II.

Rosy and azure flames were curling and crackling all along the huge oak

log which burned in the wide fire-place; our shadows, thrown in

wavering grotesques on the blackened walls, dwindled or grew gigantic

according as the blaze emitted more or less brilliancy; the alderwood

cup, now empty, now full (and not with water), like the buckets of an

irrigating wheel, had been thrice passed round the circle that we formed

about the fire, and all were awaiting impatiently the story of The

Devil’s Cross, promised us by way of dessert after the frugal supper

which we had just eaten, when our guide coughed twice, tossed down a

last draught of wine, wiped his mouth on the back of his hand and began

thus:

“It was a long, long time ago, how long I cannot say, but the Moors were

occupying yet the greater part of Spain, our kings were called counts,

and the towns and villages were held in fief by certain lords, who in

turn rendered homage to others more powerful, when that event which I am

about to relate took place.”

After this brief historical introduction, the hero of the occasion

remained silent some few moments, as if to arrange his thoughts, and

proceeded thus:

“Well! the story goes that in that remote time this town and some others

formed part of the patrimony of a noble baron whose seigniorial castle

stood for many centuries upon the crest of a crag bathed by the Segre,

from which it takes its name.

“Some shapeless ruins that, overgrown with wild mustard and moss, may

still be seen upon the summit from the road which leads to this town,

testify to the truth of my story.

“I do not know whether by chance or through some deed of shame it came

to pass that this lord, who was detested by his vassals for his cruelty,

and for his evil disposition refused admission to court by the king and

to their homes by his neighbors, grew weary of living alone with his bad

temper and his cross-bowmen on the top of the rock where his

forefathers had hung their nest of stone.

“Night and day he taxed his wits to find some amusement consonant with

his character, which was no easy matter, since he had grown tired of

making war on his neighbors, beating his servants and hanging his

subjects.

“At this time, the chronicles relate, there occurred to him, though

without precedent, a happy idea.

“Knowing that the Christians of other nations were preparing to go

forth, united in a formidable fleet, to a marvellous country in order to

reconquer the sepulchre of our Lord Jesus Christ which was in possession

of the Moors, he determined to join their following.

“Whether he entertained this idea with intent of atoning for his sins,

which were not few, by shedding blood in so righteous a cause; or

whether his object was to remove to a place where his vicious deeds were

not known, cannot be said; but it is true that to the great satisfaction

of old and young, of vassals and equals, he gathered together what money

he could, released his towns, at a heavy price, from their allegiance,

and reserving of his estates no more than the crag of the Segre and the

four towers of the castle, his ancestral seat, disappeared between the

night and the morning.

“The whole district drew a long breath, as if awakened from a nightmare.

“Now no longer clusters of men, instead of fruits, hung from the trees

of their orchards; the young peasant girls no longer feared to go, their

jars upon their heads, to draw water from the wells by the wayside; nor

did the shepherds lead their flocks to the Segre by the roughest secret

paths, fearing at every turn of the steep track to encounter the

cross-bowmen of their dearly beloved lord.

“Thus three years elapsed. The story of the Wicked Count, for by that

name only was he known, had come to be the exclusive possession of the

old women, who in the long, long winter evenings would relate his

atrocities with hollow and fearful voice to the terrified children,

while mothers would affright their naughty toddlers and crying babies by

saying: ‘_Here comes the Count of the Segre!_’ When behold! I know not

whether by day or by night, whether fallen from heaven or cast forth by

hell, the dreaded Count appeared indeed, and, as we say, in flesh and

bone, in the midst of his former vassals.

“I forbear to describe the effect of this agreeable surprise. You can

imagine it better than I can depict it, merely from my telling you that

he returned claiming his forfeited rights; that if he went away evil, he

came back worse; and that if he was poor and without credit before going

to the war, now he could count on no other resources than his

desperation, his lance and a half dozen adventurers as profligate and

impious as their chieftain.

“As was natural, the towns refused to pay tribute, from which at so

great cost they had bought exemption, but the Count fired their

orchards, their farm-houses and their crops.

“Then they appealed to the royal justice of the realm, but the Count

ridiculed the letters mandatory of his sovereign lords; he nailed them

over the sally-port of his castle and hung the bearers from an oak.

