Some part of the interview with the commandant which had resulted in their release the jester told his companion as they sped down the sloping plain in the early silvery light which transformed the dew-drops and grassy moisture into veils of mist. Behind them the château was slowly fading from view; the town had already disappeared. Around them the singing of the birds, the cooing of the cushat doves and the buzzing of the bees, mingled in dreamy cadence. On each side stretched the plain which, washed by recent heavy rains, was now spangled with new-grown flowers; here, far apart in sequestered beauty; there, clustering companionably in a mass of color.
"Upon the strength of the letter from the emperor, the vicomte took the responsibility of allowing us to depart," explained the fool. "In it his Majesty referred to his message to the king, to the part played by him who took the place of the duke, and what he was pleased to term my services to Francis and himself."
So much theplaisantrelated, but he did not add that the commandant, with Triboulet's words in mind, had at first demurred about permitting the jestress to go. "Vrai Dieu!" that person had exclaimed. "If what the dwarf said be true? To cross the king!—and yet," he had added cynically, "it sounds most unlike. Did Aladdin flee from the genii of the lamp? Such a magician is Francis. Châteaux, gardens—'tis clearly an invention of Triboulet's!" And the fallacy of this conclusion the duke'splaisanthad not sought to demonstrate.
Without question, the young girl listened, but when he had finished her features hardened. Intuitively she divined a gap in the narrative; herself! From the dwarf's slur to Caillette's gentle look of surprise constituted a natural span for reflection. And the duke's fool, seeing her face turn cold, attributed it, perhaps, to another reason. Her story recurred to him; she was no longer a nameless jestress; an immeasurable distance separated a mereplaisantfrom the survivor of one of the noblest, if most unfortunate, families of France. She had not answered the night before when he had addressed her as the daughter of the constable; motionless as a statue had she gazed after him; and, remembering the manner of their parting, he now looked at her curiously.
"All's well that ends well," he said, "but I must crave indulgence, Lady Jacqueline, for having brought you into such peril."
She flushed. "Do you persist in that foolishness?" she returned quickly.
"Do you deny the right to be so called?"
"Did I not tell you—the constable's daughter is dead?"
"To the world! But to the fool—may he not serve her?"
His face was expectant; his voice, light yet earnest. Her answer was half-sad, half-bright, as though her tragedy, like those acted dramas, had its less somber lines. And in the stage versions of those dark, mournful pieces were not the softer bits introduced with cap and bell? The fool's stick and the solemn march of irresistible and lowering destiny went hand in hand. Everywhere the tinkle of the tiny bells.
"Poor service!" she retorted. "A discredited mistress!"
"One I am minded for," he replied, a sudden flash in his eyes.
She looked away; her lips curved.
"For how long?" she said, half-mockingly, and touched her horse before he could reply.
What words had her action checked on his lips? A moment was he disconcerted, then riding after her, he smiled, thinking how once he had carelessly passed her by; how he had looked upon her but as a wilful child.
A child, forsooth! His pulses throbbed fast. Life had grown strangely sweet, as though from her look, when she had stood on the stairs, he had drawn new zest. To serve her seemed a happiness that drowned all other ills; a selfish bond of subordination. Her misfortunes dignified her; her worn gown was dearer in his eyes than courtly splendor; the disorder of her hair more becoming than nets of gold and coifs of jewels. He forgot their danger; the broad plain lay like a pleasure garden before them; fairer in natural beauty than Francis' conventional parks.
And she, too, had ceased to remember the dwarf's words, for the joy of youth is strong, and the sunshine and air were rarely intoxicating. There was a stirring rhythm in the movement of the steeds; noiselessly their hoofs beat upon the soft earth and tender mosses. The rains which elsewhere had flooded the lowlands here but enlivened the vernal freshness of the scene. The air was full of floating thistle-down; a cloud of insects dancing in the light, parted to let them pass.
At the sight of a bush, white with flowers, she uttered an exclamation of pleasure, and broke off a branch covered with fragrant blossoms, as they rode by. Out of the depths of this store-house of sweets a plundering humming-bird flashed and vanished, a jewel from nature's crown! She held the branch to her face and he glanced at her covertly; she was all jestress again. The cadence of that measured motion shaped itself to an ancient lyric in keeping with the song of birds, the blue sky, and the wild roses.
"Hark! hark!Pretty lark!Little heedest thou my pain."
He bent his head listening; he could scarcely hear the words. Was it a sense of new security that moved her; the reaction of their narrow escape; the knowledge they were leaving the château and all danger behind them?
"Hark! hark!Pretty lark!—"
Boom! Far in the distance sounded the discharge of a cannon—its iron voice the antithesis to the poet's dainty pastoral. As the report reverberated over the valley, from the grass innumerable insects arose; the din died away; the disturbed earth-dwellers sank back to earth again. The song ceased from the young girl's lips, and, gazing quickly back, she could just distinguish, above one of the parapets of the château, a wreath, already nearly dissolved in the blue of the sky. The jester, who had also turned in his saddle, met her look of inquiry.
"It sounds like a signal of some kind—a salute, perhaps," he said.
"Or a call to arms?" she suggested, and he made no answer. "It means—pursuit!"
Silent they rode on, but more rapidly. With pale face and composed mien she kept by his side; her resolute expression reassured him, while her glance said: "Do not fear for me." Gradually had they been descending from the higher slopes of the country of which the château-mount was the loftiest point and now were passing through the lower stretches of land.
