Chivalry by James Branch Cabell
But it was as though he had not spoken. "Friend, it was for this Ihave outlived these garish, fevered years, it was this which made meglad when I was a child and laughed without knowing why. That I mightto-day give up this so-great power for love of you, my all-incapableand soiled Antoine, was, as I now know, the end to which the EternalFather created me. For, look you," she pleaded, "to surrender absolutedominion over half Europe is a sacrifice. Assure me that it is asacrifice, Antoine! O glorious fool, delude me into the belief that Ideny myself in choosing you! Nay, I know it is as nothing beside whatyou have given up for me, but it is all I have--it is all I have,Antoine!" she wailed in pitiful distress.
He drew a deep and big-lunged breath that seemed to inform his beingwith an indomitable vigor, and doubt and sorrow went quite away fromhim. "Love leads us," he said, "and through the sunlight of the worldhe leads us, and through the filth of it Love leads us, but always inthe end, if we but follow without swerving, he leads upward. Yet, OGod upon the Cross! Thou that in the article of death didst pardonDysmas! as what maimed warriors of life, as what bemired travellers inmuddied byways, must we presently come to Thee!"
"But hand in hand," she answered; "and He will comprehend."
THE END OF THE NINTH NOVEL
X
The Story of the Fox-Brush
"_Dame serez de mon cueur, sans debat, Entierement, jusques mort me consume. Laurier souef qui pour mon droit combat, Olivier franc, m'ostant toute amertume._"
THE TENTH NOVEL.--KATHARINE OF VALOIS IS WON BY A HUNTSMAN, AND LOVES HIM GREATLY; THEN FINDS HIM, TO HER HORROR, AN IMPOSTOR; AND FOR A SUFFICIENT REASON CONSENTS TO MARRY QUITE ANOTHER PERSON, AND NOT ALL UNWILLINGLY.
The Story of the Fox-Brush
In the year of grace 1417, about Martinmas (thus Nicolas begins), QueenIsabeau fled with her daughter the Lady Katharine to Chartres. Therethe Queen was met by the Duke of Burgundy, and these two laid theirheads together to such good effect that presently they got back intoParis, and in its public places massacred some three thousandArmagnacs. This, however, is a matter which touches history; the rootof our concernment is that when the Queen and the Duke rode off toattend to this butcher's business, the Lady Katharine was left behindin the Convent of Saint Scholastica, which then stood upon theoutskirts of Chartres, in the bend of the Eure just south of that city.She dwelt a year in this well-ordered place.
There one finds her upon the day of the decollation of Saint John theBaptist, the fine August morning that starts the tale. Katharine theFair, men called her, with some show of reason. She was very tall, andslim as a rush. Her eyes were large and black, having an extremelustre, like the gleam of undried ink--a lustre at odd times uncanny.Her abundant hair, too, was black, and to-day doubly sombre by contrastwith the gold netting which confined it. Her mouth was scarlet, allcurves, and her complexion famous for its brilliancy; only a precisianwould have objected that she possessed the Valois nose, long and thinand somewhat unduly overhanging the mouth.
To-day as she came through the orchard, crimson-garbed, she paused withlifted eyebrows. Beyond the orchard wall there was a hodgepodge ofnoises, among which a nice ear might distinguish the clatter of hoofs,a yelping and scurrying, and a contention of soft bodies, and above alla man's voice commanding the turmoil. She was seventeen, so sheclimbed into the crotch of an apple-tree and peered over the wall.
He was in rusty brown and not unshabby; but her regard swept over thisto his face, and there noted how his eyes were blue winter stars underthe tumbled yellow hair, and the flash of his big teeth as he sworebetween them. He held a dead fox by the brush, which he was cuttingoff; two hounds, lank and wolfish, were scaling his huge body infrantic attempts to get at the carrion. A horse grazed close at hand.
So for a heart-beat she saw him. Then he flung the tailless body tothe hounds, and in the act spied two black eyes peeping through theapple-leaves. He laughed, all mirth to the heels of him."Mademoiselle, I fear we have disturbed your devotions. But I had notheard that it was a Benedictine custom to rehearse aves in tree-tops."Then, as she leaned forward, both elbows resting more comfortably uponthe wall, and thereby disclosing her slim body among the foliage like acrimson flower green-calyxed: "You are not a nun--Blood of God! you arethe Princess Katharine!"