“Exasperated, and seeing no other way of salvation, at last they made a

league with one another, commended themselves to Providence and took up

arms; but the Count gathered his followers, called the Devil to his aid,

mounted his rock and made ready for the struggle.

“It began, terrible and bloody. There was fighting with all sorts of

weapons, in all places and at all hours, with sword and fire, on the

mountain and in the plain, by day and by night.

“This was not fighting to live; it was living to fight.

“In the end the cause of justice triumphed. You shall hear how.

“One dark, intensely dark night, when no sound was heard on earth nor a

single star shone in heaven, the lords of the fortress, elated by a

recent victory, divided the booty and, drunk with the fume of the

liquors, in the midst of their mad and boisterous revel intoned

sacrilegious songs in praise of their infernal patron.

“As I have said, nothing was heard around the castle save the echo of

the blasphemies which throbbed out into the black bosom of the night

like the throbbing of lost souls wrapped in the hurricane folds of hell.

“Now the careless sentinels had several times fixed their eyes on the

hamlet which rested in silence and, without fear of a surprise, had

fallen asleep leaning on the thick staves of their lances, when, lo and

behold! a few villagers, resolved to die and protected by the darkness,

began to scale the crag of the Segre whose crest they reached at the

very moment of midnight.

“Once on the summit, that which remained for them to do required little

time. The sentinels passed with a single bound the barrier which

separates sleep from death. Fire, applied with resinous torches to

drawbridge and portcullis, leaped with lightning rapidity to the walls,

and the scaling-party, favored by the confusion and making their way

through the flames, put an end to the occupants of that fortress in the

twinkling of an eye.

“All perished.

“When the next day began to whiten the lofty tops of the junipers, the

charred remains of the fallen towers were still smoking, and through

their gaping breaches it was easy to discern, glittering as the light

struck it, where it hung suspended from one of the blackened pillars of

the banquet hall, the armor of the dreaded chieftain whose dead body,

covered with blood and dust, lay between the torn tapestries and the hot

ashes, confounded with the corpses of his obscure companions.

“Time passed. Briers began to creep through the deserted courts, ivy to

climb the dark heaps of masonry, and the blue morning-glory to sway and

swing from the very turrets. The changeful sighs of the breeze, the

croaking of the birds of night, and the soft stir of reptiles gliding

through the tall weeds alone disturbed from time to time the deathly

silence of that accursed place. The unburied bones of its former

inhabitants lay white in the moonlight and still there could be seen the

bundled armor of the Count of the Segre hanging from the blackened

pillar of the banquet hall.

“No one dared touch it, but a thousand fables were current concerning

it. It was a constant source of foolish reports and terrors among those

who saw it flashing in the sunlight by day, or thought they heard in the

depths of the night the metallic sound of its pieces as they struck one

another when the wind moved them, with a prolonged and doleful groan.

“Notwithstanding all the stories which were set afloat concerning the

armor and which the people of the surrounding region repeated in hushed

tones one to another, they were no more than stories, and the only

positive result was a constant state of fear that every one tried for

his own part to dissimulate, putting, as we say, a brave face on it.

“If the matter had gone no further, no harm would have been done. But

the Devil, who apparently was not satisfied with his work, began, no

doubt with the permission of God, that so the country might expiate its

sins, to take a hand in the game.

“From that moment the tales, which until then had been nothing more than

vague rumors without any show of truth, began to assume consistency and

to grow from day to day more probable.

“Finally there came nights in which all the village-folk were able to

see a strange phenomenon.

“Amid the shadows in the distance, now climbing the steep, twisting

paths of the crag of the Segre, now wandering among the ruins of the

castle, now seeming to oscillate in the air, mysterious and fantastic

lights were seen gliding, crossing, vanishing and reappearing to recede

in different directions,--lights whose source no one could explain.

“This was repeated for three or four nights during the space of a month

and the perplexed villagers looked in disquietude for the result of

those conventicles, for which certainly they were not kept waiting long.

Soon three or four homesteads in flames, a number of missing cattle, and

the dead bodies of a few travellers, thrown from precipices, alarmed all

the region for ten leagues about.

“Now no doubt remained. A band of evildoers were harboring in the

dungeons of the castle.

