THIBAUT CANTELEU
“WHO would risk never, risks ever,” said the Princess Audiart, and
moving her rook, checked the marshal’s king.
Her cousin Guida, a blonde of much beauty, sitting watching the game,
made a sound of demurral. The marshal’s hand hovered over a piece.
“Do not play courtly, Lord Stephen,” said the princess. “Play fairly!”
Whereupon Stephen pushed forward a different piece and, releasing his
own king, put hers in jeopardy.
“Now what will you do, Audiart?” cried Guida. “You were too daring!”
“That is as may be,” answered the princess, and studied the board.
In the great fireplace of the hall beechwood blazed and helped the
many candles to give light. It was Lenten tide and cold enough to make
the huge fire a need and a pleasure. In the summer the floor had been
strewn with buds and leaves, but now there lay upon it eastern cloths
with bear-skins brought from the North. There were seats of various
kinds,—settles or benches, divan-like arrangements of cushions.
Knights and ladies occupied these, or stood, or moved about at will. So
spacious was the hall that these and other folk of the court—pages,
jongleurs, a jester with cap-and-bells, dogs, a parrot on a swinging
perch, two chaplains in a corner, various clerkly and scholarly persons
such as never lacked in Gaucelm’s court, two or three magnificently
dressed people in the train of a Venetian, half merchant, half noble,
and rich as a soldan, whom Gaucelm at the moment entertained—gave
no feeling of a throng. The raised or princely part of the hall, in
itself a goodly space, had quiet enough for rational converse, even for
sitting withdrawn into one’s self, studying with eyes upon the fire
matters beyond the beechwood flame.
Gaucelm the Fortunate, seated in his great, richly carved chair, talked
with the Venetian. Some paces away, but yet upon the dais, Alazais held
court. Between, the Princess Audiart played chess with Stephen the
Marshal. The castle and town and princedom of Roche-de-Frêne and all
that they held were seven years and some months older than upon that
autumn day when the squire Garin had knelt in the cathedral, and ridden
through the forest, and fought for a shepherdess.
The years had not made Alazais less beauteous. She sat in a low chair,
robed in buttercup yellow richly embroidered and edged with fur. She
held a silver ball pierced and filled with Arabian perfumes. The
Venetian had given it to her, and now she raised it to her nostrils,
and now she played with it with an indolent, slow, graceful movement of
her white hands. About her were knights and ladies, and in front, upon
a great silken cushion placed upon the floor, sat a slender, brilliant
girl with a voice of beauty and flexibility and a genius for poetic
narration. The court took toll of such a talent, was taking toll now.
The damosel, in a low and thrilling voice and with appropriate gesture,
told a lay of Arthur’s knights. Those around listened; firelight and
candle-light made play; at the lower end of the hall a jongleur, trying
his viol, came in at the pauses with this or that sweet strain.
At the other end of the broad, raised space Prince Gaucelm and the
Venetian left talk of Venice trade, of Cyprus and Genoa, and came to
status and event this side the Alps.
“Duke Richard of Aquitaine plays the rebel to his father the King
of England and quarrels with his cousin the King of France and wars
against his neighbour the Count of Toulouse. Count Savaric of Montmaure
and his son Count Jaufre—”
The Princess Audiart won the game of chess, won fairly. “You couch a
good lance and build a good house, Lord Stephen,” she said. “Yesterday,
it was I who was vanquished!”
Guida had moved away, joining the group about the girl on the silk
cushion. Stephen the Marshal took one of the ivory chessmen in his hand
and turned it from side to side. “Montmaure!” he said. “Montmaure grows
more puffed with pride than mortal man should be!”
The princess nodded. “Yes. My lord count sees himself as the great fish
for whom the ocean was built.”
The marshal put down the chess-piece and took up another. “Have you
ever seen Jaufre de Montmaure?”
“No.”
“I saw him at Périgueux. He is tall and red-gold like his father, but
darker in hue. He has a hawk nose, and there is a strange dagger-scar
across his cheek.—What is it, my Lady Audiart?”
The princess was sitting with parted lips and with eyes that
looked far away. She shivered a little, shrugging her shoulders.
“Nothing! A fancy. I remembered something. But a-many men have dagger
scars.—Jaufre de Montmaure! No, I think that I never saw him. Nor do I
wish to see him. Let him stay with Aquitaine and be his favourite!”
“I know not how long that will last. Now they are ruthless and reckless
together, and they say that any day you can see Richard’s arm around
his neck. But Duke Richard,” said the marshal, “is much the nobler man.”
