationed. Similar lines of defence were repeated, one behind another, wherever the locality permitted. The legions would have needed many more days than the brief time still remaining before the end of August--they always finished their short summer campaigns in Germany before the commencement of the autumn rains--to storm all these fortifications; they could scarcely find it possible to make a circuit of them, on account of the marshes. But even if they succeeded in penetrating all the barricades to the foot of the mountain, they would then be forced to begin the inexpressibly toilsome siege of this natural fortress.
All the entrances were covered by several tiers of logs; while, on the mountain itself, rising one behind another, was a whole system of "ring walls." These extremely powerful and extensive fortifications dated principally from Celtic times, but had been considerably strengthened and enlarged in scope by the Alemanni during their occupation of the country for more than the past century: they had been forced to seek refuge here from the Roman troops often enough.
These walls were made of heaped up earth, turf, palisades, and so called Cyclopean walls: that is, rocks, so closely joined together without mortar or bricks, by a skilful use of their points, edges, and fissures that fire, tearing asunder, and the blows of the ram seemed equally ineffectual.
Each one of these rings, which rose in stories, like terraces, required to be stormed as a separate fortress. Each lower one was protected not only by its own garrison, but by all those above, since they were so constructed that stones, logs, spears, and arrows from all the upper walls could strike the enemy without injuring the combatants on the one beneath. Seven such defences girdled the mountain, the topmost one surrounding the summit, which concealed Odin's altar in the heart of an ash forest.
Those unable to fight, the women, children, old men, and slaves, were scattered through all the stories of the mountain fortress. The herds had been driven to the rear on the northern side, where their lowing, neighing, and bleating would be as far as possible from the enemy. The fugitives rested at night in huts built of thick green foliage, often with the skin of some animal fastened among the branches, which the Alemanni had great skill in constructing. Nor was there any lack of cellarlike subterranean passages where stores of grain and valuables were concealed.
The fighting men garrisoned all the entrances, reconnoitred in small bands, especially at night, beyond the barricades close to the neighborhood of the Roman camp. They spent the day in feats of arms or drilling, impatiently enduring the long delay in giving battle, and grumbling at the incomprehensible procrastination of their white-haired Duke. For the latter, Adalo, and other leaders, huts of leaves had been built on the summit of the mountain with the tents of their followers scattered around them.
Before one of these huts (a stag's antlers had been cut on the central post for a house mark) on the day after Bissula's capture, a bright fire was burning late in the evening, fed with pine cones which had been protected from the wet under the stone closing the opening of a cellar. It was supplied by a man about forty years old, whose cropped hair showed that he was a slave; while the shape of his short face, his dark eyes, high cheek bones and snub nose denoted that he was not of German lineage. Suomar had bought him many years before in Vindonissa; cheap enough, for Valentinian--or the slave dealer--had brought countless captives from the Jazyge war.
In front of the fire, sheltered from the wind and smoke, old Waldrun lay on a bearskin, her feet covered with another. Adalo was kneeling beside her. Mirthfulness and wrath had vanished; deep sorrow clouded his handsome face. He gave the blind woman some wine to drink from a silver goblet. Both beaker and wine were booty wrested from the Roman.
"Tell me everything once more, Zercho," he said earnestly, "until Waldrun has recovered and can add what you did not see. I have not yet clearly understood the one thing upon which all depends."
The bondman was now crouching beside the fire, trying to keep the smoke from the white-haired woman with the wolf-skin he wore for a cloak. It did not annoy her at all, but it helped him to avert his eyes from the youth's searching gaze.
"It happened in this way, handsome neighbor. Directly after you leaped down the slope in anger,--I saw it from the stable,--the little red sprite ordered me to bury the master's coins (alas, there are very few of them!) and the brass vessels and broken-handled jug which he obtained three winters ago at Brigantium. I had already driven the cow, the sheep, and the goats into the alder thicket.
