Day dawned. A man slept in the bed of Sylvestre Ker, where widow
Josserande had laid a wolf. The room still bore the marks of a fire, and
snow fell through the hole in the roof. The young tenant's face was
disfigured with blows, and his hair, stiffened with blood, hung in heavy
locks. In his feverish sleep he talked, and the name that escaped his
lips was Matheline's. At his bedside the mother watched and prayed.
When Sylvestre Ker awoke he wept, for the thought of his condemnation
returned; but the remembrance of Pol and Matheline dried the tears in
his burning eyes.
"It was for those two," said he, "that I forgot God and my mother. I
still feel my friend's heel upon my forehead, and even to the bottom of
my heart the shock of the stones thrown at me by my betrothed!"
"Dearest," murmured Josserande, "dearer to me than ever, I know nothing;
tell me all."
Sylvestre Ker obeyed, and when he had finished, Josserande kissed him,
took up her staff, and proceeded towards the convent of Ruiz to ask,
according to her custom, aid and counsel from Gildas the Wise. On the
way, men, women, and children looked curiously at her, for throughout
the country it was already known that she was the mother of a wolf. Even
behind the hedge which enclosed the abbey orchard Matheline and Pol were
hidden to see her pass; and she heard Pol say,--
"Will you come to-night to see the wolf run around?"
"Without fail," replied Matheline; and the sting of her laughter pierced
Josserande like a poisonous thorn.
The grand abbot received her, surrounded by great books and dusty
manuscripts. When she wished to explain her son's case, he stopped her,
and said,--
"Widow of Martin Ker, poor, good woman, since the beginning of the
world, Satan, the demon of gold and pride, has worked many such
wickednesses. Do you remember the deceased brother, Thaël, who is a
saint for having resisted the desire of making gold,--he who had the
power to do it?"
"Yes," answered Josserande; "and would to heaven my Sylvestre had
imitated him!"
"Very well," replied Gildas the Wise. "Instead of sleeping, I passed
the rest of the night with St. Thaël, seeking a means to save your son,
Sylvestre Ker."
"And have you found it, father?"
The grand abbot neither answered yes nor no, but he began to turn over a
very thick manuscript filled with pictures; and, while turning the
leaves, he said,--
"Life springs from death, according to the divine word; death seizes the
living, according to the pagan law of Rome; and it is nearly the same
thing in the order of miserable temporal ambition, whose inheritance is
a strength, a life, shot forth from a coffin. This is a book of the
defunct Thaël's, which treats of the question of maladies caused by the
breath of gold,--a deadly poison.... Woman, would you have the courage
to strike your wolf a blow on his head powerful enough to break the
skull?"
At these words Josserande fell her full length upon the tiles, as if she
had been stabbed to the heart; but in the very depth of her agony--for
she thought herself dying--she replied,--
"If you should order me to do it, I would."
"You have this great confidence in me, poor woman?" cried Gildas, much
moved.
"You are a man of God," answered Josserande, "and I have faith in God."
Gildas the Wise prostrated himself on the ground and struck his breast,
knowing that he had felt a movement of pride. Then, standing up, he
raised Josserande, and kissed the hem of her robe, saying,--
"Woman, I adore you in the most holy faith. Prepare your axe, and
sharpen it!"