IN THEIR CLUTCHES
It was the night of the grand _coup_ which was to ease Master Raphael
Llorient of all his troubles financial, and also to put an acknowledged
heretic within the clutches of these two faithful servants of the Holy
Office, Dom Ambrose Teruel and his second, Frey Tullio the Neapolitan.
The affair had been carried out with the utmost zeal, and though at
first success had seemed more than doubtful, the familiars of the Office
had pounced upon their victim walking calmly towards them down a little
hollow among the sand-dunes.
At La Masane, it appeared to them that an alarm had been given, and
that, as little Andres the ape expressed it, "the whole byre had broken
halter and run for it."
The familiars were hard on the track, however, and the way from La
Masane to the beach is no child's playground when the nights are dark as
the inside of a wolf. Serra, Calbet, and Andres Font were three sturdy
rascals, condemned to long terms of imprisonment, who had obtained
freedom from their penalties on condition of faithfully serving the Holy
Inquisition. They were all nearly, though vaguely, related to prominent
ecclesiastics, the warmth of whose family feelings had obtained this
favour for them.
They had, therefore, every reason for satisfying their masters. For
pardon frequently followed zeal, and the ex-culprit and ex-familiar was
permitted to return in the halo of a terrible sanctity to his native
village. There were not a few, however, whom the craft ended by
fascinating. And after in vain trying the cultivation of crops and the
pruning of vines, lo! they would be back again at the door of the Holy
Office, begging to be taken in, if it were only to be hewers of wood and
drawers of water for the _auto de fe_ and the water-torture.
Of the present three, Serra, a Murcian from these half-depopulated
villages where the Moors once dwelt, alone was of this type. A huge man
with a low forehead, a great shapeless face like a clenched fist, with
little twinkling pigs' eyes set deep under hairless brows, he did his
work for the love of it. He it was who saw to it that no harm befel the
prisoner on the long night-ride to Perpignan. It was a dainty capture,
well carried out. Since the wholesale emigration of the Jews of
Roussillon to Bayonne in the West, the _auto de fe_ of the East was
usually shamed for want of pretty young maids. These always attracted
the crowd more than anything, and Serra the Murcian bared his teeth at
the thought. In his way he admired Claire Agnew. From various
hiding-places he had watched her many days ere his superiors judged that
all was ready. Now he would do his best for her. She should have the
highest, the middle pile, which is honour. Also, Serra the Murcian would
see to it that her bonfire contained no sea-grass or juniper rootlets,
which blazed indeed, but only scorched; neither any wet, sea-borne wood
from wrecked ships, which smoked and sulked, but would not burn. No--he,
Serra, would do the thing for her in gentlemanly fashion as became a
hidalgo of Murcia. The pretty heretic should have clear dry birch, one
year old, with olive roots aged several hundreds, all mixed with
shavings and pine cones, and a good top-dressing of oil like a salad to
finish all. And then (the Murcian showed his teeth and gums in a vast
semi-African grin, like a trench slashed out of a melon), well--she
would have reason to be proud of herself.
The pillar of clear flame would rise above Claire's head ten--nay,
twenty feet, wrapping her about like a garment. She would have no long
time to suffer. He was a kind-hearted man, this Serra the Murcian--that
is, to those to whom he had taken a fancy, as was the case with Claire.
If any torture was commanded, either the Lesser or the Greater Question,
he would make it light. It would never do to spoil her beauty against
the Great Day! What, after all, did they know, these two wise men in
black who only sat on their chairs and watched? It was the familiars who
made or marred in the House of Pain--indeed, Serra himself, for he could
destroy the others with a word. They had accepted bribes from
relatives--he never.
They mounted Claire on the notary's white mule, the sometime gift of the
Bishop of Elne. Ah, Serra chuckled, Don Jordy would ride it no more. It
would be his--Serra's. He would sell the beast and send the money to his
old mother who lived in a disused oven cut out of the rocks near the
Castle of the Moors, three leagues or so from Murcia city. She was an
affectionate old lady--he the best of sons. It was a shame they should
have miscalled her for a witch, when all she ever did was to provide
those who desired a blank in their families, or in those of their
neighbours, with a certain fine white powder.
Serra himself had been observed stirring a little in some soup at the
mansion where he was employed as cook. So, only for that, they had sent
him to work as a slave in the mines. But a certain powerful friend of
his mother's, who lived in the lonely abbey out on the plain, near the
great water-wheel (Serra remembered the dashing of the water in his
babyhood before he could remember anything else), got him this good
place with Dom Teruel, who had been his comrade of the seminary. And so
now his mother was safe--aye, if she sold her fine white meal openly
like so much salt. For who in all Murcia would touch the mother of a
First Familiar of the Holy Office. They reverenced her more--much
more--than the village priest who held the keys of heaven and hell--for,
after all, these were far away things.
But the Holy Office--ah, that was another matter. None spake of that
either above or below their breaths, from one end of Spain to the other.
So Serra the Murcian communed with himself, and with only an occasional
tug at the ropes that bound his captive to the white mule of Don Jordy,
he continued his way, rejoiced in heart.
But the other two, ordinary criminals with but little influence,
contented themselves with hoping for the freedom of the broad champaign,
the arid treeless plains of old Castile, the far-running sweeps of
golden corn, the crowded _ventas_ with their gay Bohemian company, the
shouted songs, and above all, the cool gurgle of wine running down
thirsty, dust-caked throats--ah! it would be good. And it might come
soon, if only they served the Holy Office well!
Both of them hated and despised Serra, because of his place, his zeal,
and especially because of his favour with the Surintendant.
