DUKE CHARLES THE RASH
Our caravan travelled with the mournfulness of a funeral procession. Early in the evening Max spoke to Yolanda:--
"I hear your uncle desires Sir Karl and me to leave you at Metz."
"Yes," she answered dolefully, hanging her head, "we part at Metz. I shall see you there before I leave, and then--and then--ah, Sir Max, I was wrong and you were right; there is no hope."
"What of the lady who gave me the ring?" asked Max, in a feeble effort to banter her.
"She would have made you very happy, Sir Max. Her estates would have compensated for all losses elsewhere."
"You know, that is not true, Yolanda," said Max, earnestly.
"I am not sure, Sir Max," responded the girl, "and do not wish to be sure. I will see you at Metz, and there we may part. It is our fate. We must not be doleful, Sir Max, we must be--we must be--happy and brave." Her poor little effort to be happy and brave was piteous.
Castleman soon fell back with Yolanda, and Max rode forward beside me.
At midnight we offsaddled by a stream in a forest and allowed our horses and mules to rest until sunrise. Then we took up our journey again, and by forced marches reached Metz one morning an hour before dawn. We waited in a drizzling rain till the gates opened, and, after a long parley with the warder, entered the city. We were all nearly exhausted, and our poor mules staggered along the streets hardly able to carry their burdens another step. Two had fallen a half-league outside of Metz; and three others fell with their loads within the city gates.
Castleman had determined to stop with a merchant friend, and after what seemed a long journey from the gates we halted at the merchant's house. Our host left us in his parlor while he went to arrange for breakfast. When he had gone Castleman turned to me:--
"You and Sir Max will, if you please, find good lodging at the Great Tun. My friend will send a man in advance to bespeak your comfort."
Max and I rose to leave, and Yolanda offered him her hand, saying:--
"It may be that we are to part here at Metz, but I will send for you soon and will see you before we leave, and--and--" She could not speak further; tears were in her eyes and her voice. It was not so easy after all to be happy and brave.
"You will not fail to send for me?" asked Max, clinging to her hand.
"I will not fail," she answered, looking up timidly and instantly dropping her eyes. "Of that you have better assurance than you will ever know."
Castleman followed us to the street door and handed me a purse of gold.
"I have expected to part from you here," he said, "and it may be so; but I fear I shall need your services still further. My mules are unfit to travel at present; they may never be fit to use; surely not within a fortnight. I must find other sumpter mules, wait for those I have to regain their strength, or leave my goods at Metz. My fortune is invested in these silks, and if I leave them here, I shall never see them again. In case the Duke of Lorraine succeeds in rallying his subjects against Burgundy, I shall find it difficult to buy sumpter mules on the eve of war, and may be compelled to remain in Metz until my own mules are able to travel. In that event may I depend upon you and Sir Max to escort my niece and my daughter to Peronne without me?"
I answered promptly, though against my desires:--"You may depend on us."
At midnight I was aroused by a knock at my door. I arose and admitted Castleman.
"I will take you at your word, Sir Karl," said the burgher. "I cannot obtain sumpter mules, and I shall be ruined in fortune if I leave my silks at Metz. I have had word that the Duke of Burgundy leaves Ghent the day after to-morrow for Peronne. If he leaves late in the day, you may, by starting at once, reach Peronne Castle ahead of him. His journey will be shorter than yours by twenty-five leagues, but you will have a better road. If you travel with all haste, you may be able to take Yolanda, with--with the important papers, to the castle a half-day before my lord arrives there. Are you ready to begin the journey at once?"
"We are ready," answered Max.
"I will meet you at the Deutsches Thor Gate within an hour," said Castleman. "My daughter and my niece will be there. Since you are to travel rapidly I advise a small retinue. Your squires have proved themselves worthy men, and I feel sure you will be able to protect your charges."
"We'll not boast of what we shall do, good Castleman," said Max, "but we'll do our best."
"If you reach Peronne after the duke arrives," said Castleman, "I advise you not to enter the gates of the city, but to leave Burgundy at once and with all the speed you can make. If you reach Peronne before the duke, I advise you not to tarry; but if you determine to remain, you will go to The Mitre--a quiet inn kept by my good friend Marcus Grote. I strongly advise you not to remain at Peronne; but if you do not see fit to follow my advice, I hope you will remain close at The Mitre until my return, which, I trust, will be within three weeks. Danger will attend you if you do not follow my suggestion. In any case, Sir Max, I hope you will not visit my house. My words may seem ungracious, but they are for your good and mine. When I return to Peronne, I shall be happy if you will honor my poor house; but until my return, untold trouble to many persons may follow your disregard of what I say."
Castleman then departed, and we immediately arranged for the journey.
