John of the Woods

by Abbie Farwell Brown

XXVI

THE TALISMAN

John turned his head to see at what the King was staring. There was a movement in the crowd. Men were being elbowed forward. A noise of harsh voices arose, and to the platform crowded three figures in rags and tatters.

They forced their way directly in front of the platform, and stood staring up. John stepped forward to see what it meant, and in a moment fell back with a cry of dismay. He was looking into the eyes of Cecco, Tonio and the Giant!

"Hi! Master Gigi!" cried Tonio's hateful voice; "so here we find you setting up as a tumbler on your own account. Your Majesty," he cried, appealing to the King, who was listening with a wicked grin on his face, "this is our boy. We own him. He ran away, but he belongs to us. Give him to us again!"

The little Princess screamed and clung to the Hermit's arm; but he sat motionless, watching. The people began to murmur and jostle the three strangers. But the King raised his hand, and they listened to him.

"We will hear these men," he said. Then, turning to John, he added smoothly, "And after that, sirrah, you shall answer for yourself."

The Hermit rose and took a step forward, still holding the little Princess by the hand. Brutus broke away from the page who held him, and crouched growling at John's side.

Then Tonio raised his voice, and cried louder, pointing at John with his skinny hand. "He is our boy," he said. "We taught him his trade; let him deny it. Now he is robbing us of our fair dues. He is a runaway. Give him back to us!"

Still John stared at him, too dazed to answer. But the Hermit took another step forward, and said sternly:—

"He is your boy, you say. How did you come by him?"

"We bought him for a gold piece," they said in chorus. "That was years ago. For ten years he traveled with us. And then he ran away. His life is ours; let him deny it if he can!"

John stood silent, horrified at the fate which seemed to confront him. For in those days children who were bought and sold in this cruel way were the slaves of the masters who had purchased them.

The Prince had fallen back, pale and trembling. But the King now spoke again, gazing with malicious eyes upon the two wood-folk whom he hated.

"What have you to say for yourselves?" he asked. "You who do not deny that you are a runaway; you, old man, who stole the lad and must be punished most severely therefor, have you any reason why I should not give the one of you up to these mountebanks, his lawful masters, and the other of you to punishment and death? Speak!" The King's voice was harsh and cruel. His eyes glittered fiercely.

Still John was silent.

"Seize him!" commanded the King. "Seize them both! Off with them to prison!"

The guards stepped forward, unwillingly enough. But at that moment John drew himself up. His eyes flashed; he grasped in both hands the staff over which he had made the wolf leap, and braced himself for defense.

"They shall not take me!" he cried. "I will not go with them. I will die sooner. To me, my brothers!" and he gave a shrill, peculiar cry by which he and the Hermit were wont to call their pets.

[Illustration: To me, my brothers!]

Instantly the Hermit ranged himself at John's side. At the same moment Brutus placed himself, barking and growling, before the twain. Breaking from the leash by which he was held, the wolf came leaping towards them, and stood bristling beside the dog, showing his terrible fangs. With a savage growl Bruin burst his chain and came lumbering to the defense of his friends, and the three devoted animals made a stout and terrible wall about them. But this was not all. From the corners where they were crouched came running the other, gentler pets. Here scampered the cat and her kittens, mewing pitifully. Across the platform hopped the raven. The carrier pigeon fluttered to the Hermit's shoulder. And from the trees all roundabout came winging, with a call answering to John's, a flock of birds who had followed him from the forest, and who had been hidden in the forbidden trees of the King's park until this very hour. They fluttered like a cloud about the heads of the pair, so that one could scarcely see them.

Every one stood amazed; even the King sank back in his seat, stupefied. The guards fell back with lowered weapons. The crowd was silent, staring open-mouthed. Then a murmur arose, and words passed from man to man.

"A miracle! It is a miracle! They must be God's saints!"

But Tonio was not long silent. "Tricks! Tricks!" he cried. "Gigi has become an animal-trainer. But he is our boy still. Give him to us!"

"Seize them!" repeated the King in a choking voice.

Once more the guards made a rush forward. But the animals leaped up
and stood at bay so fiercely that they dared not come nearer. The
Hermit raised his hand, and there was sudden silence. He faced the
King and spoke sternly.

"O King," he said, "you see that they will never take us alive. In sight of all these people will you add more deaths to your record?" The murmur of the crowd grew louder. "Nay, all has not yet been said," he went on. "Listen, O King. You judge too quickly. There is not proof enough of the lad's ownership."

"Not enough?" snarled the King. "I say there is enough and to spare.
Can this boy dispute the words of these men?"