"The next day I was to take the young mistress and her grandmother into the marshes to Suomar, the master. But alas, the hot and cold cat, which invisibly shakes the body like a mouse, often springs upon the good old mistress. So it was the next day. The sufferer could hardly stir her aged limbs from the couch; her strength was as feeble as a dying torch; I almost had to carry her. But I could do this only on solid ground: in the forest marshes I should have sunk with my burden--strong bones weigh heavily. So, in the forest, the blind woman was obliged to walk by herself, leaning on her staff and guided by the little elf, while I jumped from stone to stone in advance, seeking the best path. But just before we reached the hay hut, the grandmother fell; she could no longer stand or walk. We carried her in. You know the entrance to the old cave is just beside the left corner post. Down below there it was safe, warm, and for her no darker than above. We spent the rest of the day and the night in it. Bissula, in spite of every warnings would not leave the old woman and go on with me.
"She had brought some milk in a goat-skin, and rye bread. I watched outside near the hut. In the gray dawn I stole back westward toward the edge of the forest to watch for the helmeted Romans. Soon I saw a small band of mounted men dash straight to Suomar's dwelling. I had hidden our old log boat and the oars among the thickest rushes and meant to row it through the marsh as near the hut as possible, carry the sick woman to it, and then try to take my two mistresses to Suomar by way of the lake. But when I reached the shore I saw several ships--their lofty prows and triangular sails marked them as Roman galleys--moving from Arbor on the opposite side toward our shore. They would soon be very near. The way by the water was barred; but at the right, from the west, I already heard the trampling of horses through the marshes and meadows close beside me.
"Two men with arrows and long bows in their right hands dashed by, not a spear's length distant. I crouched among the rushes, nay in the swamp to my lips; but in doing so I startled the great egret that always fishes there. As, screaming loudly--silly bird--he soared upward over the rushes, he attracted the attention of the riders to himself and, unluckily, to me too. They saw my head. A bow whirred, an arrow whizzed through my otter cap and grazed my head. The wound wasn't deep; Zercho's skull is hard, Suomar often says so, and this time, it was a good thing. I now swam out into the lake, diving like a duck as long as I could hold my breath.
"When I was forced to rise, the men had disappeared. Cautiously as the fox stealing after the mouse, I crept on all fours through the thickest rushes nearer to the land, in the direction of the hut, but making a wide circuit. Then I saw two Romans in glittering armor step into the clearing in the forest: one was leading the young mistress by the arm--"
Adalo heard this for the second time, but he again sighed deeply.
"A horse neighed behind us, and on it sat the clever old man who a few winters ago read to the little one in Arbor from many, many parchments, oh, such a long, horribly long time--while I was obliged to wait to row her back across the lake."
"Are you perfectly sure," asked Adalo, seizing the bondman by the shoulder and forcing him to turn his averted face, "that this horseman was the old Roman?"
"Well, he isn't so very old," replied the Sarmatian evasively, "though he has grown somewhat grayer since that summer."
"Answer," cried Adalo angrily. "Can you swear that the rider was Ausonius?"
"Ausonius! Yes, yes, that is what she always called him. Father Ausonius. And that's what she cried out yesterday when she saw him: 'Father Ausonius!' she shrieked."
He broke off abruptly and began to rub his head (the wound suddenly seemed to pain him) muttering meanwhile in his Sarmatian dialect, which Adalo did not understand.
"So it was really he," sighed Adalo. "And I must thank the gods for having led her to him."
"Freya will reward you for it," said the blind woman suddenly, raising herself on her left arm and groping with her right hand in the direction of the voice until she reached the youth's head and stroked his long locks. "The dwellers in Asgard will repay you for such thoughts."
"Must I not cherish them, Mother? Oh, if you could only sit up again!"
"Your drink, the Romans' drink, cheers the weary soul."
"Ausonius will protect her from the others. But," Adalo went on angrily, "who will defend her from Ausonius? She was tenderly attached to him."
"As a child to its father."
"Be it so--at that time. But now the maiden will owe him gratitude for everything, even the highest boon."
During this conversation Zercho had repeatedly looked thoughtfully at both; now he scratched himself behind the ear and was about to make some remark, but changed his mind and remained silent.