The princess laughed. “You give faint praise! Jesu! If what they say of
Count Jaufre be true—”
There fell a silence. Stephen the Marshal turned and turned the
chess-piece. “The prince will send me presently with representations to
King Philip at Paris.”
“I know. It seems wise to do that.”
“I will do my best,” said Stephen the Marshal; and sat silent again.
Then, “I will find at Paris festivals and tourneys, no doubt, and
for Roche-de-Frêne’s honour and my own, I must play my part in those
matters also.” He put down the chess-piece, and brought his hands
together. “Queens and princesses may accept, in courtly wise, heart
and _devoir_ of true knights! My Lady Audiart! I plead again for some
favour of yours that I may wear. For, as God lives, I will wear no
other lady’s!”
The Princess Audiart looked at him kindly, a little mockingly, a little
mournfully. “Stephen—Stephen! will you be a better or a braver man, or
a fitter envoy to King Philip, with my glove in your helmet? No, you
will not!”
“I should be a happier man,” said Stephen the Marshal.
“Then almost I wish that I might give it to you! But I cannot—I
cannot!” said the princess. “I love earth, fire, air and water, the
stars in heaven, the people of the earth, and the thoughts in the mind,
but I love no man after the fashion that men desire!—Turn elsewhere,
Lord Stephen!”
But Stephen the Marshal shook an obstinate head. “Saint Mark, my
witness, I shall wear no other’s favour!”
Prince Gaucelm rose, the Venetian with him, and crossed to Alazais’s
side. The girl of the silken cushion had ended her story. The jongleurs
distant in the hall began to play viol, lute and harp. “Let us go
hearken,” said the princess; and, quitting the chess-table, went to sit
beside her step-dame. She had affection for Alazais, and Alazais for
Audiart. Stephen the Marshal followed. All drew together to listen to
sung poesy.
A favourite jongleur had come forward, harp in hand. He was a dark,
wiry, eastern-appearing man, fantastically dressed in brown dashed and
streaked with orange. When he had played a dreamy, rich, and murmuring
air, he began to sing. He sang well, a fair song and one that was new
to a court that was gracious and hospitable to songs.
“Ah, that goes,” said the Princess Audiart, “like the sea in June!”
“It is like a chanson of Bernart de Ventadorn’s,” said Alazais, “and
yet it is not like him either. Who made it, Elias?”
“It may have a sound of the sea,” answered Elias, “for it came over the
sea. I got it from a palmer. He had learned it at Acre, and he said
that, words and music, the troubadour, Garin de l’Isle d’Or, made it
there.”
“Oh, we have heard of him! Knights coming back have told us—But never
did we hear his singing before! Again, Elias!”
Elias sang. “It is sweet.—_The Fair Goal!_”
* * * * *
A day or two later, in this hall, the Princess Audiart sat beside her
father upon the dais, the occasion a hearing given to the town of
Roche-de-Frêne. There was another than Roche-de-Frêne to be received
and hearkened to, namely an envoy, arrived the evening before, from
Savaric, Count of Montmaure. But the town came first, at the hour that
had been set.
The hall presented a different scene from that of the other night. Here
now were ranged the prince’s officers of state, the bailiff-in-chief,
executives of kinds. At the doors were ushers and likewise men-at-arms.
Men of feudal rank stood starkly, right and left of the dais. Others
of the castle population, men and women, who found an interest in this
happening, watched from the sides of the hall or from the musicians’
gallery. Below the dais sat two clerks with pens, ink, sandbox, and
parchment. Before it, in the middle portion of the hall, were massed
fifty of the citizens of Roche-de-Frêne.
The Princess Audiart sat in a deep chair, her arms upon its arms. She
was dressed in the colour of wine, and the long plain folds of her robe
and mantle rested the eye. Her throat was bare, around it a thin chain
of gold and a pear-shaped ruby. The thick braids of her hair came over
her gown to her knee. Between the dark waves, below a circlet of gold,
showed her intent and brooding face.
Castle and town were used to seeing her there, beside her father.
Years ago—when castle and town undertook to remember back—it
had seemed strange, but now use and wont had done their work. She
was not fair—they remembered when they had called her “the ugly
princess”—but she was wise. It was usual enough among the great of the
earth for fathers to associate with them sons. Here was a prince-father
who associated with him his daughter. By degrees Roche-de-Frêne had
ceased to wonder. Now, for a long time, the fact had been accepted.
