VADE IN PACE.
THE thought of undefined horror conveyed by that word "_oubliette_" for
a moment held Noémi as though it had paralysed her. But this was for a
moment only, and then she bounded in the direction of the keep.
A word must be said as to what an _oubliette_ was. In almost every
mediæval castle in France and Germany the visitor is shown holes,
usually in the floor, that descend to a considerable depth, and which
are said to be _oubliettes_--that is to say, places down which prisoners
were dropped when it was to the interest of the lord of the castle to
sink them in oblivion.
Sometimes these places communicate with a river or a lake, as at
Chillon, and this passage is set with irons, presumably to cut in pieces
the body of the man cast down it.
In the vast majority of cases these so-called _oubliettes_ are nothing
but openings connected with the drainage of the castle or else are the
well-mouths of cisterns in which the rain-water from the roofs was
collected and stored.
Nevertheless, the fact that skeletons have been found in some of the
closed subterranean vaults, and that a percentage of them cannot be
explained as having been anything else but receptacles for prisoners
thrown in, to die a languishing death, and lastly, the historic
certainty that some poor wretches have so perished, shows that popular
belief is not wholly unfounded. The writer has himself been let down by
ropes into one in which four skeletons were entombed, and it is well
known that in 1403 one of the Counts of Armagnac so disposed of his
cousin, who lingered on thus immured for eight days. The son would have
shared his father's fate but that out of horror at the notion of being
flung down the well on the corpse of his father, the poor lad dropped
dead on the brink.
Moreover, under the title of _vade in pace_, the _oubliette_ was used,
not in castles only, but in convents as well, and was there introduced
by Matthew, Prior of St. Martin des Prés, in Languedoc, in the middle of
the fourteenth century, when the Archbishop of Toulouse interfered to
forbid the employment of this inhuman mode of execution. A prelate might
step in to check the barbarity of a prior, but who was there to hold the
hand of a noble?
Noémi saw a cluster of men outside the door that led into the dungeon,
and forced her way through them. The dungeon was not large, it would not
admit more than a dozen men. It opened on to a platform of rock on the
outside of the castle, not into the inner court. Access to it was
obtained by a doorway in the basement of the keep, where the wall was
ten feet thick. The chamber was vaulted, and only near the middle
sufficiently lofty to admit of anyone standing upright in it. There was
no window by which light and air could penetrate. When the door was
shut, both were excluded. The walls, the floor, the vault were of
square-cut limestone.
At the further end, immediately opposite the door was a recess,
conchoidal, and in this recess what seemed to be a well. There was a
stone step in the floor, and above that a circular coped wall, precisely
such as may be seen where there is a well; with this difference, that
the orifice was not two feet in diameter, a very inconvenient size for a
bucket to pass up or down.
In the dungeon sat Le Gros Guillem on a pallet, with his feet raised and
bandaged. Before him, bound, with his hands behind his back, was Ogier
del' Peyra, between two jailers. The old man had concluded that his head
would be struck off, at the worst that he would be hanged. The sight of
the _vade in pace_, and the knowledge that he was to be cast down alive
and left to a lingering agony, had blanched his cheek, but did not make
him tremble.
Ogier did not know, he could not guess, the depth of the _oubliette_.
But he was aware that such were sometimes not so profound but that he
who was flung in broke some of his bones, and thus died of a combination
of miseries. Happy he who, falling on his head, was reduced at once to
unconsciousness.
"Well, Del' Peyra," cried Guillem, in his harsh tones, rendered harsher
by the feverishness and weariness of the past night, "will you not stoop
to beg of me your life?"
"It is of no use," answered Ogier.
"Hold the lights, that I may see him!" ordered the Captain.
Two of his men brought torches that emitted as much smoke as light. In
the dungeon, darkened by the men crowding the door, artificial
illumination was necessary.
"You are right there!" shouted Guillem, in response to the words of
Ogier. "I shall not spare your life. But what think you of the mode of
death? Come, kneel, kiss my foot--wounded through you; and I may consent
to have you hanged instead of thrown down yonder!" He indicated the
well-like opening.
