of a bout with Simon had dissipated much of his chagrin at preceding
discomfitures. Duke Baldwin always charged headlong at any whim, as a
bull charges at red temptation.
"On your knee, fellow," he commanded.
"Nay," grunted Simon, "I have nothing to kneel for."
His simplicity missed the duke's meaning, and when the duke saw how he
missed, he grinned, for his purpose was to make a knight of the giant.
"Nay, man, on your knee to take the accolade. I cannot cross weapons
with one that does not wear the rank of a knight. When you are knighted
we will test your mettle."
Now Simon, seeing what the duke would be at, housed his sword, and,
coming forward, bent his knee, while those of the duke's party,
familiar as they were with their master's vagaries, stared in amaze to
find him, after the passing of such great matters, so mightily taken up
with so small a thing. But nothing ever seemed small to Duke Baldwin
that jumped with his immediate humor. The duke drew his sword and was
about to raise it when he bethought him.
"Stay, what is thy name, fellow?" he questioned; and Simon answered,
readily enough:
"Simon the Strong, of sweet Rouen city."
Again the duke lifted his sword, and again he lowered it.
"Tell me, friend Simon," he inquired, "have you any broad lands to your
name?"
Simon bethought him of his mother's cabbage-garden out in the suburbs
of Rouen, a narrow patch enough where a gaunt goat tugged at its
tether. It was many a long day since he had seen it, but it came very
vividly to his memory now, and made him feel qualmish for a moment,
with a spasm of home-sickness.
"In sooth," he answered, slowly, "I have a trifle of property at
Florency, but it is no great matter, truly."
"Never care for that," said the duke, cheerfully; "small or great it
will serve the turn well enough to help you to gentility."
Then he gave Simon a clap on the shoulder with the flat of his sword
and cried out, "Arise, Sir Simon of Florency," and so straightway Simon
arose and marvelled a little in himself that he seemed no different for
his new honor.
"Now, friend," said the duke, sheathing his sword and stretching his
great arms apart, "see if you can spill me as you spilled my tall
soldier this morning."
Simon was willing, everyway. He was as eager to try the duke's strength
as the duke was to try Simon's, and, win or lose, the struggle meant
time gained for Argathona, though he had little fear for her safety.
Then, as none of the knights present had the right or the courage to
protest against the strange encounter, the two strong men were about to
set to in good earnest when their purposes were interrupted by Jaufre,
Guy, Ambrose, and Raymond, who came from the bedchamber to tell the
duke that his son desired to speak with him.
The duke was vexed at the interruption, for he had set his heart on a
bout with Simon, and with him the immediate impulse was ever peremptory
to the exclusion of all other thoughts and needs. But he could not very
well deny his son, though he cherished some rancor against him as being
the cause of the knight's trouble and muddle.
"Sirs," he said to the knights, "these jars must not mar our festival.
There are other women in the world, and will be other weddings, but in
the mean time you will do well to return to the banqueting-hall and
continue your cheer."
Sir Jaufre, Sir Guy, and the others quitted the room. The duke bade
Simon stay where he was and went into the next room, where he found
Rainouart stretched upon what should have been his marriage bed. The
duke's physician was by his side, but he left the room on the entrance
of the duke, after assuring him that the wound was slight, as being the
work of an unpractised hand, and would soon heal.
Rainouart was very pale, less with the loss of blood than with all the
dear and grievous emotions that had pillaged his heart so fiercely that
night, but his spirit was high and bright in his eyes, and he spoke to
his father with a firm voice.
"Where is my sweet lady?"
"If you mean the lady of Thebes," said Duke Baldwin, "she has gone
hence in a great rage."
"I do not think of her," Rainouart said. "I think of the girl from the
greenwood, the girl who saved my life once, and now has saved my honor."
Duke Baldwin grinned maliciously, for he was vexed with his son for
being such a fool as to get tangled up in his love affairs and thereby
bring people to loggerheads untimely.
"Why, she has gone, too. There came a squall of wind that blew the
lights out, and in the blackness the valiant lass slipped away, with
none to stay her."
At this news Rainouart's heart was wrung with such anguish that even
the dull duke could read his misery in his eyes, and even Baldwin's
tough composition felt something that was distinctly akin to a pulse of
pity, and he added:
"The Jill-o'-lantern left her giant squire behind her."