"Against my warning," said the old woman, continuing the bondman's story, "the child had glided away from my side out of the cellar into the hut. She grew tired of waiting in the dark hole for Zercho's return. Suddenly I heard a man's heavy step above me; then a shriek from the little one, which made me tremble. But by the time I had groped my way to the stone slab and lifted it, all was still. I vainly called her name. Soon Zercho came with the news that he had seen her led away captive. We sorrowfully waited for the darkness. My fever had left me; I could walk slowly, but faithful Zercho sought our cow and found her among the tall reeds in the swamp, lifted me upon her and, by a wide circuit through the forest, brought me here."
"For I had seen Italian galleys between the forest hut and Suomar in the eastern marshes," remarked the Sarmatian. "The enemy was reconnoitring there, so I tried to reach the mountain, as my mistress preferred."
"Yes; for since Suomar, my son, cannot be reached, it is you, Adalo, of all the men of our people, our kind neighbor, the playfellow of her childhood, to whom I must lament. The dear one is a captive: help--rescue--liberate her."
The youth passed his hand sadly over his beautifully arched eyebrows. "Yes," he thought, with bitter grief, "a captive through the fault of her own defiance and obstinacy." But he said nothing, only thinking: "It will be a difficult task. If it depended upon me--from the moment I heard it I would have stormed the Idisenhang so constantly and fiercely that the Italians would have had neither inclination nor leisure to torment the child. Or to win her," he added bitterly. "But the army is under the sole command of my cousin Hariowald, the Duke. I cannot--"
Here a low growl interrupted him: he turned and saw a singular spectacle.
A handsome boy about fourteen, whose strong resemblance to Adalo marked him as his brother--only his curling locks were light yellow, almost white--was dragging by the ear a huge she-bear, which, growling, struggling, but yielding, allowed herself to be drawn nearer and nearer to the fire.
"Down, Bruna!" cried the lad, forcing the huge animal to lie prostrate. "You dearly loved the merry, dancing girl too. Look, you growling brown giantess, that's only the grandmother, and Zercho, who always brought you so much wild-honey from the bee-wood. Butsheis missing; our Bissula is gone. Ah, if you had been there, you would have defended her savagely; for you haven't forgotten that she and Adalo saved you, dragged you out of the torrent. When you were scarcely bigger than a kitten the cloud-burst swept you away from your mother, and you cried piteously as you were drowning. And her busy hands fed you even more eagerly than ours, with rich milk, rye bread, and dainty wild berries. Since you first opened your blinking eyes, which now look as though you knew as much as a human being, you have recognized her as your best friend. Oh, if you had been with her, no one would have dared to seize her. O brother, strong brother, you hero and shield of the whole province, bring her back! Alas, if the little one, with her dainty hands, should be forced to heat the bath-water for the hated foe and wash his feet, as I often saw their maid-servants do in Arbor! Why don't we rush down on the wings of the storm and hew her out of the high-walled camp citadel?"
He swung his little wolf spear: the fire blazed up brightly as he stood in the light of the flames, a handsome boyish figure, in his light-blue linen robe bordered with white swan's down.
"Yes, my Sippilo," said the older brother with ill-repressed sorrow, "you loved her too."
The boy looked up startled, but Adalo continued:
"Yes, yes. Perhaps she is dead--to us, to our people. Perhaps we shall never see her again, never hear her sweet, elfish, mocking laugh."
"Oh, the smoke! How it stings!" cried the lad, wiping the tears from his eyes.
"Perhaps she went with the Italians willingly," said Adalo, torturing himself savagely--"with the clever Ausonius!"
"Is he here again?" cried Sippilo. "I'll run him through like a fat carp that is sunning itself in shallow water. Oh, I used to wish he might fall under the curse of Odin and the sun. Whenever I went to get frogs for fishing or to play ball, she had always rowed over to him or would not leave the long rolls of runes over which she racked her brains. He had given them to her. If only I could catch him!"
"If we only had her back again! My heart is consumed with anxiety."