The senior of the two underlings, Felieu Calbet, from the Llogrebrat
(Espluga the name of the town, where they are always fighting and every
one lives on the charity of the fathers of Poblet), was ill at ease, and
said as much to Andres Font, a little lithe creature with a monkey's
hands and temper, treacherous and vile, as a snake that writhes and
bites in the dust.
These two were trudging behind, their long Albacete knives in their
hands, ready for any attempt to escape. But the tall young maid sat
steady on the broad back of Don Jordy's white mule. She said no word.
She uttered no plaint.
Said Felieu Calbet of Espluga, senior familiar, to little wizened
Andres, third of the band, "Our brave Serra is content. Hear him! He is
humming his Moorish charms--the accursed wizard that he is! But for me,
I am not so sure that all goes well. They let that lass go somewhat too
easily--eh, Andres?"
And the little ape-faced man, first sliding his dagger into its sheath
as they emerged upon an open rocky bit of road with a few tall
stone-pines all leaning back from the sea-winds, answered after his
fashion, biting his words maliciously as he uttered them.
"Yea, belike," he muttered; "indeed, it was a strange thing that within
five hundred yards of the sea, where they had their boat anchored ready,
they should not turn and fight for the prisoner. How many were there of
them, think you, Felieu?"
"Four I saw--and there might have been another. One cowered in the hood
of a cloak, as if he feared that his face would be seen----"
"That makes five, and we but three! The thing smells of an ambush. Well,
all we have to do is to be ready, and, if need be, fight like the Demon
of the South himself. It is our prisoner or the stake for you and me, my
lad!"
The little, ape-faced, bat-eared Andres, who had never told any what he
had been sent there for, was arguing the matter out by himself.
"There is something behind this," he said; "they have a card somewhere
we have not seen the front of."
They marched a while, the silence only broken by the fall of the mule's
feet on the stones.
"I have it," cried Andres, suddenly elevating his thin voice above a
whisper. It was only a squeak at best, but it aroused the First Familiar
from his dreams of honour at the mule's bridle.
"Silence there, you Andres," he commanded, "or by Saint Vincent I will
wring your neck!"
"Wring my neck! He dares not," snarled the little wrinkled man, with an
evil grin, in the darkness--"he dares not, big as he is, and he knows
it. He would find a dozen inches of steel ensconced between his ribs. If
I am no bigger than an ox-goad, I am burnt at the end, and can drive
home a sharp point with any man."
"Do not mind the hog," said Felieu the Esplugan. "What was it you
thought of?"
"That Don Raphael Llorient was out with a band of his lads from the
Castle of Collioure. Doubtless he headed them off from the boat, and
they had to save themselves as best they might. So they scattered among
the sand-hills!"
"Hum, perhaps--we shall see," said Felieu the Esplugan. "At any rate,
keep your eyes open and your knife ready to the five-finger grip. We
must kill, rather than let her go. You know the rule."
Indeed, they all knew the rule. No relaxation of the Arm Spiritual till
the culprit, arrayed in the flame-coloured robe of condemnation, was
ready for the final relaxation to the Arm Secular.
All the same, there was no slightest attempt at rescue, and in the early
hours of the morning the procession defiled into the city gates of
Perpignan, which opened freely at all hours to the familiars of the Holy
Office--the guard discreetly keeping their eyes on the ground. And so
the four, in the same order as at first, turned sharply into the Street
of the Money.
Serra, the huge, fist-faced Murcian, with the blood of Africa in him,
carefully undid the bonds, and hoped, with a Spaniard's innate
politeness, that they had not too greatly incommoded his guest. But the
"guest" answered not a word.
"Sulky, eh?" muttered the Murcian, equally ready to take offence. "Very
well, then, so much the worse!"
And he resolved to save the expense of the oil for Claire's funeral
pyre. He had meant to go out of his way to do the thing in style. But
with such a haughty dame--and she a Huguenot, one of the Accursed, no
more a Christian than any Jew--why should she give herself airs? The
thing was intolerable!
In this, Serra the Murcian, First Familiar of the Holy Inquisition,
followed the Golden Rule. He did literally as he would be done by. If it
had been his fate (and with a reliable witch for a mother it was no
far-away conjecture)--if it had been his own fortune to die at the
stake, he would have been grateful for the highest seat, the dryest
wood, the tallest pillar of flame, the happiest despatch with all modern
improvements. He resented it, therefore, when Claire Agnew showed
herself ungrateful for the like.
Well, he had done his duty. The worse for her. Like Pilate, he washed
his hands.
* * * * *
But such emotions as these he soon forgot. He had reason.
For above, in the accustomed bare room, with only the crucifix upon
whitewashed walls, the same three men were waiting anxiously for the
arrival of the prisoner.
The little band of familiars, having handed over the white mule to a
trusty subordinate, came up the stairs, and after giving the customary
knock, and being answered in the deep voice of Dom Teruel, they stood
blinking in the glare of the lights, their prisoner in the midst.
There was silence in the room--a great fateful silence. Then the soft
voice of Mariana the Jesuit broke the pause.
"And who, good Serra, may this be that you have brought us?"
"Why," said Serra, greatly astonished, "who but the lady I have been
watching all these weeks, the Genevan heretic, the Senorita from the
house of La Masane above Collioure. We overtook her in flight, and
captured her among the sand-dunes on the very edge of the sea!"
"Ah, the Senorita?" purred the Jesuit; "then is the Senorita fitted with
a nascent but very tolerable pair of moustacios!"
Serra stared a moment, tore off the cloak with its heavy hood, clutched
at the lighter summer mantilla of dark lace and silk. It ripped and tore
vertically, and lo! as a butterfly issues from the chrysalis, forth
stepped the Abbe John, clad in pale blue velvet from head to knee, as
for a court reception.
He bowed gracefully to the company, twisted his moustache, folded his
arms, and waited.