Rainouart lifted himself eagerly on his elbow.
"I would see that squire at once."
"That may be easily done," said Duke Baldwin, "for he waits in the next
room."
Therefore Duke Baldwin raised his voice and trumpeted loudly for Sir
Simon of Florency, and instantly Simon lifted the curtain and came into
the room and looked with some compassion at the young knight on the
couch. Rainouart recognized him at once as the squire who stood by the
pavilion of the Prince of Eleusis.
"Where is my lady?" Rainouart asked, feverishly. Simon answered him
leisurely:
"She has gone back to the forest, being a little disheartened with your
city and its citizens, but she left you these leaves for the healing
of your hurt, and this message, that you are to come to her in the
greenwood."
As Simon said his say, he drew from his pouch the leaves of the herb
of healing that Argathona had given him, and laid them on the bed.
Rainouart took them tenderly in his hands and kissed them fondly, while
the duke smiled sourly at the folly that leads a man to the lipping of
weeds.
"I will go to her in the morning," Rainouart declared; but here Duke
Baldwin shook his head.
"That may not be, son," he said, emphatically.
"May not be," Rainouart flung back, hotly. "I tell you it must be. She
saved my life and I loved her, and we swore our mutual troth. Then
I was practised on by magic, and I forgot my true-love, and went in
bondage to a false faith, and from this shame my true-love has saved me
now as before she saved me from death. I am bound to her in honor as
I am bound to her in love, and on my honor and by my love I will go to
her with the dawn."
Again Duke Baldwin shook his head, and again Duke Baldwin answered as
before.
"That may not be, son." Then seeing the anger shine in Rainouart's
eyes, and the stubborn look on Rainouart's face that seemed to mirror
his own native obstinacy, he went on in a voice that for him was gentle.
"Hear me out, son Rainouart, for your honor is as near to me and as
dear to me as my own, and against that I think no tongue has ever
wagged."
Rainouart's face darkened, for he thought of his mother, the gracious
lady so basely abandoned, and he thanked God in his heart that his
honor was not as the honor of Duke Baldwin. But Duke Baldwin was not
skilled to read either his son's face or his son's heart, and he went
on, bluffly:
"As for love, why, I am a jolly lover, too, though you and I read in
the book of love at different chapters. But you cannot go to your lass
yet awhile, for your very honor's sake."
"Why not?" Rainouart asked, with such a frown as might have wrinkled
his father's forehead, and the big duke, who liked his son's manner
best when most it resembled his own, went on very amiably to explain.
He told how the Duchess of Thebes had declared war upon Athens, at
which tidings Rainouart laughed contemptuously; and how Fernand Ximenes
inclined to her, and would in all likelihood whistle the Grand Company
to her cause. At this Rainouart's eyes shone and his pale cheeks
flushed ruddy, for if this were so, it promised a fight that would be
worth the fighting.
"Therefore," the duke went on, "your sweetheart must wait awhile till
this little brawl be over, for I am sure that no lass who played the
lad so gallantly as your fancy would have her lover lag aloof from a
battle."
He smiled somewhat sourly as he spoke, for he had no great confidence
in the martial constancy of knights that plied their books and fell in
love with country wenches. But he read Rainouart's answer in his eyes
before he got it from his lips, and it reassured him.
"While Athens is at war," Rainouart said, simply, "I ride and fight
with Athens. When Athens is at peace I will marry my true-love."
Simon nodded his head approvingly, and the duke for his part applauded
in his heart. He liked the lad's belligerent spirit, however little
he relished the nonsense about the witch in the wood. Duke Baldwin's
affection for his son, never very vehement, had waxed when he had
returned as the betrothed of the Duchess of Thebes, but had dwindled to
insignificance with the shattering of that alliance and the chance that
his son might die by a stroke from a woman's hand. Indeed, the jovial
duke, alarmed by the sudden possibility of an heirless duchy, had even
in the last few minutes begun to revolve again in his mind a project
that he had abandoned with the coming of the Duchess of Thebes. He had
up to that time been so much disappointed with his son that, although
as a general principle much averse to marriage as an institution, he
was seriously thinking of wedding again. He loved to have about him
none but such as were jolly eaters, jolly drinkers, jolly lovers, jolly
soldiers, and when he observed the difference between his son and
himself and those he cherished, he shuddered over the thought that such
a puling, mulish reader of books might one day rule in Athens. Baldwin
was still in the prime of life, with every right to hope for an heir,
and he began to reconcile himself to the thought of a state which he
had always regarded as bondage, though when it existed for him before
he had allowed it to bind him but little. In such case the young prince
might be clapped into a monastery to doze away his life over tomes of
nonsense, while the jolly duke would see to it that the son-child of
his dreams should be brought up to a very different purpose.