"Guard yourself from consuming anxiety, my son," said the old woman in a warning tone. "It will paralyze your thoughts and arm; and you will need both to liberate the naughty child. I am no prophetess, but I have had strange dreams since I grew blind--which often come to pass: I saw you to-night wounded, severely wounded. Guard your life. If she should be rescued, and no longer find you--"
"Then her vengeful wish would be fulfilled. She hates me. She shouted it loudly enough."
Sippilo laughed. "You? Hate you? She loves you better than a sister. How I always had to tell her about you, everything you were doing,--your prizes of honor in the contests; the gifts of neighboring princes; your last verses; whom they praised! When I met her on the lake quite lately, she asked if Jettaburga and her father did not often visit the Stag Hall. When I said that they no longer came there, for sheer delight she loosed from her own waist the beautiful blue girdle she always wore, and gave it to me. See, there it is. I always carry it hidden in my blouse. And, Bruna, didn't she once kiss you between the eyes, when I told her how you had sprung to Adalo's assistance in the chase and torn the furious wild bull which was goring his horse? Yes, Bruna, you are faithful to her too. You have trotted after us for hours when we were gathering berries and mushrooms, and watched our noonday nap."
Just at that moment a long-drawn blast of a horn echoed from the summit of the mountain. Adalo started up.
"The Duke is calling. We are to consult about what is to be proposed in the people's council. Zercho, come with me. He wishes to question you about the number of the enemy's mounted men. You, Sippilo, take care of Mother Waldrun; that is all you can do for your Bissula."
"For the present," said the boy looking after his brother. "But I will take part in storming the camp fortress where the scoundrels hold captive the prettiest little bird--little gold-crested wren, no, little redbreast--in the land of the Alemanni." He raised his clenched fist threateningly.
Outside of the Duke's tent also a huge fire was blazing, fed by slaves who were roasting on the ends of poles the haunches and back of a freshly killed stag. Adalo passed by, motioning to Zercho to wait, parted the sailcloth stretched over the wooden frame of the tent, and entered.
The roof was formed of interwoven pine branches; against the poles of the light timberwork hung and rested everywhere weapons of all kinds. Skins covered the turf floor which, opposite to the entrance, was raised until it formed a high seat; a curtain of heavy linen hung behind it, dividing from the front of the tent a small space used for a sleeping room. In the centre stood an iron tripod, running to a point at the top, into which was screwed a burning pine-torch that diffused a dim, flickering red light.
On the fur-covered high seat, with his back resting against the main column of the tent, sat Duke Hariowald. He greeted his young kinsman only by a glance and seemed to heed nothing except the eager words of another guest, a man about forty years old, who, clad in a boarskin and wearing on his head a "boar helm" with the animal's tusks, sat at his right.
The old Duke, a giant in height, towering nearly a head above Adalo's tall figure, was a man of singular appearance. The immense framework of his body appeared to belong to a much older race of men. His deep-set gray eye--the left one had been destroyed by a stone from a Balearican sling long before, and the empty socket had a sinister expression--was under a bushy, prominent arched brow; its fire was by no means dimmed, but curbed by the long habit of self-control. This ever perceptible rule of passions blazing fiercely in his breast gave the mighty man, who in spite of his sixty-five winters could not be called old, an air of mysterious majesty. His people looked up to him with reverence, with timid expectation, nay, with a slight fear of what he was planning in rigid secrecy. His eagle eye was inscrutable when he half closed it; when open, the flash that blazed from it was fairly blinding. The expression of the mouth was concealed by the magnificent silvery-white beard, sweeping over the breast-plate to the bronze belt, which framed the cheeks and mingled with the thick locks of hair of the same hue.
Like the eye, the strong, deep, resonant voice revealed, no matter how quietly the mighty man spoke, the sense of power held in check. He rarely moved his muscular limbs, and all his gestures had a calmness which was the result of long training. So he sat without a helmet, with his ample blue cloak floating from his shoulders, his bearing one of dignified composure. The majestic beauty of his finely formed head was plainly visible as he rested it against the tent-pole, listening intently. An immense spear rested in the curve of his right arm, its brass top rising above his shoulder, as the end touched the floor; he often stroked with a gentle, almost loving touch of the hand the runes of victory inscribed on the back of the ash handle.