The glare of the torches was on Guillem's face as much as on that of his
prisoner. He was haggard with pain and mortified pride. He was but
half-dressed, was in his shirt, and his shirt was open over his red,
hairy breast. His tall, polished head shone like copper in the lurid
flicker of the links. His great mouth, half open with a grim laugh,
revealed the teeth, pointed as though to bite and tear. He was very
thin, but muscular, and his limbs were long. As already said, it was but
in jest that he was entitled "Le Gros."
It may be questioned whether in the heart of a single ruffian present
there stirred the smallest emotion of pity for the man who was to be
sent to so horrible a fate, for all had been humbled by Ogier, and all
angrily resented their humiliation. Moreover, all desired to avenge
their ten companions.
"Hold up the light, that I may see how he relishes it!" ordered Guillem,
brutally. Then he said: "Pull off his boots, strip him to his shirt."
But immediately he countermanded the order.
"Nay," said he, "leave him his leather belt and boots; he may satisfy
his cravings on them. And, Sieur Ogier, when you want more leather, call
for my boots. They have been cut to pieces, and are useless to me. They
may make a meal for you."
The Captain looked steadily at his victim from under his lowering
eyebrows.
"How came you to think of resisting me?" he asked.
Ogier shrugged his shoulders.
"This execution will be noised everywhere," continued Guillem. "I shall
take care of that. And then every man will have a wholesome dread of me,
and a fear of resisting me."
"Not my son Jean," retorted Ogier.
"Your son Jean comes next," said the Captain. "I shall deal with him
presently."
"You must catch him first," said Ogier.
"Take the prisoner to the hold!" shouted Guillem.
Then the two jailers laid their hands on the shoulders of Ogier del'
Peyra.
"You need not drag me. I can walk," said the old man.
Those crowding the close and narrow dungeon fell back, as well as they
were able, to make a passage for the condemned man.
He was taken to the well-mouth and seated on it, with his face towards
the door, through which glimpses of sunlight were visible athwart the
heads that filled the opening. Ogier had been divested of his jerkin. He
was in his shirt and breeches and boots. As the Captain had bidden that
his belt should be left him, this had been refastened about his waist,
after that his coat had been removed. In order to divest him of his
outer garments it had been necessary for the jailers to remove the
handcuffs that had fastened his arms behind his back.
"Cursed smoke!" said Guillem. "We are smothered in the fume. Stand aside
all of you and let the fresh air enter, that we may breathe. Hearken,
Ogier! Will you yet ask life of me?"
At Guillem's command the men had stepped forth and completely cleared
the entrance, so that the brilliant sunlight flowed in as well as the
pure air. And this light fell directly on the man who was soon to be
excluded for ever from it. He was seated on the well-mouth in his white
shirt. His face was as grey as the thick hair of his beard. He was
conscious that he was looking for the last time at the light. He could
see intense blue sky, and one fleecy cloud in it. He could see the green
turf, and some yellow tansies standing against a bit of wall in shade,
the tansies in full sunlight; and he could see a red admiral butterfly
hovering about them. It was marvellous how, with death before him, he
could yet distinguish so much. But he looked at everything with a sort
of greed, because he saw all these things for the last time. For the
first and only moment in his life he saw that a red admiral was
beautiful, that the sky was beautiful, the grass beautiful.
"You have not answered me," said Le Gros Guillem, sneering. "Messire
Ogier, will you yet ask life of me?"
"If you were in my hands, as I am in yours, would you ask that
question?"
Le Gros Guillem paused one moment. Then with an oath--
"No!"
"Nor I of you," said Ogier gravely.
Guillem raised his hands. The fingers were inordinately long and thin.
He made a sign to the jailers, one of whom stood back, on each side of
Ogier, by the well-mouth, with his hand on the shoulder of the prisoner.
Each man, as was customary, had his face covered--that is to say, a
black sack was drawn over his head, in which were two holes cut, through
which peered the eyes.
"Throw him down!"