Strangeness gone, it seemed, for this one spot on the huge earth,
rational.
The town had digested that great meal of liberties obtained years
ago, that and smaller loaves since given. It was hungry again; hungry
now for no slight stop-gaps, but for another full and great meal.
For many months it had given the castle oblique indications that it
was hungry. Time was when Gaucelm, a prince not unbeloved, riding
through Roche-de-Frêne, met almost wholly broad smiles and faces of
welcome. That throughout a year had been changing. Roche-de-Frêne,
at first unconsciously reflecting growing desires, but then more and
more deliberately, now wore a face of hunger. Roche-de-Frêne saw
its interest, and that another meal was to its interest. But it did
not wholly expect its lord at once to see that, nor to identify his
interest with their interest. It might, it believed, have to fight
its lord somewhat as other towns fought theirs. Not with weapons of
steel,—it would not win there,—but with persistent and mounting
clamour and disaffection, and, most effectively, with making trouble as
to tolls, rents, taxes, lord’s rights, and supplies.
The deputation included men from every guild. Here were chief dyers in
scarlet, weavers of fine cloth, makers of weapons, workers in leather,
moulders of candles, and here were traders and merchants, dealers in
wine and handlers of cattle. Men of substance had been chosen, master
workmen and also master agitators.
The prince, addressing himself to a man of venerable aspect, a merchant
whose name was known in far places, asked if he were spokesman. There
ran a murmur through the deputation. It pressed forward a little, it
took on an anxious face.
The merchant advanced a step and addressed the dais. “Fair, good lord
and my Lady Audiart, as you both know, I am a judge of merchant’s law,
but have no gift of tongue. I know a cause when it is good, but God has
not made me eloquent to set it forth to another man—craving pardon, my
liege lord and my Lady Audiart! So I will not speak, may it please you
both. But here is Thibaut Canteleu, the master of the saddlers—”
“I had expected,” said Prince Gaucelm, “to hear from Thibaut
Canteleu.—Stand forth, Thibaut!”
The merchant stepped back. The throng worked like a cluster of bees,
then parted, and out of it came a man of thirty, square-shouldered and
sturdy, with crisply curling black hair, and black, bold, and merry
eyes. It was evident that he was his fellows’ chosen and favourite,
their predestined leader. The fifty slanted their bodies toward him,
grew suddenly encouraged and bold, hung upon what he should say.
Thibaut Canteleu was magnetic, like a fire for warmth, an instiller of
courage. He made a gesture of reverence toward the dais.
The prince smiled slightly. “Well, Thibaut Canteleu?”
“Sire and my Lady Audiart,” spoke Thibaut, “few words suffice when
here is right and yon is wisdom! Sire, these many years, back to the
beginning, have we and our fathers and grandfathers before us, given
to our lords duteous service. When the town was a poor village, when
there were but a few huts—when the old castle stood—in the old days
before the memory of man, we gave it! And this castle and the old
castle—and you, lord, and the old lords—have given us succour and
protection, holding your shield above us! Beau sire, we do not forget
that, nor that you are our lord.” As he spoke he kneeled down on both
knees, joined his hands palm to palm, and made a gesture of placing
them between other hands. “Sire and my Lady Audiart, many castles have
you and not a few towns and all are your sworn men. Shall this town
that grew up by your greatest castle and took name from it, be less
your man than another? Jesu forbid! Services, dues, rents and tolls,
fair-toll and market-toll, are yours, and when you summon us we drop
all and come, and if there is war we hold the town for you while there
is breath in us! Yea, and if there should chance to be needed in this
moment moneys for building, for gathering, clothing, and weaponing
men-at-arms, for castle-wants, for pilgrimages or sending knights to
the land over the sea, for founding of abbeys and buying of books and
holy relics, or for any other great and especial matter, we stand
ready, lord, to raise as swiftly as may be, that supply.”
He came to a period in his speech, still kneeling. “That is good
hearing, Thibaut Canteleu!” said Gaucelm the Fortunate. He spoke with
equanimity, with his large scope of humour. He was as big as a mountain
range, and as became mountains he seemed to be able to see in various
directions. “Now,” he said, “let us hear, Thibaut, what your lords must
do!”