Here, the highway ran above fields, inundated by recent rains, and marshes converted into shining lakes. Out of the water uprose a grove of trees, spectral-like; screaming wild-fowl skimmed the surface, or circled above. The pastoral peace of the meadows, garden of the wild flower and home of the song-bird, was replaced by a waste of desolation and wilderness. Long they dashed on through the loneliness of that land; a depressing flight—but more depressing than the abandoned and forlorn aspect of the scene was the consciousness that their steeds had become road-worn and were unable to respond. Long, long, they continued this pace, a strained period of suspense, and then the fool drew rein.
"Look, Jacqueline," he said. "The river!"
Before them, fed by the rivulets from the distant hills, the foaming current threatened to overflow its banks. Already the rising waters touched the flimsy wooden structure that spanned the torrent. Contemplatively he regarded it, and then placing his hand for a moment on hers, said encouragingly:
"Perhaps, after all, we are borrowing trouble?"
She shook her head. "If I could but think it," she answered. Something seemed to rise in her throat. "A moment I forgot, and—was not unhappy! But now I feel as though the end was closing about us."
He tightened his grasp. "You are worn with fatigue; fanciful!" he replied.
"The end!" she repeated, passionately. "Yes; the end!" And threw off his hand. "Look!"
He followed her eyes. "Waving plumes!" he cried. "And drawing nearer! Come, Jacqueline! let us ride on!"
"How?" she answered, in a lifeless tone. "The bridge will not hold."
For answer he turned his horse to it; proceeded slowly across. It wavered and bent; her wide-opened eyes followed him; once she lifted her hand to her breast, and then became conscious he stood on the opposite bank, calling her to follow. She started; a strange smile was on her lips, and touching her horse sharply, she obeyed.
"Is it to death he has called me?" she asked herself.
In her ears sounded the swash and eddying of the current; she closed her eyes to keep from falling, when she felt a hand on the bridle, and in a moment had reached the opposite shore. The jester made no motion to remount, but remained at her horse's head, closely surveying the road they had traveled.
"Must we go on?" she said, mechanically.
"Only one of them can cross at a time," he answered, without stirring. "It is better to meet them here."
"Oh," she spoke up, "if the waters would only rise a little more and carry away the bridge."
He glanced quickly around him, weighing the slender chance for success if he made that last desperate stand, and then, grasping a loose plank, began using it as a lever against one of the weakened supports of the bridge. Soon the beam gave way, and the structure, now held but at the middle and one side, had already begun to sag, when from around the curve of the highway appeared Louis of Hochfels, and a dozen of his followers.
The free baron rode to the brim of the torrent, regarded the flood and the bridge, and stopped. He was mounted on a black Spanish barb whose glistening sides were flecked with foam; a cloak of cloth of gold fell from his brawny shoulders; his heavy, red face looked out from beneath a sombrero, fringed with the same metal. A gleam of grim recollection shone from his bloodshot eyes as they rested on the fool.
"Oh, there you are!" he shouted, with savage satisfaction. "Out of the frying-pan into the fire! Or rather—for you escaped the fagots at Notre Dame—out of the fire into the frying-pan!"
Above the tumult of the torrent his stentorian tones were plainly heard. Without response, the jester inserted the plank between the structure and the middle support. The other, perceiving his purpose, uttered an execration that was drowned by the current, and irresolutely regarded the means of communication between the two shores, obviously undetermined about trusting his great bulk to that fragile intermedium. Here was a temporary check on which he had not calculated. But if he demurred about crossing himself, the free baron did not long display the same infirmity of purpose regarding his followers.
"Over with you!" he cried angrily to them. "The lightest first! Fifty pistoles to the first across!" And then, calling out to the fool: "In half an hour, you, my fine wit-cracker, shall be hanging from a branch. As for the maid, she is a witch, I am told—we will test her with drowning."
Tempted by their leader's offer, one of the troopers, a lank, muscular-looking fellow, at once drove the spurs into his horse. Back and forth moved the lever in the hands of the jester; the soldier was midway on the bridge, when it sank suddenly to one side. A moment it acted as a dam, then bridge, horse and rider were swept away with a crash and carried downward with the driving flood. Vainly the trooper sought to turn his steed toward the shore; the debris from the structure soon swept him from his saddle. Striking out strongly, he succeeded in catching a trailing branch from a tree on the bank, but the torrent gripped his body fiercely, and, after a desperate struggle, tore him away.
As his helpless follower disappeared, the free baron gave a brief command, and he and his troops posted rapidly down the bank. The young girl breathed a sigh of relief; her eyes were yet full of awe from the death struggle she had witnessed. Fascinated, her gaze had rested on the drowning wretch; the pale face, the look of terror; but now she was called to a realization of their own situation by the abrupt departure of the squad on the opposite shore.
"They have gone," she cried, in surprise, as the party vanished among the trees.
"But not far." The jester's glance was bent down the stream. "See, where the torrent broadens. They expect to find a fording place."
Once more they set forth; he knowing full well that the free baron and his men, accustomed to the mountain torrents, unbridled by the melting snows, would, in all likelihood, soon find a way to cross the freshet. His mind misgave him that he had loosened the bridge at all. Would it not have been better to force the conflict there, when he had the advantage of position? But right or wrong, he had made his choice and must abide by it.
