In a little while Father Spaur, with the two Tyrolese, returned, and they carried me quickly through the little parlour and up the staircase to my bedroom. There they flung me on the bed and locked the door and left me. Through the open window the dance-melodies rose to my ears. It seemed to me that I could distinguish particular tunes which I had heard when I crouched in the snow upon that November night.
Que toutes joies et toutes honneurs
Viennent d'armes et d'amours.
Jack's refrain, which he had hummed so continually during our ride to Austria, came into my head, and set itself to the lilt of the music. Well, I had made essay of both arms and love, and I had got little joy and less honour therefrom, unless it be joy to burn with anxieties, and honour to labour as a peasant and be deemed a common trickster!
The music ceased; the guests went homewards down the hill, laughing and singing as they went; the Castle gradually grew silent. The door of my room was unlocked and flung open, and Groder entered, bearing a candle in his hand. He set it down upon the table, and drew a long knife from a sheath which projected out of his pocket. This he held and flourished before my eyes, seeking like a child to terrify me with his antics, until Father Spaur, following in upon his heels, bade him desist from his buffoonery.
Groder cut the girdle which bound my ankles.
"March!" said he.
But my legs were so numbed with the tightness of the cord that they refused their office. Father Spaur ordered him to chafe my limbs with his hands, which he did very unwillingly, and after a little I was able to walk, though with uncertain and wavering steps.
"Should you suffer at all at Groder's hands," said the priest pleasantly, "I beg you to console yourself with certain reflections which I shared with you one afternoon that we rode together."
We proceeded along the corridor and turned into the gallery which ran round the hall. But at the head of the great staircase I stopped and drew back. The priest's taunts and Groder's insolence I had endured in silence. What they had bidden me do, that I had done; for in the miscarriage of my fortunes I was minded to bear myself as a gentleman should, without pettish complaints or an unavailing resistance which could only entail upon me further indignities. But from this final humiliation I shrank.
Below me the entire household of servants was ranged in the hall, leaving a lane open from the foot of the stairs to the door. Every face was turned towards me--except one. One face was held aside and hidden in a handkerchief, and since that hour I have ever felt a special friendliness and gratitude for the withered little Frenchwoman, Clemence Durette. Alone of all that company she showed some pity for my plight. None the less, however, my eyes went wandering for another sight. What with the uncertain glare of the torches, that sent waves of red light and shadow in succession sweeping across the throng of faces, 'twas some while or ever I could discover the Countess. That she was present I had no doubt, and at last I saw her, standing by the door apart from her servants, her face white, and her eyelids closed over her eyes.