Now, however, the readiness of Rainouart to obey the call to arms made
Baldwin more content with his son, though he frowned at the foolish
words about marrying his true-love. However, with the gain of a little
time Rainouart's mind might change, though that did not seem likely,
or he might be prevailed upon to take a less high-flown sense of his
obligations to his lovely amazon, or, at the worst, the girl might be
got rid of some way or other.
"Well," he said, cheerfully, "you must wait a while ere you can talk of
marriage to a maid. For you are married, lad, hard and fast, married to
the lady Esclaramonde of Thebes, for a marriage is a marriage though it
be but a marriage in name."
Rainouart gave a groan at the duke's speech, and Simon, who had not
thought of this dilemma, scratched his chin and scowled. The duke
nodded sagaciously.
"Only our Holy Father the Pope can set you apart now, for even when we
take Thebes it would scarcely chime with the chivalry of the Rock to
kill the baggage, however much she deserve it. But I will send an envoy
to Avignon to put our case before the pontiff. By the time he returns
we shall have taken Thebes, and then you will be a free man to go
a-wooing in a wood."
"And till then," Simon added, "I will be your esquire, if you agree,
for such was the wish of your dear lady, whose humble servant I am very
proud to be."
Rainouart stretched out his hand and clasped the hand of Simon.
"We will be brothers-in-arms," he vowed, "as we are brothers in
service." Then he turned to his father.
"Sire," he said; "your son is your soldier till there be an end of the
war and till the pope makes me a free man again. And then, by your
leave, I will take my troth anew to the greenwood, and humbly pray my
sweet love to forgive me."
The duke said nothing, for he had nothing pleasant to say to such
vagaries. But Simon tugged at his russet beard, and muttered:
"I think she will forgive you."
XXV
CEPHISSUS
The dawn was as pink as a peach, and through the pellucid air the city
of Athens looked her fairest. The Parthenon, topping her holy hill,
glowed like amber in the young sunlight, showing the same fine lines of
perfect symmetry to the nobles of France that it had shown to the Roman
soldiers of Mummius and to the Athenians of the great war. Within the
sanctuary the gold and ivory image of Athena, fashioned by Phidias, had
given way to the pale face of Our Lady, Mother of the Holy Child, and
the grandiloquent Latin of the mass rolled its volume through the hall
that once had echoed to the sonorous Greek of the Palladian hymns. The
gods had gone, great Pan was dead, Christ had arisen, and still the
Parthenon in almost unaltered beauty crowned the Acropolis. But the
chivalry of France paid little heed to the Parthenon or the past of
Athens as they rode briskly out on that radiant morning to annihilate
the Catalan Grand Company. Their thoughts were with the vivid present,
with the pleasure of coming battle, with the pride of certain victory,
with the promise of the swift return, flushed with triumph, to find
praise and welcome smiling in their ladies' eyes. It was but the second
day since the night of the ruined nuptials, but Baldwin was brisk on
war business, and his chivalry and his fighting-men were quick to move.
The foot-soldiers had taken the field for the march to Thebes on the
previous day, and this day, this glorious day of peach-colored dawn,
the duke and his knights were to ride to the undoing of the Catalan
Grand Company.
The Catalan Grand Company had confirmed the menace of Ximenes, and
justified Duke Baldwin's doubts by going over as one man to the cause
of the Duchess of Thebes. But their defection did not trouble the bluff
duke. On the contrary, it furnished him with a full-blooded excuse for
exterminating the mutinous mercenaries and wiping out his debt to them
with a wet sword. So he and his chivalry rode to their assured victory,
and made their march a gala-day.
