“Right glad should I be to lead ye in a good cause; but there lies heavy guilt on my soul, and till that guilt is confessed and absolved (if absolved it may be), I am not worthy to lead Christian men in the cause of God.”
“It is well spoken, my son,” said the monk; “and he that humbleth himself, as thou hast done, shall be exalted. Come hither with me apart, and tell thy tale freely.”
Briefly and clearly, De Claremont told of the fatal combat on Calais sands, the fall of his brother Hugo by his hand, and his own headlong flight from the accursed spot. More he could not tell, for (perhaps in mercy) all that had followed was blotted out as if it had never been, and of what had befallen in the interval, up to his encounter with Du Guesclin, he had no recollection whatever.
The good old man heard the dismal tale with close attention, and, as it ended, laid his thin hand on the penitent’s bowed head with the tenderness of a father.
“I say not that thou hast not sinned deeply, my son,” said he, gently; “but, thank God, thou art free from the brand of Cain, for not in envious malice and of set purpose, like that wicked one, hast thou slain thy brother. It was a hasty quarrel, fought out with equal arms, and he might well have taken thy life instead. Sinner thou may’st be, but murderer art thou none. This day will I myself cleanse the rust from thine armour, in token that the Evil One hath no power over thee; for God sends not the bondmen of Satan to rescue the servants of Heaven, as thou hast done this day. Go forth, and lead these men southward with a good courage; for know that yonder in the south some great and unthought-of blessing awaits thee, though it hath not been given me to know what it shall be. Go, then, and God be with thee!”
CHAPTER XXI
The Black Wolf
On the same day on which Alured perilled his life to save the monk, a man was sitting alone, beside a dying fire, in the gloomy depths of the great forest which then covered a large part of that wild region south of the Loire, which was to be terribly famous, four centuries later, under the name of La Vendée.
This solitary forester was an apt figure for that background of gloomy trees and matted thickets. He was a man of high stature and powerful build, whose huge frame, though gaunt as a wolf, showed in every movement a tiger-like strength and elasticity with which few men could have coped. His ragged clothing, and rusty, dinted steel-cap, matched well with his grim, sullen, shaggy-bearded face, and the restless watchfulness of his keen black eyes, which had the half-cowed, half-ferocious look of a trapped beast of prey; and altogether, he was the last man that a timid wayfarer would have wished to meet in such a place.
All at once he raised his head with a quick, sharp movement, as if he had just caught some distant sound, though the faint and far-off hoof-tramp would have escaped any ear less keen and practised. But that he heard it was plain from the cruel smile that lighted up his dark face as he muttered, after listening intently for a moment—
“He is alone—good luck!”