To add to his discomfiture, his horse, which at first had lagged, now began to limp, and, as they proceeded, this lameness became more apparent. With a twinge of heart, he plied the spur more strongly, and the willing but broken creature responded as best it could. Again it hastened its pace, seeming in a measure to recover strength and endurance, then, without warning, lurched, fell to its knees and quickly rolled over on its side. Jacqueline glanced back; the animal lay motionless; the rider was vainly endeavoring to rise. Pale with apprehension she returned, and, dismounting, stood at the head of the prostrate animal. Determinedly the jester struggled, the perspiration standing on his brow in beads. At length, breathing hard, he rested his head on his elbow.
"Here am I caught to stay, Jacqueline!" he said. "The horse is dead. But you—you must still go on."
With clasped hands she stood looking down at him. She scarcely knew what he was saying; her mind seemed in a stupor; with apathetic eyes she gazed down the road. But the accident had happened in a little hollow, so that the outlook in either direction along the highway was restricted.
"My emperor is both chivalrous and noble," continued theplaisant, quickly. "Go to him. You must not wait here longer. I did not tell you, but I think the free baron will have no difficulty in crossing. You have no time to lose. Go; and—good-by!"
"But—he had a long way to ride—even if he could cross," she said slowly, passing her hand over her brow.
"Jacqueline!" he cried out, impatiently.
She made no motion to leave, and, reading in her face her determination, angered by his own helplessness, he strove violently to release himself, until wrenching his foot in his frantic efforts, he sank back with a groan. At that sound of pain, wrung from him in spite of his fortitude, all her seeming apathy vanished. With a low cry, she dropped on her knees in the road and swiftly took his head in her arms.
It was he, not the young girl, who spoke first. He forgot all peril—hers and his. He only knew her warm, young arms were about him; that her heart was throbbing wildly.
"Jacqueline!" he cried, passionately. "Jacqueline!" And threw an arm about her, drawing her closer, closer.
Did she hear him? She did not reply. Nor did she release him. She did not even look down. But he felt her bosom rising and falling faster than its wont.
"Jacqueline," he repeated, "are you listening?"
She stirred slightly; the pallor left her face. In her gaze shone a light difficult to divine—pity, tenderness, a warmer passion? Where had he seen it before? In the cell when he lay injured; in his waking dreams? It seemed the sudden dawn of the full beauty of her eyes; a half-remembered impression which now became real. Yet even as she looked down his face changed; his eager glance grew dark; he listened intently.
The sound of horses' hoofs beat upon the air.
"Jacqueline!—go!—there is yet time!"
Abruptly she arose. He held out his hand for a last quick pressure; a God-speed to this stanch maid-comrade of the motley.
"God keep you, mistress!"
Standing in the road, gazing up the hollow, she neither saw his hand nor caught his words of farewell. An expression of bewilderment had overspread her features; quickly she glanced in the opposite direction.
"See! see!" she exclaimed, excitedly.
But he was past response; overcome by pain, in a last desperate attempt to regain his feet, he had lost consciousness. As he fell back, above the hill in the direction she was looking, appeared the black plumes of a band of horsemen.
"No; they are not—"
Her glance rested on the jester, lying there motionless, and hastening to his side, she lifted his head and placed it in her lap. So the troopers of the Emperor Charles—a small squad of outriders—found her sitting in the road, her hair disordered about her, her face the whiter against that black shroud.
On an eminence commanding the surrounding country an unwonted spectacle that same day had presented itself to the astonished gaze of the workers in a neighboring vineyard. Gleaming with crimson and gold, a number of tents had appeared as by magic on the mount, the temporary encampment of a rich and numerous cavalcade. But it was not the splendent aspect of this unexpected bivouac itself so much as the colors and designs of the flags and banners floating above which aroused the wonderment of the tillers of the soil. Here gleamed no salamander, with its legend, "In fire am I nourished; in fire I die," but the less magniloquent and more dreaded coat of arms of the emperor, the royal rival and one-time jailer of the proud French monarch.
The sunlight, reflected from the golden tassels and ornamentation of the tents, threw a flaming menace over the valley, and the peasants in subdued tones talked of the sudden coming of the dreaded foeman.Mère de Dieu! what did it portend!Ventre Saint Gris! were they going to storm the fortresses of the king? Was an army following this formidable retinue of nobles, soldiers and servants?
Above, on the mount, as the sun climbed toward the meridian, was seated in one of the largest of the tents a man of resolute and stern mien who gazed reflectively toward the fertile plain outstretching in the distance. His grizzled hair told of the after-prime of life; he was simply, even plainly, dressed, although his garments were of fine material, and from his neck hung a heavy chain of gold. His doublet lacked the prolonged and grotesque peak, and was less puffed, slashed and banded than the coat worn by those gallants of the day who looked to Italy for the latest extravagances of fashion. His hat, lying carelessly on the table at his elbow, was devoid of aigrette, jewels or plume; a head-covering for the campaign rather than the court. Within reach of his hand stood a heavy golden goblet of massive German workmanship, the solid character of which contrasted with the drinking vessels after Cellini's patterns affected by Francis. This he raised to his lips, drank deeply, replaced the goblet on the table, and said as much to himself as to those around him:
"A fair land, this of our brother! Small wonder he likes to play the host, even to his enemies. We may conquer him on the ensanguined field, but he conquers us—or Henry of England!—on a field of cloth of gold!"
"But for your Majesty to put yourself in the king's power?" ventured a courtier, who wore a begemmed torsade and a cloak of Genoa velvet.