"SO FOR A HEARTBEAT SHE SAW HIM" _Painting by HowardPyle_]
The nuns, her present guardians, would have declared the ensuing actionhorrific, for Katharine smiled frankly at him and demanded how he couldbe certain of this.
He answered slowly: "I have seen your portrait. Hah, your portrait!"he jeered, head flung back and big teeth glinting in the sunlight."There is a painter who merits crucifixion."
She considered this indicative of a cruel disposition, but also of afine taste in the liberal arts. Aloud she stated:
"You are not a Frenchman, messire. I do not understand how you canhave seen my portrait."
The man stood for a moment twiddling the fox-brush. "I am a harper, myPrincess. I have visited the courts of many kings, though never thatof France. I perceive I have been woefully unwise."
This trenched upon insolence--the look of his eyes, indeed, carried itwell past the frontier--but she found the statement interesting.Straightway she touched the kernel of those fear-blurred legendswhispered about her cradle and now clamant.
"You have, then, seen the King of England?"
"Yes, Highness."
"Is it true that he is an ogre--like Agrapard and Angoulaffre of theBroken Teeth?"
His gaze widened. "I have heard a deal of scandal concerning the man.But never that."
Katharine settled back, luxuriously, in the crotch of the apple-tree."Tell me about him."
Composedly he sat down upon the grass and began to acquaint her withhis knowledge and opinions concerning Henry, the fifth of that name toreign in England. Katharine punctuated his discourse with eagerquestionings, which are not absolutely to our purpose. In the mainthis harper thought the man now buffeting France a just king, and, thecrown laid aside, he had heard Sire Henry to be sufficiently jovial andeven prankish. The harper educed anecdotes. He considered that theKing would manifestly take Rouen, which the insatiable man was nowbesieging. Was the King in treaty for the hand of the Infanta ofAragon? Yes, he undoubtedly was.
Katharine sighed her pity for this ill-starred woman. "And now tell meabout yourself."
He was, it appeared, Alain Maquedonnieux, a harper by vocation, and bybirth a native of Ireland. Beyond the fact that it was a savagekingdom adjoining Cataia, Katharine knew nothing of Ireland. Theharper assured her of anterior misinformation, since the kings ofEngland claimed Ireland as an appanage, though the Irish themselveswere of two minds as to the justice of these pretensions; all in all,he considered that Ireland belonged to Saint Patrick, and that the holyman had never accredited a vicar.
"Doubtless, by the advice of God," Alain said: "for I have read inMaster Roger de Wendover's Chronicles of how at the dread day ofjudgment all the Irish are to muster before the high and pious Patrick,as their liege lord and father in the spirit, and by him be conductedinto the presence of God; and of how, by virtue of Saint Patrick'srequest, all the Irish will die seven years to an hour before thesecond coming of Christ, in order to give the blessed saint sufficienttime to marshal his company, which is considerable." Katharineadmitted the convenience of this arrangement, as well as the neglect ofher education. Alain gazed up at her for a long while, as inreflection, and presently said: "Doubtless the Lady Heleine of Argosalso was thus starry-eyed and found in books less diverting readingthan in the faces of men." It flooded Katharine's cheeks with alivelier hue, but did not vex her irretrievably; yet, had she chosen toread this man's face, the meaning was plain enough.
I give you the gist of their talk, and that in all conscience istrivial. But it was a day when one entered love's wardship with asplurge, not in more modern fashion venturing forward bit by bit, asthough love were so much cold water. So they talked for a lo
Alain rose, approaching the wall. "To-morrow I ride for Milan to takeservice with Duke Filippo. I had broken my journey these three dayspast at Chateauneuf yonder, where this fox has been harrying my host'schickens. To-day I went out to slay him, and he led me, his murderer,to the fairest lady earth may boast. Do you not think this fox was atrue Christian, my Princess?"
