When Gilbert learned from his man that Beatrix was badly hurt and
suffering great pain, he turned his face away and bit hard on the
saddle-bag that served him for a pillow. It was late in the afternoon,
and Dunstan had just come back from making inquiries in the ladies'
lines, half a mile away.
Nothing could have been simpler than his round tent, which had a single
pole and covered a circle four or five paces in diameter. The dry
ground had been sprinkled with water and beaten with mallets so as to
harden it as much as possible. Gilbert and his two men slept on
smoke-cured hides over which heavy woollen blankets were spread, almost
as thick as carpets, hand-woven in rough designs of vivid blue and red,
the coarse work of shepherds of Auvergne, but highly valued.
Against the pole the saddles were piled one upon another, Gilbert's own
on top, with its curved pommels; Dunstan's, covered with plaited lines
for binding on rolled blankets and all sorts of light packages and
saddle-bags before and behind the rider's seat; and the mule's
pack-saddle, on which little Alric rode, perched upon the close-bound
bundles, when the road was fair. During most of the journey the sturdy
Saxon had trudged along on foot, as Dunstan did also, but it was not
seemly that a man of gentle blood should be seen walking on the march,
except of great necessity.
Above the saddles Gilbert's mail hung by the neck, with a stout staff
run through both arms to stretch it out, lest dampness should rust it;
also his other armour and his sword were fastened up like an ancient
trophy, with bridles and leathern bottles and other gear. Beside the
saddles, on the ground, the shining copper kettle held three bright
brass bowls, well-scoured wooden trenchers, a long wooden ladle, an
iron skewer, and three brass spoons, the simple necessities for cooking
and eating. Forks had not been thought of in those days.
Gilbert lay on his back and turned his face away from his man. He was
bruised and scratched, and his head ached from being struck on the
ground when the mare had dragged him; but he was whole and sound in
limb, and Dunstan had stretched his joints and pressed his bruises with
a wise touch that had in it something of Oriental skill. He lay wrapped
in a long robe of coarse white linen, as thick as wool--a sensible
Greek garment which he had got in Constantinople. The afternoon was
warm, and though the flap of the tent was raised and stretched out like
an awning, there was little air, and the place smelt of the leathern
trappings and of hot canvas; and through the side to which he turned
his face Gilbert could see little dazzling sparks of rays where the sun
was beating full upon the outside.
He wished that in the mad rush of the Arab the life might have been
pounded out of him, and that he might never have waked to know what he
had done; for although in his sober senses he did not love the Queen,
it seemed to him that he had loved her in the moment when he sprang to
save her life, and that he could never again forget the look of fear
for him in her eyes and her cry of terror for his sake. All that
Beatrix had said to him in the garden at Constantinople came back to
him now; until now, he had disbelieved it all, as a wild and foolish
impossibility, for he was over-modest and diffident of himself in such
matters.
Beatrix would certainly have been killed but for the chance which had
thrown the mare across the narrow way, and he had risked his life to
save another woman. It mattered not that the other was the Queen; that
was not the reason why he had leapt upon the bridle. He had done it for
a glance of her eyes, for the tone of her voice, as it were in an
instant of temptation, when he had stepped out of the rank to face
destruction for a dearer sake. It seemed like a crime, and it proved
against his own belief that he loved what he loved not. Had he let the
Queen pass, and had he stopped Beatrix's horse instead, she might have
been unhurt, and one other brave man might have saved Eleanor at the
brink. Indeed, he thought of the sad face with its pathetic little
smile, drawn with pain and hot upon the pillow, by his fault; and he
thought with greater fear of the danger that some deep hurt might leave
the slender frame bent and crippled for life.
But meanwhile the news had spread quickly that it was the silent
Englishman, neither knight nor squire, who had saved the Queen, and
outside the tent men stopped and talked of the deed, and asked
questions of Alric, who had picked up enough Norman-French to give
tolerably intelligible answers. At first came soldiers, passing as they
went to fetch water from the lake, and again as they came back with
copper vessels filled to the brim and dripping upon their shoulders,
they set down their burdens and talked together. Presently came a great
knight, the Count of Montferrat, brother to the Count of Savoy, who had
been at Vezelay, where Gilbert had talked with him. He walked with slow
strides, his bright eyes seeming to cut a way for him, his long mantle
trailing, his soft red leather boots pushed down in close creases about
his ankles, his gloved hand pressing down the cross-hilt of his sword,
so that the sheath lifted his mantle behind him. On each side of him
walked his favourite knights, and their squires with them, all on their
way to the King's quarters, where a council of war was to be held,
since it was known how the great German host had been routed, and that
the Emperor himself might follow Duke Frederick of Suabia. This Duke
had already reached the camp, after beating off the Seljuk skirmishers
who had harassed his retreat and driven in the first fright-struck
Germans.
