CHAPTER II.
CHARLES MARTEL.
Charles the Hammer, or Martel, had arrived at the convent of St. Saturnine escorted by only about a hundred armed men. He was on the way to join a detachment of his army that lay encamped at a little distance from the abbey. The steward of the palace and one of the officers of the squad that accompanied him were installed in a room that served as the refectory of Father Clement, while the latter went for the little prince.
At this period in the full vigor of his age, Charles Martel exaggerated in his language and costume the rudeness of his Germanic stock. His beard and hair, which were of a reddish blonde, were kept untrimmed and shaggy, and framed in a face of high color, that bore the imprint of rare energy coupled with a good nature that was at times both jovial and sly. His keen eyes revealed an intelligence of superior order. Like the lowest of his soldiers, he wore a coat of goat-skin over his tarnished armor. His boots, made of heavy leather, were armed with rusty iron spurs. From his leather baldric hung a long sword of Bordeaux, a town renowned for its manufacture of arms.
The officer who accompanied Charles Martel seemed to be twenty-five years of age—tall, slender, powerfully built. He wore his brilliant steel armor with military ease, half-hidden under a long white cloak with black tufts, after the Arabian fashion. His magnificent scimitar, with both handle and scabbard of solid gold and ornamented with arabesques of coral and diamonds, likewise was of Arabian origin. The young man's face was of rare manly beauty. He had placed his casque upon a table. His wavy black hair, divided in the middle of his head, fell in ringlets on both sides of his forehead, which was furrowed by a deep scar, and shaded his manly face that bore a slight brown beard. His eyes of the blue of the sea, usually mild and proud, seemed however to reveal a secret sorrow or remorse. At times a nervous twitch brought his eyebrows together, and his features would for a while become somber. Soon, however, thanks to the mobility of his impressions, the ardor of his blood, and the impetuosity of his character, his face would again resume its normal expression.
Charles, who for a while had been silently contemplating his young companion with a kind and sly satisfaction, at last broke the silence, saying in his hoarse voice:
"Berthoald, how do you like this abbey and the fields that we have just traversed?"
"The abbey seems to me large, the fields fertile. Why do you ask?"
"Because I would like to make you a present to your taste, my lad."
The young man looked at the Frankish chief with profound astonishment.
Charles Martel proceeded: "In 732, it is now nearly six years ago, at the time that those heathens from Arabia, who had settled in Gaul, pushed forward as far as Tours and Blois, I marched against them. One day I saw arrive at my camp a young chief followed by fifty daring devils. It was you, the son, as you told me, of a Frankish seigneur, who was dead and had been dispossessed of his benefice, like so many others. I cared nothing about your birth. When the blade is well tempered I care little about the name of the armorer," Charles explained as he noticed a slight quiver in the eyelashes of Berthoald whose forehead swiftly mantled with a blush and whose eyes dropped in involuntary confusion. "You searched your fortune in war and had assembled a band of determined men. You came to offer me your sword and your services. The next day, on the plains of Poitiers, you and your men fought so bravely against the Arabs that you lost three-fourths of your little troop. With your own hands you killed Abd-el-Rhaman, the general of those heathens, and you received two wounds in disengaging me from a group of horsemen who were about to kill me, and would thereby have ended the war to the lasting injury of the Franks."