"I?" answered the young woman with a sad and bitter smile. "No, no! Pride is not allowed me. You are the queen. I am one of your humble subjects."
"Come, come, my daughters!" said the matron. "The day declines. Go to the baths of the Emir. As to you, my beauty," proceeded the devilish shrew, addressing Joan, "as to you, we shall rig you up, we shall perfume you, and above all we shall have your hump radiate with matchless lustre."
"You may do with me what you please, when you will have given my child wherewithal to appease his hunger and thirst. He must recover his strength, he must sleep. I shall not leave him one instant."
"Be easy, my star of beauty, you shall remain at his side, nor shall your child want for anything. We shall pay due attention to him."
CHAPTER IV.
ORGIES OF THE CRUSADERS.
The interior court-yard of the palace of the Emir, of Marhala, presented that evening a fairy aspect. The court was a perfect square. Along the four sides ran a wide gallery of Moorish ogives carved with trifoil and supported by low pillars of rose-colored marble. Between each column and into the court, large vases of Oriental alabaster filled with flowers served as pedestals to gilded candelabras holding torches of perfumed wax. Mosaics of various colors ornamented the floor of the galleries. The ceilings and walls disappeared under white arabesques chiseled on a purple background. Soft silken divans reclined against the walls, pierced with several ogive doors that were half closed with curtains fringed with pearls. These doors led to the interior apartments. At each corner of the galleries, gilded cages with silver bars held the rarest birds of Arabia, on whose plumage were mirrored the glint of the ruby, the emerald and the azure sapphire. In the center of the court a jet of crystalline water shot up from a large porphyry vase, falling back in a brilliant spray, and producing the murmur of a perpetual cascade as the water overflowed into a broad basin, from whose marble rim rose another circle of large and gilded candelabras, similar to those along the galleries. This refreshing fountain, sparkling with light, served as central ornament to a low table that wound around the basin and was covered with a cloth of embroidered silk. On it glistened the magnificent gold and silver vessels, carried from Gaul by the Duke of Aquitaine, and the rich spoils taken from the Saracens: goblets and decanters studded with precious stones, large amphoras filled with wine of Cyprus and Greece, huge gold platters on which were displayed Phœnician peacocks, Asiatic pheasants, quarters of Syrian antelopes and mutton, Byzantine hams, heads of the wild boars of Zion, and pyramids of fruit and confectionery. The banquet hall had for its dome the starry vault. The night was calm and serene; not a breath of wind agitated the flames of the torches.
But the tumult of an orgie resounded at this sumptuous table, around which, seated or reclining upon couches, feasted the guests of William IX. Distinguished above all and occupying the place of honor, was the legate of the Pope; then followed, to the right and left of the Duke of Aquitaine, Bohemond, Prince of Taranto; Tancred; Robert Courte-Heuse, Duke of Normandy; Heracle, seigneur of Polignac; Siegfried, seigneur of Sabran; Gerhard, Duke of Roussillon; Radulf, seigneur of Haut-Poul; Arnulf, sire of Beaugency; and other seigneurs of Frankish origin, beside the knight, Walter the Pennyless. These noblemen, already effeminated by Oriental habits, instead of remaining armed from dawn to dusk, as in Gaul, had exchanged their harness of war for long robes of silk. The Duke of Aquitaine, whose hair floated on a tunique of gold cloth, wore, after the fashion of the ancients, a chaplet of roses and violets, already wilted by the vapors of the feast. Azenor the Pale, whose lips, no longer white as of yore, but now red with life, was seated beside William, superbly ornamented with sparkling collars and bracelets of precious stones. The papal legate, clad in a robe of purple silk bordered with ermine, carried on his breast a cross of carbuncles hanging from a gold chain. Behind him, ready to wait upon his master, stood a young negro slave, in a short blouse of white silk with silver collar and bracelets ornamented with corals. The cup-bearers and equerries of the other seigneurs likewise attended the table. The wines of Cyprus and of Samos had been flowing from vermillion amphoras since the beginning of the feast, and flowed still, carrying away in their perfumed waves the senses of the guests. The Duke of Aquitaine, one arm encircling the waist of Azenor, and raising heavenward the gold goblet at which his mistress had just moistened her lips, called out: "I drink to you, my guests! May Bacchus and Venus be propitious to you! Honor to him who is deepest in love!"
Heracle, the seigneur of Polignac, in turn raised his cup and answered: "William, Duke of Aquitaine, we, your guests, drink to your courtesy and your splendid banquet!"
"Yes, yes!" joined the Crusaders; "let's drink to the banquet of William IX! Let's drink to the courtesy of the Duke of Aquitaine!"
"I drink gladly," said Arnulf, the seigneur of Beaugency, in his cups, and, shaking his head, he added meditatively, a sentence already repeated by him a score of times during the repast with the tenacity of the maudlin: "I'd like to know what my wife, the noble lady Capeluche, is doing at this hour in her chamber!"