"I am usually glad to greet you, son of Adalger," said the Duke's other guest, with a frowning brow, "but now I am most unwilling. I pleaded for peace--" The Duke remained silent. "Now you come and you--I know it--dream of nothing day and night save war with Rome."
Adalo measured him with a wrathful glance. "The ancient foe of our people is in the country, and a king of the Alemanni counsels peace? Ebarbold, son of Ebur, fear was alien to your kinsmen--"
The other laid his hand on the curved knife in his belt. Adalo did not see it: he was under the spell of Hariowald's eye. A warning glance from the old man, and the youth hastily added, "and is unknown to you, hero of the wild-boar's courage."
The guest loosened his grip of the dagger and leaned back proudly.
"But Roman gold does not ensnare you," Adalo continued; "so some magic blinds you."
"Oryouand all our crazy youths. The red drink of Zio, the war-god, has intoxicated you. Or," he added in a lower, almost timid tone, "He, Odin the Val-father, wishes again to people his Valhalla with slaughtered heroes."
A change of expression flashed over the Duke's face. He gently raised his spear and, unheard by the others, murmured, "Mighty Odin, do not avenge the words." But Ebarbold went on:
"No matter about the boys! Their only art is war, and they have little sense; but that you, who have seen sixty winters and almost as many victories of the men with the high helmets--that you too should desire war! My friends, I went to Rome; I climbed to the citadel on the towering rock. It glitters with gold and marble. I served in the great Valentinian's army. I have seen for years the countless thousands of Roman warriors with their finest weapons, against which ours are like children's toys."
The Duke, unnoticed, pressed his spear closer to his breast.
"And the military engines, the huge galleys with three banks of oars one above another, the treasures of coined and uncoined gold and silver! The whole extent of the land, all Mittelgard, as far as men live--white, brown, and black--I've seen them painted on a long, long strip of hide. The rising and the setting of the sun serve Rome. In his golden house on one of the seven hills of the Tiber the Imperator has placed a gold ball: all the provinces are copied on it. It is the work of a magician. If a foe crosses the boundary in the farthest north or south, the gold ball echoes and trembles in that spot; the Imperator hears it, looks, and sends the legions. We will not defy him. The Cæsar is a god on earth."
"Do not hear it. Mighty One!" the old Duke murmured, stroking the runes on his spear soothingly.
Adalo was about to make a vehement reply, but he involuntarily looked at the silent man, and controlled himself.
"We have learned that long enough, I think," Ebarbold continued; "from generation to generation, when each province still fought independently, long before this name and league of the Alemanni were heard and invented!"
"You don't like this league?" the Duke now asked suddenly.
The King started. The voice, hitherto mute, sounded so loud and powerful. Glancing up timidly, he shrugged his shoulders: "Whether I like it or not, I can no longer dissolve it."
"No, you cannot," said Hariowald very calmly, stroking his long beard; but his gray eye darted a glance which boded evil.
"You don't like thenameof Alemanni either?" asked Adalo indignantly.
"No, Adeling. 'All men together!' Ha, our forefathers prided themselves on standing alone, province by province; nay, in the old days family by family, not leaning on others, and also not bound by them, not subject to the will of the majority."