The monarch leaned back in his great chair and his face grew harsh. As he sat there musing, his virility and iron figure gave him rather the appearance of the soldier than the emperor. This impression his surroundings further emphasized, for the walls of the tent were covered, not with the gorgeous-colored Gobelins of the pleasure-loving French, but with severe and stately tapestries from his native Flanders, depicting in somber shades various scenes of martial triumph. When he raised his head he cast a look of ominous displeasure upon the last speaker.
"Had he not once the English king beneath his roof?" answered the monarch. "At Amboise, where we visited Francis some years ago, was there any restraint put upon us?"
A grim smile crossed his features at the recollection of the gorgeousfêtesin his honor on that other occasion. Perhaps, too, he thought of the excitements held out by those servitors of the king, the frail and fair ladies of the court, for he added:
"Saints et saintes! 'twas a palace of pleasure, not a dungeon, he prepared for us. But enough of this! It is time we rode on. Let the cavalcade, with the tents, follow behind."
"Think you, your Majesty, if the princess be not yet married to the bastard, she is like to espouse the true duke?" asked the courtier, as a soldier left the tent to carry out the orders of the emperor.
Charles arose abruptly. "Of a surety! He must have loved her greatly, else—"
The clattering of hoofs, drawing nearer, interrupted the emperor's ruminations, and, wheeling sharply, he gazed without. A band of horsemen appeared on the mount.
"The outriders!" he said in surprise. "Why have they returned?"
"They are bearing some one on a litter," answered the attendant noble, "and—cap de Dieu—there is a woman with them!"
As the troops approached, the emperor strode forward. Out in the sunlight his face appeared older, more careworn, but although it cost him an effort to walk, his step was unfaltering. A moment he surveyed the men with peremptory glance, and then, casting one look at their burden, uttered an exclamation. His surprise, however, was of short duration. At once his features resumed their customary rigor.
"What does this mean?" he asked, shortly, addressing the leader of the soldiers. "Is he badly hurt?"
"That I can not say, your Majesty," replied the man. "A horse fell upon his leg, which is badly bruised, and there may be other injuries."
"Where did you find him?" continued the emperor, still regarding the pale face of theplaisant.
"Not far from here, your Majesty. The woman was sitting in the road, holding his head."
Charles' glance swiftly sought the jestress and then returned.
"They were being pursued, for shortly after we came a squad of men appeared from the opposite direction. When they saw us they fled. The woman insisted upon being brought here, when she learned of your Majesty's presence."
"Take the injured man into the next tent and see he has every care. As for the woman, I will speak with her alone."
"Your Majesty's orders to break camp—" began the courtier.
"We have changed our mind and will remain here for the present." And the emperor, without further words, turned and reëntered his pavilion.
With his hands behind him, he stood thoughtfully leaning against a table; his countenance had become somber, morose. The twinges of pain from a disease which afterward caused him to abdicate the throne and relinquish all power and worldly vanities for a life of religious meditation began to make themselves felt. Love—ambition—what were they? The perishable flesh—was it the all-in-all? Those sudden pangs of the body seemed like over-forward confessors abruptly admonishing him.
The jester and the woman—Francis and the princess—what had they become to him now? Figures in an intangible, illusory dream. Deeply religious, repentant, perhaps, for past misdeeds at such a moment as this, the soldier-emperor stood before a silver crucifix.
"Credo in sanctum," he murmured, with contrite glance. "How repugnant is human glory! to conquer the earth; to barter what is immortal!Carnis resurrectionem—"
A shadow fell across the tapestry, and glancing from the blessed symbol, he saw before him, kneeling on the rug, the figure of a woman. For her it was an inauspicious interruption. With almost a frown, Charles, recalled from an absorbing period of oblation and self-examination, surveyed the young girl. The reflection of dark colors from the hangings and tapestries softened the pallor of her face; her hair hung about her in disorder; her figure, though meanly garbed, was replete with youth and grace. Silent she continued in the posture of a suppliant.
"Well?" said the monarch finally, in a harsh voice.
Slowly she lifted her head; her dark eyes rested on the ruler steadfastly, fearlessly. "Your Majesty commanded my presence," she answered.
"Who are you?" he asked coldly.
"I am called Jacqueline; my father was the Constable of Dubrois."
Incredulity replaced every other emotion on the emperor's features, and, approaching her, he gazed attentively into the countenance she so frankly uplifted. With calmness she bore that piercing scrutiny; his dark, troubled soul, looking out of his keen gray eyes, met an equally lofty spirit.
"The Constable of Dubrois! You, his daughter!" he repeated.
His thoughts swiftly pierced the shadows of the past; that umbrageous past, darkened with war and carnage; the memory of triumphs; the bitterness of defeats! And studying her eyes, her face, as in a vision he recalled the features, the bearing, of him who had held himself an equal to his old rival, Francis. A red spot rose to his cheek as he reviewed the martial, combative days; the game of arms he had played so often with Francis—and won! Not always by daring, or courage—rather by sagacity, clear-headedness, more potent than any other force!
But a pang of bodily suffering reminded him of the present and its ills, and the vainglory of brief exultation faded as quickly as it had assailed him; involuntarily his glance sought the sacred emblem of intercession. When he regarded her once more his face had resumed its severe, uncompromising aspect.
"The constable was a proud, haughty man," he said, brusquely. "Yea, over-proud, in fact. You know why he fled to me?"