“These desperadoes, who showed themselves at first only very rarely and

at definite points of the forest which even to this day extends along

the river, finally came to hold almost all the passes of the mountains,

to lie in ambush by the roads, to plunder the valleys and to descend

like a torrent on the plain where, slaughtering indiscriminately, they

did not leave a doll with its head on.

“Assassinations multiplied; young girls disappeared and children were

snatched from their cradles despite the lamentations of their mothers to

furnish those diabolical feasts at which, it was generally believed, the

sacramental vessels stolen from the profaned churches were used as

goblets.

“Terror took such possession of men’s souls that, when the bell rang for

the Angelus, nobody dared to leave his house, though even there was no

certain security against the banditti of the crag.

“But who were they? Whence had they come? What was the name of their

mysterious chief? This was the enigma which all sought to explain, but

which thus far no one could solve, although it was noticed that from

this time on the armor of the feudal lord had disappeared from the place

it had previously occupied, and afterwards various peasants had affirmed

that the captain of this inhuman crew marched at its head clad in a suit

of mail which, if not the same, was its exact counterpart.

“But in the essential fact, when stripped of that fantastic quality with

which fear augments and embellishes its cherished creations, there was

nothing necessarily supernatural nor strange.

“What was more common in outlaws than the barbarities for which this

band was distinguished or more natural than that their chief should

avail himself of the abandoned armor of the Count of the Segre?

“But the dying revelations of one of his followers, taken prisoner in

the latest affray, heaped up the measure of evidence, convincing the

most incredulous. Less or more in words, the substance of his confession

was this:

“‘I belong,’ he said, ‘to a noble family. My youthful irregularities, my

mad extravagances, and finally my crimes drew upon my head the wrath of

my kindred and the curse of my father, who, at his death, disinherited

me. Finding myself alone and without any resources whatever, it was the

Devil, without doubt, who must needs suggest to me the idea of gathering

together some youths in a situation similar to my own. These, seduced by

the promise of a future of dissipation, liberty and abundance, did not

hesitate an instant to subscribe to my designs.

“‘These designs consisted in forming a band of young men of gay temper,

unscrupulous and reckless, who thenceforward would live joyously on the

product of their valor and at the cost of the country, until God should

please to dispose of each according to His will, as happens to me this

day.

“‘With this object we chose this district as the theatre of our future

expeditions, and selected as the point most suitable for our gatherings

the abandoned castle of the Segre, a place peculiarly secure, not only

because of its strong and advantageous position, but as defended against

the peasantry by their superstitions and dread.

“‘Gathered one night under its ruined arcades, around a bonfire that

illumined with its ruddy glow the deserted galleries, a heated dispute

arose as to which of us should be chosen chief.

“‘Each one alleged his merits; I advanced my claims; already some were

muttering together with threatening looks, and others, whose voices were

loud in drunken quarrel, had their hands on the hilts of their poniards

to settle the question, when we suddenly heard a strange rattling of

armor, accompanied by hollow, resounding footsteps which became more and

more distinct. We all cast around uneasy, suspicious glances. We rose

and bared our blades, determined to sell our lives dear, but we could

only stand motionless on seeing advance, with firm and even tread, a man

of lofty stature, completely armed from head to foot, his face covered

with the visor of his helmet. Drawing his broad-sword, which two men

could scarcely wield, and placing it upon one of the charred fragments

of the fallen arcades, he exclaimed in a voice hollow and deep like the

murmurous fall of subterranean waters:

“‘_If any one of you dare to be first, while I dwell in the castle of

the Segre, let him take up this sword, emblem of power._

“‘All were silent until, the first moment of astonishment passed, with

loud voices we proclaimed him our captain, offering him a glass of our

wine. This he declined by signs, perchance that he need not reveal his

face, which in vain we strove to distinguish across the iron bars hiding

it from our eyes.

“‘Nevertheless we swore that night the most terrible oaths, and on the

following began our nocturnal raids. In these, our mysterious chief went

always at our head. Fire does not stop him, nor dangers intimidate him,

nor tears move him. He never speaks, but when blood smokes on our hands,

when churches fall devoured by the flames, when women flee affrighted

amid the ruins, and children utter screams of pain, and the old men

perish under our blows, he answers the groans, the imprecations and the

lamentations with a loud laugh of savage joy.