Max and I, with our squires, were waiting at the Deutsches Thor Gate when Castleman arrived with Twonette, Yolanda, and a guide. I knocked at the door of the lodge to rouse the warder, who, of course, was asleep, and that alert guardian of a drowsy city came grumbling to the wicket.
"What in the devil's name do you want at this time of night?" he growled. "The gates won't open till dawn."
"Yes, they will," replied Castleman. "I have the burgomaster's order."
"I open the gates only on an order from the governor of the citadel," said the warder.
"I have not that, my good friend," responded Castleman, "but I have a hundred silver marks in my purse."
"Let me see the burgomaster's order," said the worthy gatekeeper. "I am always glad to be accommodating."
Castleman handed over the order and the purse, and the warder pretended to read the paper in the dark.
"I'll open the gate to accommodate you and to please the burgomaster," he said.
The gates screeched upon their hinges, and every link in the portcullis chain groaned as if it wished to alarm the city. When the portcullis was a-block, Max, myself, and the squires mounted our horses. Yolanda leaned down from her saddle and, placing her arms about Castleman's neck, kissed him. Twonette followed her example; then our small cavalcade passed out through the gate, and we entered on our long, hard race with the Duke of Burgundy.
At dawn Yolanda called me to her side.
"Our guide will conduct us to Cinq Voies on the Somme, eight leagues this side of Peronne," she said. "There we shall dismiss him. From Cinq Voies the road is straight to Peronne down the river. Shall we put our horses to the gallop?"
To her last suggestion I objected:--
"We have no relays. These horses must carry us to Peronne. In Styria we have an adage, 'If you would gallop on a long journey, walk your horse.'"
"In Styria!" exclaimed Yolanda, laughing. "You told me you were from Italy."
"So I am," I replied.
"Now you say we have an adage in Styria," she returned, amused at my discomfiture. "I hope you have not been wandering from the path of truth in your long journey, Sir Karl."
"No farther than yourself, Fräulein," I answered.
A frown came instantly to her face and, after a moment's hesitation, she retorted:--
"Ah, but I am a woman; I am privileged to wander a little way from the narrow road. A man may protect himself with his sword and battle-axe, and need never stray. A woman's defence lies in her wit and her tongue." The frown deepened, and she turned sharply upon me: "But in what respect, pray, have I wandered? I have not spoken a word to you which has not been the exact truth. If I have left anything untold, it is because I do not wish to tell it, in which case, of course, you would not wish to pry."
Her audacity amused me, and though I knew I ought to hold my tongue, I could not resist saying:--
"I have asked no questions, Fräulein."
Yolanda cast a surprised glance toward me and then broke into a merry laugh.
"That is to say I have asked too many questions. Good for you, Sir Karl! I have had the worst of this encounter. I will ask no more questions nor give you further cause to wander from the truth. Your memory, Sir Karl, is poor. 'To be a good liar, one must have a good memory,' as King Louis of France has said."
"Ask all the questions you wish, Fräulein," I responded penitently, "I will answer with the truth."
"There is no need to ask questions," she said, giving me a side glance full of sauciness. "I already know all that I wish to know."
I could not resist saying:--
"Perhaps, Fräulein, I know quite as much about you as you know about us."
"There is little to know about me that is really worth while, but what little there is I sincerely hope you do not know," she replied half angrily. "If you do know anything which I have left untold, or if, in your vanity, you think you have discovered some great mystery concerning me, I advise you to keep your supposed knowledge to yourself. The day that I am made sure you know too much, our friendship ceases, and that, Sir Karl, would give me pain. I hope it would pain you."
I at once began an orderly though hasty retreat.
"I do not know to what you refer concerning yourself," I explained. "All I know about you is that you are Fräulein Castleman, and a very charming person, whom I would have for my friend, if that be possible. I spoke but jestingly. I have often doubted that you are a burgher maiden, but there my knowledge ceases; and I am willing that it should so remain till you see fit to enlighten me."
"There is little knowledge in doubt," said Yolanda, with a nervous laugh, "though a doubt usually precedes wisdom."
Although I was looking at my horse's ears, I could see the light of her eyes as she watched me inquiringly. After a long pause she stroked her horse's mane with her whip, and said, musingly:--
"A man should seek to know only the languages, philosophy, and other useful learning. Useless knowledge has cost many a man his head."
After a long pause she turned to me with a broad smile:--
"But it is usually not dangerous so long as it does not lodge in the tongue."
I replied quickly:--
"Fräulein, when my tongue makes a fool of me, I pray God I may lose it."
"God save all fools by a like fate," she answered.
I was sure she did not mean to include me in the category of fools.