"Yes, Sire," she answered, flushing resentfully.
"To persuade me to espouse his cause against the king. Many times have my good brother, Francis, and myself gone to war," he added, reflectively and not without a certain complacency, "but then were we engaged in troubles in the east; to keep the Mohammedans from overrunning our Christian land. How could I oblige the constable by fighting the heathen and the believers in the gospel in one breath? Your father—for I am ready to believe him such, by the evidence of your face, and, especially, your eyes—accused me of little faith. But I had either to desert him, or Europe. His cause was lost; 'twas the fortune of war; the fate of great families becomes subservient to that of nations."
He spoke as if rather presenting the case to himself than to her; as though he sought to analyze his own action through the medium of time and the trend of larger events. Attentively she watched him with deep, serious eyes, and, catching her almost accusing look and knowing how, perhaps, he shuffled with history, his brow grew darker; he was visibly annoyed at her—his own conscience—he knew not what!
"I did not complain, your Majesty," she said proudly.
Her answer surprised him. Again he observed her attire; the pallor of her face; the dark circles beneath her eyes. Grimly he marked these signs of poverty; those marks of the weariness and privations she had undergone.
"Was it not your intention to seek me? To beg an asylum, perhaps?" he went on, less sternly.
"Not to beg, your Majesty! To ask, yes! But now—not that!"
"Vrai Dieu!" muttered Charles. "There is the father over again! It is strange this maiden clothed almost in rags should claim such illustrious parentage," he continued to himself, as he walked restlessly to and fro. "It is more strange I ask no other proofs than herself—the evidence of my eyes! Where did you come from?" he added, aloud, pausing before her. "The court of Francis?"
"Yes, Sire."
"Why did you leave the king?"
"Why—because—" Her hands clenched. The gray eyes continued to probe her. "Because I hate him!"
The emperor's face relaxed; a gleam of humor shone in his glance. "Hate him whom so many of your sex love?" he replied.
Through her tresses he saw her face turn red; passionately she arose. "With your Majesty's permission, I will go."
"Go?" he said abruptly. "Where can you go? You are somewhat quick of temper, like—. Have I refused you aught? I could not serve your father," he continued, taking her hand, and, not ungently, detaining her, "but I may welcome his daughter—though necessity, the ruler of kings, made me helpless in his behalf!"
As in a flash her resentment faded. Half-paternally, half-severely, he surveyed her.
"Sit down here," he went on, indicating a low stool. "You are weary and need refreshment."
Silent she obeyed, and the emperor, touching a bell, gave a low command to the servitor who appeared. In a few moments meat, fruits and wine were set before her, and Charles, from his point of vantage—no throne of gold, but a chair lined with Cordovan leather, watched her partake. The pains had again left him; the monk gave way to the ruler; he thought of no more phrases of the Credo, but with impassive face listened to her story, or as much as she cared to relate. When she had finished, for some time he offered no comment.
"A strange tale," he said finally. "But what will our nobles do when ladies take mere fools for knight-errants?"
"He is no mere fool!" she spoke up, impulsively.
The emperor shot a quick look at her from beneath his lowering brows.
"I mean—he is brave—and has protected me many times," she explained in some confusion.
"And so you, knowing what you were, remained—with a poor jester—a clown—rather than leave him to his fate?" continued Charles, inexorably, recalling the words of the outriders.
Her face became paler, but she held her head more proudly; the spirit of the jestress sprang to her lips, "It is only kings, Sire, who fear to cling to a forlorn cause!"
His eyes grew dark and gloomy; morosely he bent his gaze upon her. No one had ever before dared to speak to him like that, for Charles had no love for jesters, and kept none in his court. Unsparing, iron-handed, he had gone his way. But, perhaps, in her very fearlessness he recognized a touch of his own inflexible nature. At any rate, his sternness soon gave way to an expression of melancholy.
"God alone knows the hearts of monarchs!" he said, somberly, and directed his glance toward the crucifix.
Moved by his unexpected leniency and the aspect of his cheerlessness, she immediately repented of her response. He looked so old, and melancholy, this great monarch. When he again turned to her his face and manner expressed no further cognizance of her reply.
"You need rest," he said, "and shall have a tent to yourself. Now go!" he continued, placing his hand for a moment, not unkindly, on her head. "I shall give orders for your entertainment. It will be rough hospitality, but—you are used to that. I am not sorry, child, you hate our brother Francis, if it has driven you to our court."
Although the daughter of the constable received every attention commensurate with the cheer of the camp, the day passed but slowly. With more or less interest she viewed the diversified group of soldiers, drawn by Charles from the various countries over which he ruled: the brawny troops from Flanders; the alert-looking guards, recruited from the mountains of Spain; the men of Friedwald, with muscles tough as the fibers of the fir in their native forests. Even the Orient—suggestive of many campaigns!—had been drawn upon, and the bright-garbed olive-skinned attendants, moving among the tents of purple or crimson, blended picturesquely with the more solid masses of color.
For the Flemish soldiery, who had brought the fool and herself to the camp, the young girl had a nod and a word, but it was the men of Friedwald who especially attracted her attention, and unconsciously she found herself picturing the land that had fostered this stalwart and rough soldiery. A rocky, rugged region, surely; with vast forests, unbroken brush! Yonder armorer, polishing a joint of steel, seemed like a survivor of that primeval epoch when the trees were roofs and the ground the universal bed. Once or twice she passed him, curiously noting his great beard and giant-like limbs. But he minded her not, and this, perhaps, gave her courage to pause.