John now looked at the Hermit eagerly. His heart beat with hope of something, he knew not what.

The King sneered. "You see!" he cried triumphantly.

But once more the Hermit held up his hand. "Will you not question these fellows further?" he asked. "Dare you hear more, O King?"

"Dare I!" blustered the King, "and why not, pray? If there be more to say, tell it," he commanded the mountebanks.

"Ay," they answered eagerly, "we can indeed prove that the boy is ours."

"Tell how you came by him," interrupted the Hermit, in a tone not to be disobeyed.

Tonio answered sullenly:—

"We have told already. We bought him for a gold piece, of a fisherman on a distant coast. He had found the babe, nearly dead with cold and hunger, floating in a basket on the sea. It was a castaway, a foundling; no one wanted it. We took it away with us, and had hard work to make it live."

"Is that all?" asked the Hermit. "Was there nothing to prove that this is the same child?" He said this in a loud voice so that every one could hear.

"Proof!" cried Tonio, shaking his fist at John fiercely. "Who can mistake him in that suit, the very one we gave him? Look at his mop of yellow tow and his eye with the brown spot over it. No one who has seen it could forget that spot. Ay, there is still another way to prove him ours. I see the gleam of silver around his neck. He still wears the chain and the bit of silver which he dares not remove, because there is magic in it, they say. It was on his neck when the fisherman found him. Look, and see if we do not say truth!"

John still stood motionless, looking in the Hermit's face. But at these last words the old man stepped behind him and drew the silver talisman from the boy's breast, laying it out on his green silk bosom, where it glittered for all to see.

Cecco and Tonio and the Giant gave a cry of triumph. But from the crowd behind them rose a murmur of different meaning. Men began to crowd forward eagerly.

"Yes, look!" cried the Hermit, pointing at the medal. "The Cross of the good man John, the friend of King Cyril! Which of you does not know and love it?"

The murmur of the crowd swelled into a shout,—"Who is he? Who is the lad? We will know!"

"Who but John," answered the Hermit, with kindling eyes. "Who but John, the good man's son,—my brother's son. I know, for I christened the child, and I saw the King hang this Cross about the baby's neck, a Cross like the one he had given John himself. This is the child who disappeared fourteen years ago. The King sent him away to be killed. But the servant to whom the task fell was less cruel. The child was set adrift on the ocean, and escaped as you have heard. Will you let him be lost again?"

"No! No!" roared the crowd. "He shall not go! He shall not go!" And they seized the three mountebanks and hustled them away.

With a shout the King's own guards rushed forward to help in this matter. There was a cry at the back of the platform. The King had fallen in a fit. But few at the moment were thinking of him. The people were throwing up their caps and dancing joyously.

"John! John!" they shouted. "We knew the silver Cross which the holy John always wore when he went about doing good to us. Oh, we remember now! We shall never again forget! John! Hurrah for his son John!"

John himself stood bewildered, and the animals around him shivered and looked surprised. They were not used to such tumults. Suddenly John felt his hand clasped softly. The little Princess was at his side, looking up in his face and smiling through tears. "Dear John!" she said. "Now you are safe. Now you will be our brother indeed!"

"Yes, he is safe," said the Hermit, embracing the boy tenderly. "My John! My brother's son! Oh, how I have longed to tell you and claim you for my nephew! But I vowed that I would wait until you had proved yourself worthy of him, worthy of the name by which I christened you. And you are worthy, O my dear John, even to wear the silver Cross!"

"I do not understand yet," said John. "Who am I? And why do the people shout my name and seem to love me so much?"

"You are the son of John, the holy friend of the people," answered the
Hermit.

"But you, my father,—for so I must call you still," said John; "who are you, and how came you to be living in the forest?"

"I was but a humble servant of God," said the Hermit. "But when King Cyril died, and my brother and you were gone, there was not happiness for me in the city of sorrow. I became an exile. I fled to the forest with the hunted animals who were my brother's friends. And there I made a home for them, a kingdom of my own, with Brutus for my prime minister. And there, after many years, you came to find me, my dear son! It was a miracle!"

Now the Prince came forward and laid his hand timidly on John's shoulder. "John," he said, "now you know how less than ever you have reason to love the rulers of this land. But oh, John! I beg you to forgive us. Be my brother, John; and if you can forget, let me be your friend!"

"My brother and friend!" cried John; and the two hugged each other affectionately, while Brutus leaped up and licked the face first of one, then of the other, and the other animals frisked joyously.

"Hurrah! Hurrah!" shouted the people, "They are like good King Cyril and his friend the holy John. Let it be so! Let it be so! Hurrah! Hurrah!"