"Yes, that's it!" said the old Duke with a fierce smile. "You were in the citadel of Rome--so was I. But I perceived with my one eye what you have not seen. You noticed the glittering lustre of their magnificence; it dazzled you: I saw through the glitter to the decay, the decline beneath. And one thing more," he added mysteriously, lowering his voice--"for several generations they have had no more luck with their own gods--with the new ones, I mean. Ay, the old one whom they formerly had--" he now spoke with a certain timidity, even reverence--"I mean the one with the thunderbolts and the eagle--he was a god of battles, almost like our own. Often his eagle on their shields seemed to me to flap its wings, and the lightning to glow redly. Often and often have I seen them conquer under that handsome bearded god and his sons. Mars and Hercules. But now they have chosen for their god a youth, gentle and nobly wise, but no warrior. His own priests say he never held a sword in his hand. He did not descend from a line of gods; he was the son of a laborer. And this man--a carpenter--belonged to a race long in bondage to Rome, a people many of whom have wandered to us with packs on their bent backs, mere traders in spices. Not many of them are seen in the ranks of the legions. Since the Romans chose for their god that gentle teacher who would not even defend his own life, victory has deserted their standards. But what (besides their Jupiter in the clouds) formerly secured to them for centuries conquest on earth I also learned; the god whom I most honor showed it to me: one will controlled them all. They were already united men--all for one, and one for all, through many hundred winters; while we, according to the wish of your heart, fought province by province, each for himself, and--succumbed. This is your freedom--the freedom of discord and consequent destruction!"
The glowing wrath of enthusiastic conviction transfigured the old Duke's noble face.
Ebarbold wished to cast a venomous glance at him, but was forced to lower his eyes in the presence of such lofty dignity. His lips curled bitterly as he replied:
"Beware, Hariowald. Your title is Duke, not King; and your reign ends when this war is over. According to your desire, it seems, one man must rule the Alemanni. From the earliest days we have had kings and counts of the provinces; but woe betide us if all the districts ever become the slaves of one king of the people."
"Are the gods slaves becauseonerules them as king?" The old Duke's voice sounded threatening.
Ebarbold answered evasively: "But here on earth we Alemanni have equal rights. And rather than--"
"Why do you hesitate?" asked Adalo angrily.
"He hesitates because he shrinks from uttering his thoughts. But the Lofty One gave me the power to read the minds of men upon their brows like explained runes."
Flushing and paling, Ebarbold started up.
"This son of Ebur thinks," the Duke continued, "that rather than obey a king of the Alemanni he would serve the Cæsar."
Now Adalo sprang from his seat.
"And suppose it were so," cried Ebarbold, "would you prevent it? In a few weeks, when the leaves fall, your command of the army will end. But meanwhile--"
"Meanwhile I counsel you to obey."
"You?"
"Not me," the old man answered, with immovable composure, "but the Council which rules all the provinces--even yours, the Ebergau and its King. But sit down again, hot-tempered hero! And Adalo, hand him from the wall of the tent where it hangs, the mead horn. The heron of forgetfulness will rustle over our heads, bearing away on its wings the words of wrath and discord."
The two young men took their seats again. While the wild bull's horn, tipped at both ends with bronze, was passing around the circle, Ebarbold said: "Even if we should conquer this time and drive this band of Romans from the country--we have learned the lesson often enough--others will come to avenge those who are defeated. So it has been for many generations."
"But so it will be no longer," the Duke answered slowly. "That is provided for. The evil she-wolf is surrounded by too many dogs at once. She can no longer raise her left paw to aid her right: the Goth is holding it firmly on the Danube, and she is still scarcely able to escape the bite of the Franconians on the Rhine."
"The Goths?" said Ebarbold. "Who knows whether they will be in the field this year?"
"I do," replied the Duke quietly.
"Can you see from here to Thrace?" sneered Ebarbold: "I cannot."
"But there is One who, from his throne in the clouds, overlooks all countries: and he revealed it to me."
"But I see the misery the Romans have wrought around us in our own land," the King continued. "My people have suffered heavily. The cohorts in passing through burned all the dwellings. My own hall too."
"We will rebuild them," cried Adalo, laughing, as he hung the horn on the wall. "The forest will not refuse trees to its people. My home below on the hillock beside the lake"--his face now grew grave--"is dear to me; sacred the hearth beside which I sat in my dear mother's lap while my father, skilled in the music of the harp, sung of the gods and the deeds of our own ancestors. The Centurion will probably soon hurl the torch into the ancient dwelling of my family with the rune of the stag's antlers. Never more can I hope to mount the high seat where I was so often allowed to fill my father's drinking horn. But though through all the future years I should have no other shelter for this head than the waving boughs of the woods, never will I yield to the Italians."