"What sort of country is Friedwald?" she said, abruptly.
"Wild," he answered.
"Is the duke liked?" she went on.
"Yes."
"Do you know his—jester?"
"No."
For all the information he would volunteer, the man might have been Doctor Rabelais' model for laconicism, and a moment she stood there with a slight frown. Then she gazed at him meditatively; tap! tap! went the tiny hammer in the mighty hand, and, laughing softly, she turned. These men of Friedwald were not unpleasing in her eyes.
Twice had she approached the tent wherein lay the fool, only to learn that the emperor was with the duke'splaisant. "A slight relapse of fever," had said the Italian leech, as he blocked the entrance and stared at her with wicked, twinkling eyes. She need be under no apprehension, he had added; but to her quick fancy his glance said: "A maid wandering with a fool!"
Apprehension? No; it could not be that she felt but a new sense of loneliness; of that isolation which contact with strange faces emphasized. What had come over her? she asked herself. She who had been so self-sufficient; whose nature now seemed filled with sudden yearnings and restlessness, impatience—she knew not what. She who thought she had partaken so abundantly of life's cup abruptly discovered renewed sources for disquietude. With welling heart she watched the sun go down; the glory of the widely-radiating hues give way to the pall of night. Upon her young shoulders the mantle of darkness seemed to rest so heavily she bowed her head in her hands.
"A maid and a fool! Ah, foolish maid!" whispered the wanton breeze.
The pale light of the stars played upon her, and the dews fell, until involuntarily shivering with the cold, she arose. As she walked by the emperor's quarters she noticed a figure silhouetted on the canvas walls; to and fro the shadow moved, shapeless, grotesque, yet eloquent of life's vexation of spirit. Turning into her own tent, the jestress lighted the wick of a silver lamp; a faint aroma of perfume swept through the air. It seemed to soothe her—or was it but weariness?—and shortly she threw herself on the silken couch and sank to dreamless slumber.
When she awoke, the bright-hued dome of the tent was aglow in the morning sun; the reflected radiance bathed her face and form; her heaviness of heart had taken wings. The little lamp was still burning, but the fresh fragrance of dawn had replaced the subtile odor of the oriental essence. Upon the rug a single streak of sunshine was creeping toward her. In the brazier which had warmed her tent the glowing bark and cinnamon had turned to cold, white ash.
Through the girl's veins the blood coursed rapidly; a few moments she lay in the rosy effulgence, restfully conscious that danger had fled and that she was bulwarked by the emperor's favor, when a sudden thought broke upon this half-wakeful mood, and caused her to spring, all alert, from her couch. To dress, with her had never been a matter of great duration. The hair of the joculatrix naturally rippled into such waves as were the envy of the court ladies; her supple fingers adjusted garment after garment with swift precision, while her figure needed no device to lend grace to the investment.
Soon, therefore, had she left her tent, making her way through the awakening camp. In the royal kitchen the cook was bending over his fires, while an assistant mixed a beverage of barley-water, yolks of eggs and senna wine for Charles when he should become aroused. Those courtiers, already astir, cast many glances in the girl's direction, as she moved toward the tent of the fool.
But if these gallants were sedulous, she was correspondingly indifferent. Anxiety or loyalty—that stanchness of heart which braved even the ironical eyes of the black-robed master of medicine—drove her again to the ailing jester's tent, and, remembering how she had ridden into camp—and into the august emperor's favor—these fondlings of fortune looked significantly from one to the other.
"A jot less fever, solicitous maid," said the leech in answer to the inquiries of the jestress, and she endured the glance for the news, although the former sent her away with her face aflame.
"An the leech let her in, he'd soon have to let the patient out," spoke up a gallant. "Her eyes are a sovereign remedy, where bolus, pills and all vile potions might fail."
"If this be a sample of Francis' damsels, I care not how long we are in reaching the Low Countries," answered a second.
To this the first replied in kind, but soon had these gallants matters of more serious moment to divert them, for it began to be whispered about that Louis of Hochfels had determined to push forward. The unwonted activity in the camp ere long gave credence to the rumor; the troopers commenced looking to their weapons; squires hurried here and there, while near the tents stood the horses, saddled and bridled, undergoing the scrutiny of the grooms.
Some time, however, elapsed before the emperor himself appeared. Nothing in the bead-roll, or devotional offering of the morning, had he overlooked; the divers dishes that followed had been scrupulously partaken of, and then only—as a man not to be hurried from the altar or the table—had he emerged from his tent. His glance mechanically swept the camp, noting the bustle and stir, the absence of disorder, and finally rested on the girl. For a moment, from his look, it seemed he might have forgotten her, and she who had involuntarily turned to him so solicitously, on a sudden felt chilled, as confronted by a mask. His voice, when at length he spoke, was hard, dry, matter-of-fact, and it was Jacqueline whom he addressed.
"You slept well?"
"Yes, Sire," she answered.
"And have already been to the fool's tent, I doubt not."
The mask became half-quizzical, half-friendly, as her cheeks mantled beneath his regard. Was it but quiet avengement against a jestress whose tongue had been unsparing enough, even to him, the day before? Certes, here stood now only a rosy maid, robbed of her spirit; or afolle, struck witless, and Charles' face softened, but immediately grew stern, as his mind abruptly passed from wandering jestress and fleeing fool to matters of more moment.