The soldiers and grooms made way for the noble, but he asked which
might be the tent of Gilbert Warde, the Englishman; so they pointed to
the raised flap, where Alric stood with his sturdy legs apart, under
the shadow of Gilbert's long shield, which was hanging from a lance
stuck in the ground. The shield was blank, though many gentlemen
already painted devices on theirs, and sovereign lords displayed the
heraldic emblems of their houses long before their vassals began to use
their coats-of-arms on their shields in war. But Gilbert would bear
neither emblem nor device till some great deed should make him famous.
The Count of Montferrat glanced at the blank shield thoughtfully, and
asked little Alric of what family his master was; and when he heard
that his forefathers had been with Robert the Devil when he died, and
with William at Hastings, and with Godfrey at Jerusalem, and that his
father had died fighting for Maud against the usurper, but that Gilbert
had not knighthood for all that, he wondered gravely. Yet knowing that
he was hurt and ill at ease, the Count would not go in, but gave Alric
a piece of gold and bade him greet the young Lord of Stoke and tell him
that the Count of Montferrat craved better acquaintance with him when
he should be recovered.
He went on his way, and was not gone far when the Count of Savoy and
the lord of fated Coucy came strolling side by side, with their trains
of knights and squires, on their way to the council. And having seen
Montferrat stop at the tent, they did likewise, and asked the same
questions, giving Alric money out of respect for his master's brave
deed and good name, according to custom. Many others came after them,
great and small, and the great gave the groom money, and the poor
men-at-arms asked him to drink with them after supper; so that his flat
leathern wallet, which was cracking in its creases from having been
long empty, was puffed out and hard, and weighed heavily at his belt,
and as for the wine promised him, he might have floated a boat in it.
There was one of the Greek guides who stood near the tent, playing with
a string of thick beads, and keeping behind Alric; and when there was a
crowd around him this Greek slipped nearer, with his razor in the palm
of his hand, and stealthily tried to cut the thongs by which the wallet
was fastened. So the Saxon turned quickly and smote him between the
eyes with his fist, and it was an hour before the Greek came to himself
and crawled away, for nobody would lift him. But Alric laughed often as
he sucked the trickling blood from his knuckles, and though he was a
little man and young, the soldiers looked at him with respect, and many
more of them asked him to drink.
So on that afternoon Gilbert's reputation grew suddenly, as a bright
lily that has been long in bud under a wet sky breaks out like a flame
in the first sunshine; and the days were over when he must trudge along
unnoticed in the vast throng of nobles, with his two men and his modest
baggage.
Meanwhile the council was held in the King's tent of state, within
which three hundred nobles sat at ease after the King himself had taken
his place on the throne, with the Queen on his right hand. There the
red-bearded Frederick of Suabia, nephew to Conrad and famous afterward
as the Emperor Barbarossa, stood up and told his tale: how the wild
German knights had truly forced their leaders to take the mountain road
and fight the Seljuks at a disadvantage; how the Seljuks appeared and
disappeared again from hour to hour, falling upon their prey at every
turn, reddening every pass with blood, and leaving half-killed men
among the slain to wonder whence the swift smiters had come and whither
they were gone. He himself had wounds not healed, and he told how, day
by day, the mad bravery of the Germans, and the fury of his Black
Forest men-at-arms, had risen again and again to very desperation, to
sink before evening in a new defeat; until, at last, as the Seljuk
swords still killed and killed, a terror had fallen upon the host in
the passes, and men had thrown away their armour and fled like rats
from a burning granary, so that their leaders could not hold them. He,
with a few strong helpers, had covered his flying troops, and the brave
Emperor Conrad, giant in strength, the greatest swordsman of the world,
was even now fighting at the hindmost rear of the army to save whom he
could.
It had been madness, he told them all, to try the mountain ways. To
Palestine there were two roads, and they might choose between them,
either following the long coast round Asia Minor to the Gulf of Cyprus,
or else, going down to the Propontis, they might get ships from
Constantinople and sail to the ports of Syria. The short way was death,
and though death were nothing, it meant failure and destruction to the
Christian power in Jerusalem and Antioch.
Thus he spoke, and the King and Queen and all the great nobles heard
him in silence. There were the great Counts of Flanders and Toulouse,
of Savoy, of Montferrat and Dreux and Blois, and the lords of Lusignan,
of Coucy, of Courtenay, and of Bourbon, and the Bishops of Toul and
Metz, and all the great knights of Gascony and Poitou, with many others
of high name and good blood, who heard the red-bearded Duke speak. But
when he had finished, none answered him, and the French King sat on his
throne, repeating the prayers for the dead in a low voice. But
Eleanor's eyes flashed fire and her gloved hand strained impatiently
upon the carved arm of the chair of state.