“‘Never does he lay aside his arms nor lift the visor of his helmet

after victory nor take part in the feast nor yield himself to slumber.

The swords that strike him pierce his armor without causing death or

drawing blood; fire reddens his coat of mail and yet he pushes on

undaunted amid the flames, seeking new victims; he scorns gold, despises

beauty, and is not moved by ambition.

“‘Among ourselves, some think him a madman, others a ruined noble who

from a remnant of shame conceals his face, and there are not wanting

those who are persuaded that it is the very Devil in person.’

“The author of these revelations died with a mocking smile on his lips

and without repenting of his sins; divers of his comrades followed him

at different times to meet their punishment, but the dreaded chief, to

whom continually gathered new proselytes, did not cease his ravages.

“The unhappy inhabitants of the region, more and more harassed and

desperate, had not yet achieved that pitch of resolution necessary to

put an end, once for all, to this order of things, every day more

insupportable and grievous.

“Adjoining the hamlet and hidden in the depths of a dense forest, there

dwelt at this time, in a little hermitage dedicated to Saint

Bartholomew, a holy man of godly and exemplary life, whom the peasants

always held in an odor of sanctity, thanks to his wholesome counsels and

sure predictions.

“This venerable hermit, to whose prudence and proverbial wisdom the

people of Bellver committed the solution of their difficult problem,

after seeking divine aid through his patron saint, who, as you know, is

well acquainted with the Devil, and on more than one occasion has put

him in a tight place, advised that they should lie in ambush during the

night at the foot of the stony road which winds up to the rock on whose

summit stands the castle. He charged them at the same time that, once

there, they should use no other weapons to apprehend the Enemy than a

wonderful prayer which he had them commit to memory, and with which the

chronicles assert that Saint Bartholomew had made the Devil his

prisoner.

“The plan was put into immediate execution, and its success exceeded all

hopes, for the morrow’s sun had not lit the high tower of Bellver when

its inhabitants gathered in groups in the central square, telling one

another with an air of mystery how, that night, the famous captain of

the banditti of the Segre had come into the town bound hand and foot and

securely tied to the back of a strong mule.

“By what art the actors in this enterprise had brought it to such

fortunate issue no one succeeded in finding out nor were they themselves

able to tell; but the fact remained that, thanks to the prayer of the

Saint or to the daring of his devotees, the attempt had resulted as

narrated.

“As soon as the news began to spread from mouth to mouth and from house

to house, throngs rushed into the streets with loud huzzas and were soon

massed before the doors of the prison. The parish bell called together

the civic body, the most substantial citizens met in council, and all

awaited in suspense the hour when the criminal should appear before his

improvised judges.

“These judges, who were authorized by the sovereign power of Urgel to

administer themselves justice prompt and stern to those malefactors,

deliberated but a moment, after which they commanded that the culprit be

brought before them to receive his sentence.

“As I have said, as in the central square, so in the streets through

which the prisoner must pass to the place where he should meet his

judges, the impatient multitude thronged like a clustered swarm of bees.

Especially at the gateway of the prison the popular excitement mounted

from moment to moment, and already animated dialogues, sullen mutterings

and threatening shouts had begun to give the warders anxiety, when

fortunately the order came to bring forth the criminal.

“As he appeared below the massive arch of the prison portal, in complete

armor, his face covered with the visor, a low, prolonged murmur of

admiration and surprise rose from the compact multitude which with

difficulty opened to let him pass.

“All had recognized in that coat of mail the well-known armor of the

Count of the Segre, that armor which had been the object of the most

gloomy traditions while it had been hanging from the ruined walls of the

accursed stronghold.

“This was that armor; there was left no room for doubt. All had seen the

black plume waving from his helmet’s crest in the battles which formerly

they had fought against their lord; all had seen it, blowing in the

morning breeze, like the ivy of the flame-gnawed pillar on which the

armor had hung since the death of its owner. But who could be the

unknown personage who was wearing it now? Soon it would be known; at

least, so they thought. Events will show how this expectation, like many

another, was frustrated and how out of this solemn act of justice, from

which might have been expected a complete revelation of the truth, there

resulted new and more inexplicable confusions.

