“Sire,” cried another, “the pillar which bare up your vaulted hall is broken down, and the dome thereof we have seen walking like a tortoise toward the sea.”
“Sire,” faltered a third, “the river, with its ships and its fishes, is pouring through the streets, and will soon be beating against your Palace walls.”
King Hugo, white with terror, muttered:
“By my faith! these men are wizards.”
“Well, Sir King,” Charlemagne addressed him with a smile on his lips, “the Knight I wait for is long of coming.”
The King sent for him, and he came. He was a knight of stately stature and well armed. The good Emperor clave him in twain, as he had said.
Now while these things were a-doing, Olivier thought to himself:
“The intervention of Our Most Blessed Lady is plain to see in these marvels; and I am rejoiced to behold the manifest tokens she vouchsafes of her love for the Realm of France. Not in vain have the Emperor and his companions implored the succour of the Holy Virgin, Mother of God. Alas! I shall pay for all the rest, and have my head cut off. For I cannot well ask the Virgin Mary to help me make good my brag. ‘Tis an enterprise of a sort wherein ‘twould be indiscreet to crave the interference of Her who is the Lily of Purity, the Tower of Ivory, the Guarded Door and the Fenced Orchard-Close. And, lacking aid from on high, I am sore afraid I may not do so much as I have said.”
Thus ran Olivier’s thoughts, when King Hugo roughly accosted him with the words:
“‘T is now your turn, Count, to fulfil your promise.”