“Fair, good lord—”
“We are yet to guard Roche-de-Frêne from wolf-neighbour and
fox-neighbour, Count Dragon and King Lion? Have you heard tell of the
siege in your grandfather’s time? But well I wot that the town has no
enemies, that none is jealous of its trade, that no wolf thinks, ‘Now
if I had its market—or if I had it with its market!’ and no dragon
ponders, ‘What if I put forth a claw and drag these weavers and dyers
and saddlers where they may weave and dye and work in leather for me?
When I have them in my den they may whistle not for new, but for old
freedoms!’—We are yet to keep Roche-de-Frêne in as fair safety as we
may?”
“Lord, lord,” said Thibaut, “are we not of one another? If you are
strong to keep us safe, are we not strong to make you wealth?”
“My father gave you freedoms, and often have I heard him say that he
repented his giving! Then I ruled, and for a time held to that later
mind of his. Then about many matters I formed my own mind, and in
larger measure than he had given, I granted freedom. For a fair space
of time you rested content. Then you began to ask again. And again, now
this grant and now that, I have given!”
He ceased to speak, sitting dressed in bronze samite, with a knight’s
belt of finest work, and on his head a circlet of gold.
Thibaut Canteleu still kneeled. Now he raised his black eyes. “Lord,
why did you give?”
“Because it seemed to me right,” said Prince Gaucelm.
Thibaut spread his hands. The corners of the Princess Audiart’s lips
twitched. She glanced aside at Gaucelm the Fortunate, and a very sweet
and loving look came like a beam of light into her face. She said under
her breath, “Ah, Jesu! Judgement in this matter has been given!” turned
her head and retook the intent and brooding look. Her eyes, that had
marked width between them, received impression from the length and
breadth of the hall. She gathered each slight movement and change in
the deputation of citizens; and as for Thibaut Canteleu, she saw that
Thibaut, also, grasped that judgement had been given.
Prince Gaucelm sat without movement of body or change of look. His size
did not give him a seeming of heaviness, nor the words that he had
spoken take power from his aspect. He did not seem conscious of their
effect upon others. He sat in silence, then shook himself and returned
to the matter in hand. “Tell us now, Thibaut Canteleu, what it is that
the town desires.”
“Lord,” said Canteleu, “we wish and desire to elect our own
magistrates. And our disputes and offences—saving always, lord, those
that are truly treasonable or that err against Holy Church—we wish and
desire to bring into our own courts and before judges of our choosing.”
A sharp sound ran through the hall—that portion of it that was
not burgher. Truly Roche-de-Frêne was making a demand immense,
portentous—The red was in the faces of the prince’s bailiffs and
in those of other officials. But Gaucelm the Fortunate maintained
a quietness. He looked at Thibaut Canteleu as though he saw the
generations behind him and the generations ahead. He spoke.
“That is what you now wish and ask?”
“Lord, that is what we wish and ask.”
“And if I agree not?”
“We are your merchants and artisans, lord! What can we do? But are love
and ready service naught? Fair good lord, and my Lady Audiart, we hold
that we ask a just—yea, as God lives, a righteous thing! Moreover, we
think, lord, that we plead, not to such as the Count of Montmaure, but
to Roche-de-Frêne!”
Behind him spread a deep, corroboratory murmur, a swaying of bodies
and nodding of heads. The winter sunshine, streaming in through long,
narrow windows, made luminous the positive colours, the greens, blues,
reds of apparel, the faces swarthy, rosy or pale, the workman hands and
the caps held in them, the smoother merchant hands and the better caps
held in them. It lighted Thibaut Canteleu, still kneeling, in a blue
tunic and grey hose, a blue cap upon the pavement beside him.
The prince spoke. “Get you to your feet, Thibaut, and depart, all of
you! A week from to-day, at this hour, come again, and you shall be
answered.”
Thibaut Canteleu took up his cap and rose from his knees. He made a
deep reverence to the dais, then stepped backward. All the deputation
moved backward, kept their faces toward the prince until they reached
the doors out of which they passed, between the men-at-arms. The blur
of red and blue and green, of faces pale or sanguine or swarthy,
filtered away, disappeared. The hall became again all castle—a place
of lord and lady, knight, esquire, man-at-arms, and page, a section of
the world of chivalry. All around occurred a slight shifting of place,
a flitting of whispers. The prince stirred, turned slightly in his
great chair, and spoke in an undertone to his daughter. She answered in
as low a voice, sitting quite still, her long, slender hands resting
upon the arms of her chair.
Gaucelm nodded, then spoke to the seneschal standing to the right of
the dais. “Now will we hear Montmaure’s envoy.”