“The mysterious bandit arrived finally at the Council Hall and a

profound silence followed the murmurs which had arisen among the

bystanders on hearing resound beneath the lofty arches of that chamber

the click of his golden spurs. One of the members of the tribunal in a

slow and uncertain voice asked his name, and all anxiously listened that

they might not lose one word of his response, but the warrior only

shrugged his shoulders lightly with an air of contempt and insult, which

could but irritate his judges, who exchanged glances of surprise.

“Three times the question was repeated, and as often received the same

or a similar reply.

“‘Have him lift his visor! Have him show his face! Have him show his

face!’ the citizens present at the trial began to shout. ‘Have him show

his face! We will see if then he dare insult us with his contempt, as he

does now hidden in his mail.’

“‘Show your face,’ demanded the same member of the tribunal who had

before addressed him.

“The warrior remained motionless.

“‘I command you by the authority of this council.’

“The same answer.

“‘By the authority of this realm.’

“Nor for that.

“Indignation rose to its height, even to the point where one of the

guards, throwing himself upon the criminal, whose pertinacious silence

was enough to exhaust the patience of a saint, violently opened his

visor. A general cry of surprise escaped from those within the hall, who

remained for an instant smitten with an inconceivable amazement.

“The cause was adequate.

“The helmet, whose iron visor, as all could see, was partly lifted

toward the forehead, partly fallen over the shining steel gorget, was

empty,--entirely empty.

“When, the first moment of terror passed, they would have touched it,

the armor shivered slightly and, breaking asunder into its various

pieces, fell to the floor with a dull, strange clang.

“The greater part of the spectators, at the sight of the new prodigy,

forsook the room tumultuously and rushed in terror to the square.

“The news spread with the speed of thought among the multitude who were

awaiting impatiently the result of the trial; and such was the alarm,

the excitement and the clamor, that no one longer doubted what the

popular voice had asserted from the first--that the Devil, on the death

of the Count of the Segre, had inherited the fiefs of Bellver.

“At last the tumult subsided, and it was decided to return the

miraculous armor to the dungeon.

“When this was so bestowed, they despatched four envoys, who, as

representing the perplexed town, should present the case to the royal

Count of Urgel and the archbishop. In a few days these envoys returned

with the decision of those dignitaries, a decision brief and

comprehensive.

“‘Let the armor be hanged,’ they said, ‘in the central square of the

town; if the Devil occupies it, he will find it necessary to abandon it

or to be strangled with it.’

“The people of Bellver, enchanted with so ingenious a solution, again

assembled in council, ordered a very high gallows to be erected in the

square, and when once more the multitude filled the approaches to the

prison, went thither for the armor in a body with all the civic dignity

which the importance of the case demanded.

“When this honorable delegation arrived at the massive arch giving

entrance to the building, a pallid and distracted man threw himself to

the ground in the presence of the astonished bystanders, exclaiming with

tears in his eyes:

“‘Pardon, _señores_, pardon!’

“‘Pardon! For whom?’ said some, ‘for the Devil, who dwells in the armor

of the Count of the Segre?’

“‘For me,’ continued with shaking voice the unhappy man in whom all

recognized the chief warden of the prison, ‘for me--because the

armor--has disappeared.’

“On hearing these words, amazement was painted on the faces of as many

as were in the portico; silent and motionless, so they would have

remained God knows how long if the following narrative of the terrified

keeper had not caused them to gather in groups around him, greedy for

every word.

“‘Pardon me, _señores_,’ said the poor warden, ‘and I will conceal

nothing from you, however much it may be against me.’

“All maintained silence and he went on as follows:

“‘I shall never succeed in giving the reason, but the fact is that the

story of the empty armor always seemed to me a fable manufactured in

favor of some noble personage whom perhaps grave reasons of public

policy did not permit the judges to make known or to punish.

“‘I was ever of this belief--a belief in which I could not but be

confirmed by the immobility in which the armor remained from the hour

when, by the order of the tribunal, it was brought a second time to the

prison. In vain, night after night, desiring to surprise its secret, if

secret there were, I crept up little by little and listened at the

cracks of the iron door of its dungeon. Not a sound was perceptible.

“‘In vain I managed to observe it through a small hole made in the wall;

thrown upon a little straw in one of the darkest corners, it remained

day after day disordered and motionless.