Under vow to the Virgin, the emperor had announced he would not draw sword himself that day, but, seated beneath a canopy of velvet, overlooking the valley, he so far compromised with conscience as personally to direct the preparations for the conflict. On his sable throne, surrounded by funereal hangings, how white and furrowed, how harassed with many cares, he appeared in the glare of the morn to the young girl! Was this he who held nearly all Europe in his palm? who between martial commands talked of Holy Orders, the Apostolic See and the Seven Sacraments to his priestly confessor?
And from aloof she studied him, with new doubts and misgiving, her thoughts running fast; and anon bent her eyes to the hill on the other side of the valley. In her condition of mind, confused as before a crisis, it was a distinct relief when toward noon word was brought that the free baron was approaching. Soon, not far distant, thecortègeof Louis of Hochfels was seen; at the front, flashing helmets and breastplates; behind, a cavalcade of ladies on horseback and litters, above which floated many flags and banners.
Would he come on; would he turn back? Many opinions were rife.
"Oh," cried a page with golden hair, "there will be no battle after all."
And truly, confronted by the aspect of the emperor's camp, the marauder had at first hesitated; but if the dangers before him were great, those behind were greater. Accordingly, leaving the cavalcade of the princess, her maids and attendants, the free baron of Hochfels, surrounded by his own trusted troops, dashed forward arrogantly into the valley, bent upon sweeping aside even the opposition of Charles himself.
"Yonder's a daring knave, your Majesty," with some perturbation observed the prelate who stood near the emperor's chair.
"Certes, he tilts at fame, or death, with a bold lance," replied Charles. "Would that Robert of Friedwald were there to cry him quits."
While thus he spoke, as calm as though secluded in one of his monastery retreats, weighing the affairs of state, nearer and nearer drew the soldiers of the bastard of Pfalz-Urfeld; roughly calculating, a force numerically as strong as the emperor's own guard.
The young girl, her face now white and drawn, watched the approaching band. Would Charles never give the signal? Imperturbable sat the mounted troopers of the emperor, awaiting the word of command. At length, when her breath began to come fast and sharp, Charles raised his arm. In a solid, steady body, his men swept onward. The girl strove to look away, but could not.
Both bands, gaining in momentum, met with a crash. That nice symmetry of form and orderliness of movement was succeeded by a tangle of men and horses; the bristling array of lances had vanished, and swords and weapons for hand-to-hand warfare threw a play of light amid the jumble of troops and steeds, flags and banners. With sword red from carnage, Louis of Hochfels drew his men around him, hurling them against the firm front of Charles' veterans. It was the crucial moment; the turning point in a struggle that could not be prolonged, but would be rather sharp, short and decisive. If his men failed at the onset, all was lost; if they gained but a little ascendancy now, their mastery of the field became fairly assured. Great would be the reward for success; the fruits of victory—the emperor himself. And savagely the free baron cut down a stalwart trooper; his blade pierced the throat of another.
"Clear the way to Charles!" he cried, exultantly. "He is our guerdon."
So terrible that rush, the guard of Spain on the right and the troops of Flanders on the left began to give way; only the men of Friedwald stood, but with the breaking of the forces on each side it was inevitable they, too, must soon be overwhelmed. Involuntarily, as the quick eye of the emperor detected this sign of impending disaster, he half-started from his chair. His hand sought his side; in his eyes shone a steely light. The prelate quickly crossed himself and raised his head as if in prayer.
"The penance, Sire," he murmured, but his voice trembled.
Mechanically Charles replaced his blade. "Yea; better a kingdom lost," he muttered, "than a broken vow."
Yet, after so many battles won in the field and Diet; after titanic contests with kings in Christendom, and Solyman in the east, to fall, by the mockery of fate, into the grasp of a thieving mountain rifler—
"Ambition! power! we sow but the sand," whispered satiety.
"Vainglory is a sleeveless errand," murmured the spirit of the flagellant.
Yet he gazed half-fiercely at his priestly adviser, when suddenly his gloomy eye brightened; the inutility of ambition was forgotten; unconsciously he clasped the arm of the joculatrix, who had drawn near. His grip was like a gauntlet; even in her tense, strained mood she winced.
"The fight is not yet lost!" he exclaimed. As he spoke the figure of a knight, fully armed, who had made his way through the avenue of tents, was seen swiftly descending the hill. Upon his strong Arabian steed, the rider's appearance and bearing signaled him as a soldier apart from the rank and file of the guard. His coat-of-arms, that of the house of Friedwald, was richly emblazoned upon the housings of his courser. Whence had he come? The attendants and equerries had not seen him in the camp. Only the taciturn armorer of Friedwald looked complacently after him, stroking his great beard, as one well satisfied. As this late-comer approached the scene of strife the flanks of the guard were wavering yet more perilously.
"A miracle, Sire!" cried the prelate.
"But one that partakes more of earth than Heaven," retorted Charles, with ready irony.
"Who is he, Sire?" breathlessly asked the young girl. At her feet whimpered the blue-eyed page, holding to her skirt, all his courage gone.
But ere he could answer—if he had seen fit to do so—from below, out of the vortex, came the clamorous shouts:
"The duke! The duke!"
The master of the mountain pass heard also, and felt at that moment a sudden thrill of premonition. The guerdon; the quittance; could it be possible after all, the end was not far? He could not believe it, yet a paroxysm of fury seized him; his strength became redoubled; wherever his sword touched a trooper fell.