Katharine said: "I lament his destruction. Farewell, Messire Alain!And since chance brought you hither--"
"Destiny brought me hither," Alain affirmed, a mastering hunger in hiseyes. "Destiny has been kind; I shall make a prayer to her that shecontinue so." But when Katharine demanded what this prayer would be,Alain shook his tawny head. "Presently you shall know, Highness, butnot now. I return to Chateauneuf on certain necessary businesses;to-morrow I set out at cockcrow for Milan and the Visconti's livery.Farewell!" He mounted and rode away in the golden August sunlight, thehounds frisking about him. The fox-brush was fastened in his hat.Thus Tristran de Leonois may have ridden a-hawking in drowned Cornwall,thus statelily and composedly, Katharine thought, gazing after him.She went to her apartments, singing,
"_El tems amoreus plein de joie, El tems ou tote riens s'esgaie,--_"
and burst into a sudden passion of tears. There were hosts ofwomen-children born every day, she reflected, who were not princessesand therefore compelled to marry ogres; and some of them werebeautiful. And minstrels made such an ado over beauty.
Dawn found her in the orchard. She was to remember that it was acloudy morning, and that mist-tatters trailed from the more distanttrees. In the slaty twilight the garden's verdure was lustreless,grass and foliage uniformly sombre save where dewdrops showed likeberyls. Nowhere in the orchard was there absolute shadow, nowhere avista unblurred; but in the east, half-way between horizon and zenith,two belts of coppery light flared against the gray sky like embersswaddled by their ashes. The birds were waking; there were occasionalscurryings in tree-tops and outbursts of peevish twittering to attestas much; and presently came a singing, less meritorious than that ofmany a bird perhaps, but far more grateful to the girl who heard it,heart in mouth. A lute accompanied the song demurely.
Sang Alain:
"_O Madam Destiny, omnipotent, Be not too obdurate the while we pray That this the fleet, sweet time of youth be spent In laughter as befits a holiday, From which the evening summons us away, From which to-morrow wakens us to strife And toil and grief and wisdom--and to-day Grudge us not life!_
"_O Madam Destiny, omnipotent, Why need our elders trouble us at play? We know that very soon we shall repent The idle follies of our holiday, And being old, shall be as wise as they, But now we are not wise, and lute and fife Seem sweeter far than wisdom--so to-day Grudge us not life!_
"_O Madam Destiny, omnipotent, You have given us youth--and must we cast away The cup undrained and our one coin unspent Because our elders' beards and hearts are gray? They have forgotten that if we delay Death claps us on the shoulder, and with knife Or cord or fever mocks the prayer we pray-- 'Grudge us not life!'_
"_Madam, recall that in the sun we play But for an hour, then have the worm for wife, The tomb for habitation--and to-day Grudge us not life!_"
Candor in these matters is best. Katharine scrambled into the crotchof the apple-tree. The dew pattered sharply about her, but thePrincess was not in a mood to appraise discomfort.
"You came!" this harper said, transfigured; and then again, "You came!"
She breathed, "Yes."
So for a long time they stood looking at each other. She foundadoration in his eyes and quailed before it; and in the man's mind nota grimy and mean incident of the past but marshalled to leer at hisunworthiness: yet in that primitive garden the first man and woman,meeting, knew no sweeter terror.
It was by the minstrel a familiar earth and the grating speech of earthwere earlier regained. "The affair is of the suddenest," Alainobserved, and he now swung the lute behind him. He indicated nointention of touching her, though he might easily have done so as hesat there exalted by the height of his horse. "A meteor arrives withmore prelude. But Love is an arbitrary lord; desiring my heart, he hasseized it, and accordingly I would now brave hell to come to you, andfinding you there, esteem hell a pleasure-garden. I have already mademy prayer to Destiny that she concede me love, and now of God, ourFather and Master, I entreat quick death if I am not to win you. For,God willing, I shall come to you again, though in doing so it werenecessary that I split the world like a rotten orange."
"Madness! Oh, brave, sweet madness!" Katharine said. "I am a king'sdaughter, and you a minstrel."
"Is it madness? Why, then, I think all sensible men are to becommiserated. And indeed I spy in all this some design. Across halfthe earth I came to you, led by a fox. Heh, God's face!" Alain swore;"the foxes Samson, that old sinewy captain, loosed among the corn ofheathenry kindled no disputation such as this fox has set afoot. Thatwas an affair of standing corn and olives spoilt, a bushel or so ofdisaster; now poised kingdoms topple on the brink of ruin. There willbe martial argument shortly if you bid me come again."