"Yield? The purpose is only to confirm a treaty such as we have often made."
"And the Romans as often broken," said Adalo.
"Or we ourselves. What is asked of us? Young men to fight the Cæsar's battles. We have more than we can feed. In return they will give us red gold."
"May Hel swallow up this gold and these treaties!" cried Hariowald. "For generations they have sold to our ancient foe our heart's blood and our young heroes, who were used against ourselves and our neighbors. If the hundreds of thousands who fell for Rome had banded together against Rome, we should have watered our long-maned horses long ago in the Gallic sea. But we will not cast aside your words, Ebarbold. Perhaps I may even consent to send an envoy to the Roman camp for peace!"
"What! Is that your wish?" cried Adalo impetuously.
"My wish will appear."
"To offer peace? Let them retire? With their booty?"
"It will not be hard to carry." Here a smile which lent the old Duke's lips a wonderful charm hovered around them. "Six pots in Iburninga and a broken mead vessel in Mariswik; so two old women complained to me."
"And the prisoners!" Adalo reminded him.
"They have only one, I hear," Ebarbold remarked, "the child of a small farmer."
"No matter, she is a free maiden, a daughter of our race," cried Adalo, with blazing eyes. "She has a right to the protection of her people."
"Protection? A captive! What can we--"
"Release her with the sword--or avenge her."
"Commence, for the sake of one woman, the conflict which will destroy the people?"
"You are right," said the Duke slowly. "Women as well as men must be sacrificed for the welfare of the nation. Let her stay where she is--little Bissula."
"What, Bissula?" asked Ebarbold, startled. "Albfledis, whom they call Bissula? The beautiful red elf?"
"You know her?" Adalo asked.
"Who has not heard of her? She is talked of along the whole shore of the lake, and in such a way that the listener is anxious to see her. I too grew curious and tried to get a look at her lately, at the last sun-festival. It is a pity about her. By Freya's eyes, a great pity! But peace is worth more."
"Certainly," said Hariowald, "and victory still more."
"Victory is certain," exclaimed Adalo.
"Do you think so?" replied the old man reprovingly. "I do not. Not yet," he corrected himself.
"Lead us to the attack on the Roman camp! Our men are pouring here in dense throngs since you sent the blood-red arrow from house to house."
"There are not yet enough. The army still lacks many men from distant provinces situated far away toward the north and the east: Alpgau, Albwins-Bar, Wisentgau, and Draggau."
"Do not calculate! Dare!"
"I am doing so; but I also consider the firmness of the Roman camp."
"But meanwhile our foes are strengthening themselves too. Their proud galleys already lie anchored opposite in Arbor; they will soon bring fresh cohorts over."
"Let them do so." The old Duke laughed softly; his look expressed a grim, mysterious joy. "Meanwhile," he added after a pause, "I will send an envoy to the foe to-morrow."
"Send me!" exclaimed Ebarbold eagerly.
"No. Adalo, you will go."
"He! He will not bring back peace."
"No, but keen scrutiny, and--" he whispered to the youth--"perhaps Bissula."
"Thanks! Thanks!"
"I," cried Ebarbold wrathfully, "would surely bring home to our people--"
"Subjection!" said the Duke. "That is just what you must not do. If the Italians reject fair proposals, then I will ask the Council of the people, the whole army, for its decision--"
"I know in advance," Ebarbold angrily interrupted, "what they will determine, guided by you, you disciple of Odin, you giver of victims to Zio! But your decision is one thing; it is another--"
He checked the word on his tongue and hesitated.
"That you will do, you wish to say. King of the Ebergau! I warn you, Ebarbold. Your father was a gallant hero; he fell by my side twenty winters ago in the murderous battle against Julian. Remembering him, I once more warn you: beware!"
"Look to yourself," cried Ebarbold angrily. "You are not my guardian!"
Springing up, he rushed out of the tent.