“‘One night, at last, pricked by curiosity and wishing to convince

myself that this object of terror had nothing mysterious about it, I

lighted a lantern, went down to the dungeons, drew their double bolts

and, not taking the precaution to shut the doors behind me, so firm was

my belief that all this was no more than an old wives’ tale, entered the

cell. Would I had never done it! Scarcely had I taken a few steps when

the light of my lantern went out of itself and my teeth began to chatter

and my hair to rise. Breaking the profound silence that encompassed me,

I had heard something like a sound of metal pieces which stirred and

clanked in fitting themselves together in the gloom.

“‘My first movement was to throw myself toward the door to bar the

passage, but on grasping its panels I felt upon my shoulders a

formidable hand, gauntleted, which, after jerking me violently aside,

flung me upon the threshold. There I remained until the next morning

when my subordinates found me unconscious and, on reviving, only able to

recollect that after my fall I had seemed to hear, confusedly, a

sounding tread accompanied by the clatter of spurs, which little by

little grew more distant until it died away.’

“When the warden had finished, profound silence reigned, on which there

followed an infernal outbreak of lamentations, shouts and threats.

“It was with difficulty that the more temperate could control the

populace, who, infuriated at this last turn of affairs, demanded with

fierce outcry the death of the inquisitive author of their new

disappointment.

“At last the tumult was quieted and the people began to lay plans for a

fresh capture. This attempt, too, had a satisfactory outcome.

“At the end of a few days, the armor was again in the power of its foes.

Now that the formula was known and the help of Saint Bartholomew

secured, the thing was no longer very difficult.

“But yet something remained to be done; in vain, after conquering it,

they hanged it from a gallows; in vain they exercised the utmost

vigilance for the purpose of giving it no opportunity to escape by way

of the upper world. But as soon as two fingers’ breadth of light fell on

the scattered pieces of armor, they fitted themselves together and,

clinkity clank, made off again to resume their raids over mountain and

plain, which was a blessing indeed.

“This was a story without an end.

“In so critical a state of affairs, the people divided among themselves

the pieces of the armor that, perchance for the hundredth time, had come

into their possession, and prayed the pious hermit, who had once before

enlightened them with his counsel, to decide what they should do with

it.

“The holy man ordained a general fast. He buried himself for three days

in the depths of a cavern that served him as a retreat and at their end

bade them melt the diabolical armor and with this and some hewn stones

from the castle of the Segre, erect a cross.

“The work was carried through, although not without new and fearful

prodigies which filled with terror the souls of the dismayed inhabitants

of Bellver.

“As soon as the pieces thrown into the flames began to redden, long and

deep groans seemed to come out of the great blaze, within whose circle

of fuel the armor leapt as if it were alive and felt the action of the

fire. A whirl of sparks red, green and blue danced on the points of the

spiring flames and twisted about hissing, as if a legion of devils,

mounted on these, would fight to free their lord from that torment.

“Strange, horrible, was the process by which the incandescent armor lost

its form to take that of a cross.

“The hammers fell clanging with a frightful uproar upon the anvil, where

twenty sturdy smiths beat into shape the bars of boiling metal that

quivered and groaned beneath the blows.

“Already the arms of the sign of our redemption were outspread, already

the upper end was beginning to take form, when the fiendish, glowing

mass writhed anew, as if in frightful convulsion, and enfolding the

unfortunate workmen, who struggled to free themselves from its deadly

embrace, glittered in rings like a serpent or contracted itself in

zigzag like lightning.

“Incessant labor, faith, prayers and holy water succeeded, at last, in

overcoming the infernal spirit, and the armor was converted into a

cross.

“This cross it is you have seen to-day, the cross in which the Devil who

gives it its name is bound. Before it the young people in the month of

May place no clusters of lilies, nor do the shepherds uncover as they

pass by, nor the old folk kneel; the strict admonitions of the priest

scarcely prevent the boys from stoning it.

“God has closed His ears to all supplications offered Him in its

presence. In the winter, packs of wolves gather about the juniper which

overshadows it to rush upon the herds; banditti wait in its shade for

travellers whose slain bodies they bury at its foot, and when the

tempest rages, the lightnings deviate from their course to meet,

hissing, at the head of this cross and to rend the stones of its

pedestal.”