This conversation revealed to me two facts: first, I learned that by some means--possibly the ring Max wore--this girl, Yolanda, whoever she might be, knew Max. Second, I discovered in myself a dangerous propensity to talk, and of all sure roads to ruin the tongue is the surest. A man's vanity prompts him to be witty; hatred prompts him to cut his enemy, and his love of truth often prompts him to speak it at the wrong time. These three motives combined often prompt him to lose his head. Max and I were on dangerous ground, and one untimely error might make it perilous.
We travelled rapidly, and near midnight of the second day out of Metz we reached Cinq Voies on the Somme. The village, consisting of a large inn, a church, a priest's house, and a farrier's shop, is situate at the meeting of five roads, from which the hamlet takes its name. One road led down from Cambrai and Ghent in the north, one from Liege in the northeast, and the one over which we had travelled from Metz came out of the southeast. Two roads led westward to Peronne. One followed the right bank of the Somme, passed Peronne, and thence on to Amiens. Another road followed the left bank of the Somme, touched Peronne, and thence ran southwesterly to Paris.
When we reached Cinq Voies on the Somme--within eight leagues of Peronne--we halted for supper, very tired and weary. While supper was preparing, we held a consultation, and determined to rest there for the night. I advised against this course, believing that the duke would pass that way on his road from Ghent to Peronne. But Yolanda's sweet face was pinched by weariness, and Twonette was sound asleep. Our horses, I feared, might fail, and leave us hopelessly in the lurch. Therefore, I gave the command to offsaddle, and we halted at the inn for the night.
Our host told me his house was full of guests who had arrived two hours before, but he found a room for Yolanda and Twonette, and told Max and me to sleep, if we could, on the tap-room floor. After an hour on the hard boards I went to the stable, and, rousing a groom, gave him a silver crown for the privilege of sleeping on a wisp of hay. I fell asleep at once and must have slept like the dead, for the dawn was breaking when one of our squires wakened me. I could not believe that I had been sleeping five minutes, but the dim morning light startled me, and I ordered the horses saddled.
I hastened to the inn and wakened Max, to whose well-covered bones a board was as soft as a feather bed. While I was speaking to him, I heard a noise in an adjoining room and saw the door opening. Max and I barely escaped through an open arch when a commanding figure clad in light armor entered the tap-room.
I had not seen Charles of Burgundy since he was a boy--he was then Count of Charolois--but I at once knew with terrifying certainty that I looked on the most dreaded man in Europe. He had changed greatly since I last had seen him. He was then beardless; now he wore a beard that reached almost to his belt, and I should not have recognized in him the young Count of Charolois. There was, however, no doubt in my mind concerning his identity.
Even had I failed to see the angry scar on his neck, of which I had often heard, or had I failed to note the lack of upper teeth (a fact known to all Europe) which gave his face an expression of savagery, I should have recognized him by his mien. There was not another man like him in all the world, and I trust there never will be. His face wore an expression of ferocity that was almost brutal. The passions of anger, arrogance, and hatred were marked on every feature; but over all there was the stamp of an almost superhuman strength, the impress of an iron will, the expression of an exhaustless energy, and the majesty of a satanic bravery. If Yolanda was the daughter of this terrible man, and if he should discover that I had her hidden in the room above his head, I should never eat another breakfast. Truly, Max and I were on perilous ground.
Max remained in concealment, and I climbed the stairs, two steps at a time, to Yolanda's room. I gently knocked, and received a sleepy response.
"Rise at once," I whispered. "I must speak to you instantly."
"Enter--we are already dressed," answered Yolanda.
When I entered she had risen from the bed and was rubbing her eyes.
"We were so tired we slept in our garments. Don't we show it?" said Yolanda.
Her hands were above her head, vainly endeavoring to arrange her hair, which had fallen in a great tumble of dark curls over her shoulder. Rest had flushed her cheeks, and her lips and her eyes were moist with the dew of sleep. Though my business was urgent I could not resist exclaiming:--
"Ah, Fräulein, you surely are beautiful."
"I thank you, Sir Karl," she answered, flashing a smile upon me. "You may kiss my hand."
She offered me her hand and asked:--
"But what is your news?"
While she spoke I heard voices and the tramping of hoofs beneath the window in front of the inn, and turned to look. I quickly drew away from the window and beckoned Yolanda:--
"Come here, Fräulein."
She came to my side, and as she looked out upon the road two men emerged from the inn door. One of them was the Duke of Burgundy. She clutched my arm and whispered excitedly:--
"Watch them, Sir Karl! Note the road they take! If they go by the right, we shall take the left. We must reach Peronne Castle before the duke. Death itself hangs upon the issue, Sir Karl."
I watched till the duke and all his people had left the inn; then I followed till I saw them take the road leading down the right bank of the Somme. When I returned to the inn, I paid the score, and gave each member of our little party a boule of bread to be eaten as we rode; and within five minutes after the duke's departure we were fording the Somme to take the left bank for Peronne.