But like a wave, recovering from the recoil, the soldiers of Friedwald broke upon his doomed band with a force manifold augmented; broke and carried the flanks with it, for the assaulting parties to the right and left were dismayed by the strength unexpectedly hurled against the center. The bulky Flemish, the lithe Spaniard, the lofty trooper of Friedwald, overflowed the shattered line of the marauders.
"Duke Robert!" and "Friedwald!" shouted the Austrian band.
"Cowards! Would you give way?" cried the free baron, striking among them. "Fools! Better the sword than the rope. Come!"
But in his frenzied efforts to rally his men the master of Hochfels found himself face to face with the leader of the already victorious troops. At the sight of him the bastard paused; his breast rose and fell with his labored breathing; his sword was dyed red, also his arms, his clothes; from his forehead the blood ran down over his beard. His eyes rolled like those of an animal; he seemed something inhuman; an incarnation of baffled purpose.
"If it is reprisal you want, Sir Duke, you shall have it," he panted.
"Reprisal!" exclaimed Robert of Friedwald, scornfully. "The best you can offer is your life."
And with that they closed. Evading the strokes of his more bulky antagonist, the younger man's sword repeatedly sought the vulnerable part of the other's armor. The free baron's strength became exhausted; his blows rang harmlessly, or struck the empty air.
A sensation of pain admonished him of his own disability. About him his band had melted away; doggedly had they given up their lives beneath sword, mace and poniard. The ground was strewn with the slain; riderless horses were galloping up the road. The free baron breathed yet harder; before his eyes he seemed to see only blood.
Of what avail had been his efforts? He had won the princess, but how brief had been his triumphs! With a belief that was almost superstition, he had imagined his destiny lay thronewards. But the curse of his birth had been a ban to his efforts; the bitterness of defeat smote him. He knew he was falling; his nerveless hand loosened his blade.
"I am sped!" he cried; "sped!" and released his hold, while the tide of conflict appeared abruptly to sweep away.
As he struck the earth an ornament that he had worn about his neck became unfastened and dropped to the ground. But once he moved; to raise himself on his elbow.
"The hazard of the die!" he muttered, striving to see with eyes that were growing blind. A rush of blood interrupted him, he fell back, straightened out, and stirred no more.
Now had the din of strife ceased altogether, when descending the slope appeared a cavalcade, at the head of which rode a lady on a white palfrey, followed by several maids and guarded by an escort of soldiers who wore the king's own colors. A stricken procession it seemed as it drew near, the faces of the women white with fear; the gay attire and gorgeous trappings—a mockery on that ensanguined arena.
Proudly proceeded the lady on the white horse, although in her eyes shone a look of dread. It was an age when women were accustomed to scenes of bloodshed, inured to conflicts in the lists; yet she shuddered as her palfrey picked its way across that field. At the near side of the hollow her glance singled out a motionless figure among those lying where they had fallen, a thick-set man, whose face was upturned to the sky. One look into those glassy eyes, so unresponsive to her own, and she quickly dismounted and fell on her knees beside the recumbent form. She took one of the cold hands in hers, but dropped it with a scream.
"Dead!" she cried; "dead!"
The lady stared at that terribly repulsive face. For some moments she seemed dazed; sat there dully, the onlookers forbearing to disturb her. Then her gaze encountered that of him who had slain the free baron and she sprang to her feet. On her features an expression of bewilderment had been followed by one of recognition.
"The duke's fool!" she exclaimed wildly. "He is dead, and you have killed him! The fool has murdered his master."
"It is true he is dead," answered the other, leaning heavily on his sword and surveying the inanimate form, "but he was no master of mine."
"That, Madame la Princesse, we will also affirm," broke in an austere voice.
Behind them rode the emperor, a dark figure among those bright gowns and golden trappings, the saddle cloth and adornments of his steed somber as his own garments. As he spoke he waved back the cavalcade, and, in obedience to the gesture, the ladies, soldiers and attendants withdrew to a discreet distance. Bitterly the princess surveyed the monarch; overwrought, a torrent of reproaches sprang from her lips.
"Why has your Majesty made war on my lord? Why have you countenanced his enemies and harbored his murderers?" And then, drawing her figure to its full height, her tawny hair falling in a cloud about her shoulders: "Be sure, Sire, my kinsman, the king, will know how to avenge my wrongs."
"He can not, Madam," answered Charles coldly. "They are already avenged."
"Already avenged!" she exclaimed, with her gaze upon the prostrate figure.
"Yes, Madam. For he who hath injured you has paid the extreme penalty."
"He who was my husband has been foully murdered!" she retorted, vehemently. "What had the Duke of Friedwald done to bring upon himself your Majesty's displeasure?"
"Nothing," answered the emperor, more gently.
"Nothing! And yet he lies there—dead!"
"He who lies before you is not the duke, but Louis of Hochfels, the bastard of Pfalz-Urfeld."
"Ah," she cried, excitedly, "I see you have been listening to the false fool, his murderer."
An expression of annoyance appeared on the emperor's face. He liked not to be crossed at any time by any one.
"You have well called him the false fool, Madam," said Charles, curtly, "for he is no true fool."
"And yet he rode with your troops!"
"To redeem his honor, Madam."
"His honor!"
With a scornful face she approached nearer to the monarch.
"His honor! In God's name, what mean you?"
"That the false fool, Madam, is himself the Duke of Friedwald!"