"I bid you come," said Katharine; and after they had stared at eachother for a long while, he rode away in silence. It was through adank, tear-flawed world that she stumbled conventward, while out of theeast the sun came bathed in mists, a watery sun no brighter than asilver coin.
And for a month the world seemed no less dreary, but about Michaelmasthe Queen-Regent sent for her. At the Hotel de Saint-Pol matters weremuch the same. Her mother Katharine found in foul-mouthed rage overthe failure of a third attempt to poison the Dauphin of Vienne, asIsabeau had previously poisoned her two elder sons; I might here traceout a curious similitude between the Valois and that dragon-spawnedrace which Jason very anciently slew at Colchis, since the world wasnever at peace so long as any two of them existed: but King Charlesgreeted his daughter with ampler deference, esteeming her PresbyterJohn's wife, the tyrant of Ethiopia. However, ingenuity had justsuggested card-playing for his amusement, and he paid little attentionnowadays to any one save his opponent.
So the French King chirped his senile jests over the card-table, whilethe King of England was besieging the French city of Rouen sedulouslyand without mercy. In late autumn an armament from Ireland joinedHenry's forces. The Irish fought naked, it was said, with long knives.Katharine heard discreditable tales of these Irish, and reflected howgross are the exaggerations of rumor.
In the year of grace 1419, in January, the burgesses of Rouen, havingconsumed their horses, and finding frogs and rats unpalatable, yieldedthe town. It was the Queen-Regent who brought the news to Katharine.
"God is asleep," the Queen said; "and while He nods, the Butcher ofAgincourt has stolen our good city of Rouen." She sat down andbreathed heavily. "Never was poor woman so pestered as I! Thepuddings to-day were quite uneatable, and on Sunday the Englishmanentered Rouen in great splendor, attended by his chief nobles; but theButcher rode alone, and before him went a page carrying a fox-brush onthe point of his lance. I put it to you, is that the contrivance of asane man? Euh! euh!" Dame Isabeau squealed on a sudden; "you arebruising me."
Katharine had gripped her by the shoulder. "The King of England--atall, fair man? with big teeth? a tiny wen upon his neck--here--andwith his left cheek scarred? with blue eyes, very bright, bright astapers?" She poured out her questions in a torrent, and awaited theanswer, seeming not to breathe at all.
"I believe so," the Queen said.
"O God!" said Katharine.
"Ay, our only hope now. And may God show him no more mercy than he hasshown us!" the good lady desired, with fervor. "The hog, having wonour Normandy, i
The Princess remained quite still, as Dame Isabeau had left her; youmay see a hare crouch so at sight of the hounds. Finally the girlspoke aloud. "Until last August!" Katharine said. "Until last August!_Poised kingdoms topple on the brink of ruin, now that you bid me cometo you again_. And I bade him come!" Presently she went into heroratory and began to pray.
In the midst of her invocation she wailed: "Fool, fool! How could Ihave thought him less than a king!"
You are to imagine her breast thus adrum with remorse and hatred ofherself, what time town by town fell before the invader likecard-houses. Every rumor of defeat--and they were many--was herarraignment; impotently she cowered at God's knees, knowing herself amurderess, whose infamy was still afoot, outpacing her prayers, whosevictims were battalions. Tarpeia and Pisidice and Rahab were hersisters; she hungered in her abasement for Judith's nobler guilt.
In May he came to her. A truce was patched up and French and Englishmet amicably in a great plain near Meulan. A square space was stakedout and on three sides boarded in, the fourth side being the riverSeine. This enclosure the Queen-Regent, Jehan of Burgundy, andKatharine entered from the French side. Simultaneously the EnglishKing appeared, accompanied by his brothers the Dukes of Clarence andGloucester, and followed by the Earl of Warwick. Katharine raised hereyes with I know not what lingering hope; it was he, a young Zeus now,triumphant and uneager. In his helmet in place of a plume he wore afox-brush spangled with jewels.