Simon had never seen a braver menace of war. The sunlight gleamed on
coats of many-tinted silk, on armor rich with gilding, on shields whose
gayly painted spaces were so many brave pages from the armorial of
France. Iris was outvied. Cloth of gold and cloth of silver glittered;
stuffs of flame color, sea color, corn color, blood color dazzled the
day; even the Athenian eyes, inured to vivid pigments seen in full
sunlight, ached in the play of hue. All the knights were clad as for
a tournament, save that they did not carry on their helmets the huge
and grotesque crests which made the mimic fight fantastic, for these,
though skilfully fashioned of light wicker-work and painted leather,
would have proved too cumbrous and too bulky in the hour of actual
combat.
Duke Baldwin rode at the head of his knights, with his visor exalted,
and his companions, the Knight of the Fish, the Knight of the Lizard,
the Knight of the Griffin, knights of all conceivable creatures that
blazoners and crest-builders had taken into their whimsical kingdom,
rode in Duke Baldwin's train and cried their war-cries into the ears
of a delighted audience. The Athenians, then as ever eager for new
things, and rejoicing in show, lined the streets and applauded lustily
as the pageant of war passed by. The knights rode to the fight as to
a feast, full of mirth. On every side jest challenged laughter and
laughter answered jest. Sir Guy, Sir Jaufre, Sir Ambrose, Sir Gaston,
Sir Raymond made merry one with another, and blew kisses to such girls
as had fair faces among the gazing throng. It was true that some lords
were missing from Duke Baldwin's following. Andronicus Palæologus,
pompous exile, had asserted that the quarrel was none for him to meddle
with and had taken shipping for Nauplia; Demetrius of Epirus had stolen
away by night to Thebes to lend such dignity as his name could give
to the Catalan rally. But no one seemed to remember or to regret the
fugitive or the traitor, and no one seemed to think any but mirthful
thoughts or to speak other than mirthful words.
Simon marvelled somewhat at the knightly mirth. There was nothing so
wonderful in the crushing of such an uproar as that of the Catalan
Grand Company. Yet Simon's own spirits were high, and he found snatches
of old songs bubbling from his lips as he rode close at hand to his
master. Rainouart seemed once again what he had been before the fatal
coming of Esclaramonde. Thanks to the herb of healing, thanks to his
native health, he had wellnigh recovered from the wound that the
ill-directed stroke of a woman had dealt him. What was of far more
moment, he had wholly escaped from the spell of Esclaramonde's magic,
and rode with clear eyes and clean spirit. If he were not now as blithe
as his fellows, he had never displayed a noisy humor of mirth. But
while the others carolled and babbled, he rode quietly with a bright
smile on his face, for he thought of the girl in the greenwood, and all
the world was fragrant with the perfume of the noble rose. His carriage
cheered Duke Baldwin greatly, wherefore he rode lively enough at the
head of his knights, and did not trouble himself much about the amorous
folly of his son so long as that son rode in arms like a gallant
gentleman against the enemy.
The peach tint of the dawn flushed into rose and glowed into gold as
the morning grew, and soon the sky was all of the liveliest blue above
the heads of Baldwin and his companions. They knew some hours of
blithe riding through a blithe country, now open as they traversed the
Attic plain, now enclosed as they came to the hilly places and fringed
the forest--and here Simon looked wistfully at the wood, but Rainouart
rode steadily with his gaze fixed straight ahead--and then again open
as they began to enter the Theban plain. Here Duke Baldwin found his
foot-soldiers encamped, and here he heard that the opposing forces had
marched out of Thebes and taken up their position in an encampment on
the plain to await the Athenian invaders. Here the knights made a halt
for rest and repose, for the morning was still very young, with the air
exceedingly cool and sweet. The horses were fed and tended, the knights
ate and drank, but sparingly, as befits those about to give battle,
and their brief leisure was as mirthful as their march. When all were
refreshed, man and beast, the march was resumed, and a little time
brought Duke Baldwin and his friends in full view of the enemy and of
the destined battle-field.
Simon looked curiously at the stirring scene before him. A great space
of land lay between the Athenian forces and their enemies--a space
vividly green with young corn that flourished on the plain of Thebes
as on all the plains of Greece. On the other side of that spreading
area of soft shoots the men of the Catalan Grand Company were drawn
up in open array of battle, with the gaudy banner of the Duchess of
Thebes floating over their ranks side by side with their own flag and
the treasonable pennon of Epirus. Simon marvelled on looking to see
them waiting there so composedly for the formidable onslaught of the
Frankish chivalry. The bowmen were resting by their strung bows as
unconcernedly as if a holiday were toward, and the armored leaders
moved hither and thither leisurely among the ranks. It seemed as if
the following of Baldwin had but to spur only a few yards across the
soft, bright corn to brush these foemen out of existence. Nine hundred
of the finest knights in Greece, swathed in steel, rode with the Duke
of Athens and filled the summer air with their war-cries, eager to
sweep over the field and chastise the insolence of their contemptible
enemies. Behind them now tramped a well-equipped army on foot,
strongly armed, admirably marshalled, inured to war, and eager for the
engagement.