At that moment, taking advantage of the avenue made for the admission of
air, Noémi rushed in. A couple of men stepped forward to intercept her,
but she was too nimble for them; she was within almost as soon as they
thought of throwing themselves in her way, and had cast herself upon
Ogier and clasped him with her arms.
"Father! Father! It cannot, it shall not be!"
The door was filled again; the men crowded in to see what new turn
events would take, whether this intervention would avail.
The jailers desisted as they were raising the old man; they felt that
the sight of the execution of the sentence could not be permitted to a
young girl. Moreover, she held Del' Peyra fast, and he could not be
extricated from her arms without the exercise of force.
"Noémi!" exclaimed Le Gros Guillem, throwing his feet off the pallet,
"what is the meaning of this? Why are you here? At once away! Do you
hear me?"
"I will not let go! He shall not die! Father, it cannot--it shall not
be!"
"Unloose her arms," ordered Guillem, and signed to the men.
Firmly they obeyed. It was in vain that the girl clung, writhed,
endeavoured to disengage her arms from their grasp, and clung to the
condemned man. They held her like a vice and drew her back from the
pit-mouth and interposed their persons between her and the man she was
endeavouring to save.
Then, in a paroxysm of horror and pity, Noémi threw herself on her knees
before her father and implored him to yield.
"What is Del' Peyra to you?" he asked sternly.
"Nothing--nothing," she gasped. "Oh, father, let him go! let him go!"
"Twice have you interfered between me and him. Why is that?"
She could not answer his question; she did not attempt to do so. She
persisted in her entreaties. In her anguish she caught hold of one of
his injured feet and made him cry out with pain.
"Father! If I have ever done anything for you! If you have any love for
me--any thought to do what I wish--grant me this. Spare him! Spare him!"
"Never!" answered Le Gros Guillem. Then he waved his long hand and said,
"Remove this silly girl."
But when Noémi felt hands laid on her, she leaped to her feet, shook
herself free, and said, panting--
"Let be! Do not touch me! I ask his life, no more."
"You do well, child," sneered the Captain. "You then run no more risk of
disappointment."
"Yet--if that be denied me, there is one thing I do ask," gasped Noémi.
Her breath came as though she had been running up hill. She put her
hands to her head, and held it, till she had recovered sufficiently to
proceed.
"There is one thing I do ask," she repeated. "Do not cast him down--let
him down gently."
A harsh laugh from Le Gros Guillem.
"You are a silly child, a fool, who know not what you ask. You will
prolong his torture, not shorten it--but you shall have your wish. Be it
so."
He waved to the jailers.
"Go, child, go!" said he to his daughter.
"I will stay and see it done," she said. "I will not ask another thing."
She stood erect and looked at the old man; her mouth quivered, and her
eyes were as though fixed hard in their sockets like stones in a
setting.
And the sight was one to freeze the blood.
The jailers raised Ogier, who offered no resistance, but fixed his eyes
strainingly on a spot of light above a man's head in the doorway.
He was lifted till his feet were above the well, and then he was let
down by ropes passed under his arms, slowly, deliberately.
Those holding the torches raised them, and the smoke described
cabalistic devices on the roof. The glare was on the sinking man.
He went down below his knees, then his waist disappeared. Involuntarily
he put forth his arms to arrest his descent, by gripping the
well-breast, but recollected that resistance was in vain, and lowered
his arms to his sides.
Then his breast was hidden, then his shoulders went under. For a moment
all visible was the ghastly grey face with the glittering eyes, and
then--that also was gone.
He uttered no cry, no groan, he went down like a dead man, into profound
darkness, into his living tomb.
All was still in the dungeon, save for the labouring breath of those who
looked on. The jailers lowered till the ropes became slack. Then they
knew the poor wretch was on the floor of the vault below. Each man threw
down one end of his rope and drew at the other, even as at a funeral the
ropes are withdrawn when the dead has been lowered.
In the stillness, Guillem laughed--silently--showing all his fangs, and
waving his arms in the direction of the _oubliette_ mouth, and extending
his lean fingers said--
"_Vade in pace!_"