"Requiem eternam dona eis," muttered the King.
"Amen!" responded Eleanor, in a clear, contemptuous voice. "And now
that prayers are over, let us do deeds. Let us mount and ride forth at
dawn to meet the Emperor, and help him in his need at the last. Let us
ride in even order, sending out scouts and skirmishers before us, and
keeping good watch, armed and ready at all moments. Then, when all are
safe who are alive, we will return here, that the Germans may rest
themselves by this good lake; and afterward we will set forth again by
the safest road, cautiously, not wasting upon skirmishes the strength
we shall need hereafter for a great victory."
"The Emperor will surely be here to-morrow, without our help," said the
King, in manifest discontent. "It is of no use to go and meet him."
"If he is so near, let us mount to-night, this very hour, rather than
have on us the shame of lying idly here while men who wear the cross
are in need of us."
The King said nothing, but at Eleanor's words a low murmur of assent
ran through the assembly of brave men, from those at her feet to those
farthest from her; and the impatient touch of each hand on sword or
dagger, at the thought of fight, made a sound of softly moving steel
and leather and buckle, which one may only hear among soldiers.
Eleanor stood up, untired by her terrible ride, unshaken by her fall,
her eyes full of the brightness of pride. It was her daily food and her
perpetual necessity to have the better of the King in the eyes of men,
whether the matter were great or small. She stood up to her height, as
if to show all her beauty and strength to the world, and the low sun
streamed through the wide entrance to the tent and fell full upon her
face and her unblinking eyes.
"My lords and barons, gentlemen of Guienne and France, our journey is
over to-day, our battles begin to-morrow! Our brothers are in danger,
the enemy is in sight! Men of the Cross, to arms!"
"To arms!" rang the reply in many voices, both high and deep, like a
major chord sounding from the heart.
As she rose, the nobles had risen, too, and only the King kept his
seat, his pale face bent, his hands folded upon the hilt of the sword
that stood between his knees. The Queen said no more, and, without
glancing at her husband, as if she alone were sovereign, she descended
the two steps from the throne to the floor of the tent. Three knights,
one of Gascony, one of Poitou, and one of her own Guienne, who were her
guard of honour, followed her as she passed out, smiling to the great
nobles on her right and left. And many showed that they desired to
speak with her--first among them the Count of Montferrat.
"Madam," he said, when he had bowed low before her, "I praise God and
the Holy Trinity that your Grace is alive to-day. I pray that you will
deign to accept the homage and felicitations of Montferrat!"
"Of Bourbon, Madam!" cried a voice beside her.
"Of Savoy, your Grace!" said another.
"Of Coucy, of Courtenay, of Metz--" the voices all rang at once, as the
lords pressed round her, for she had not been seen since she had left
the field after her fall.
"I thank you," she answered, with a careless smile. "But you should
thank also the man who saved my life, if you love me."
"Madam, we have," replied Montferrat. "And if your Grace will but let
me have the man, I will do him much honour for your Highness's sake."
"He is no vassal of mine," Eleanor said. "He is a poor English
gentleman, cheated of his lands, a friend of young Henry Plantagenet."
"The friend of a boy!" The Count laughed lightly.
But Eleanor grew thoughtful on a sudden, for beyond her rare beauty and
her splendid youth, and within her world of impatient passion, there
were wisdom and knowledge of men.
"A boy? Yes, he may be fourteen years old, not more. But there are boys
who are not children, even in their cradles, and there are men who are
nothing else--their swaddling-clothes outgrown, and their milk teeth
cast, but not their whimpering and fretting."
The nobles were silent, for she spoke over-boldly and meant the King,
as they knew.
"As for this Englishman," she continued after an instant's pause, "he
is not mine to give you, my lord Count. And as for doing him honour for
his brave deed, though I would gladly please you, I should be loth to
let you do my duty for your pleasure."
She smiled again very graciously, for she was glad that men should
praise Gilbert Warde to her; and it was strangely pleasant to think
that no one guessed half of what she would give him if he would take
it. For among the nobles there were great lords, goodly men and young,
who dreamed of her fair face, but would not have dared to lift up their
eyes to her.
So she passed out, with her knights behind her, and most of the lords
and barons followed her at a distance, leaving the King within.
When she was gone he rose slowly, and giving his sword to the
chamberlain who stood waiting, he went to his chapel tent, with
downcast eyes and clasped hands, as if walking in a solemn procession.
A little bell rang, the sun was low, and it was the hour of the
Benediction. The King knelt down before the rich altar, and when he had
prayed earnestly for strength and courage, and for wisdom to win the
war of the Cross, he prayed from the bottom of his unhappy heart that,
if it were the will of Heaven, he might by some means be delivered from
the woman of Belial who marred his life and burdened his soul.