Simon was puzzled if no one else was. The odds against the Catalan
Grand Company showed tremendous, even when such reinforcements as were
afforded by the adherents of the Duchess of Thebes were taken into
account, while Demetrius of Epirus brought no more than his small
personal following and the cheap dishonor of his name. It looked as
if none might survive the skirmish to mount the gibbets which Duke
Baldwin so uncompromisingly promised to the rebels. Suddenly an idea
came into Simon's head, and he slapped his leg with satisfaction. That
is it, he said to himself, convinced that he had found an answer to
the problem that perplexed him. The dogs knew that they must die, one
way or another, by sword or by rope, and they meant to make a good end
of it, soldier-wise, and at bay. Something of pity stirred in his heart
for the stout fellows so soon to be butchered and waiting so soldierly
for the end. They were truculent ruffians, those Catalans, but at least
they knew how to play a losing game with courage and dignity. Another
little hour and how many of those bearded faces would show any hot
blood in the cheeks? The fortune of war, Simon reflected, composedly,
and settled himself in the saddle for the obliterating charge which he
guessed must soon be made, for Duke Baldwin had reined in his horse,
and with him the army halted, a splendid patch of steel and color
upon the plain. Duke Baldwin turned in his saddle and smiled upon his
chivalry, while he pointed to the Catalan Grand Company and the forces
of the lady of Thebes.
"There lie the rebels," he shouted, his great voice rolling like a
drum-call over his host, "and here ride we that shall wipe them out of
the field. It is but poor sport I offer you, gentle friends, to slay
the jacks of a jade, but it will soon be over, and we shall scour the
land of Greece clean of these cozeners."
As he spoke he swung his sword forth from his scabbard, and held it
stretched in menace against the enemy, while the knights behind him
thundered cheer after cheer, and settled themselves firmly in their
saddles for the charge across the shining plain. Baldwin lifted his
great blade to heaven.
"Saint Denis for Athens!" he cried, and stuck his spurs into the sides
of his mighty charger.
"Saint Denis for Athens!" echoed his chivalry at his heels, and in
another moment the splendid mass of men-at-arms was in motion. Simon's
spirits were at the top as he gave his horse the rein and felt the
morning air stronger against his face. But he kept a watchful eye on
the young prince who rode beside him, and it gladdened him to see that
Rainouart sat so stiffly in his saddle and held his lance so well. "A
plague upon love and lovers," he grumbled in his heart; "what have they
to do with a gentleman-at-arms?" and then he had time to think no more
for the swift exhilaration of the charge. On the knights came, Baldwin
leading, the young Prince of Athens close behind him, and Simon by his
side, the rest thundering in open order with levelled spears. A few
minutes more now and the Catalan Grand Company would be very decisively
disbanded. But even as Simon charged his horse caught a hoof in a hole,
and, coming heavily on to its knees, shot Simon out of his stirrup,
and Simon landed sprawling on the ground. Now Simon was a heavy man,
and Simon, as befitted the knight of Florency, was in full armor, and
Simon, though he tried his best, found it as hard to rise as if he were
a capsized turtle. But Rainouart riding ahead saw his mishap, and,
reining in his black horse, came back to Simon.
"Nay," cried Simon, "ride to victory, and leave me to shift."
But Rainouart would not have it so. He might be out of the first
bright wave of battle, but he could not leave his brother-in-arms in
distressful plight. And there was, indeed, but brief delay. Rainouart
dismounting soon got Simon to his feet, and Simon mounted his horse,
which was little the worse for its stumble, and together they spurred
to catch up with the charging cavalry. But the time, short though it
was, had allowed a great gap of green field to grow between the riding
knights and their two pursuers, and it took some strenuous seconds to
bring their horses' noses to the tails of their predecessors.