The Princess Pourquoi

by Margaret Pollock Sherwood

THE GENTLE ROBBER

Once there was a robber bold—not that he looked bold, for he had the gentlest of manners and the most persuasive tongue. It was with a certain manly shyness that he approached his victims, and his voice was very low and soft as he convinced them how greatly to their interest it would be to hand over their purses, so that many went on through the green forest paths with empty pockets, it is true, but with eyes full of tears of gratitude for the benefactor who had held them up.

"Pray don't mention it!" said the Robber Chief, as he deprecatingly thrust into his wallet the purses he had taken and heard the outpoured thanks. "It is nothing, nothing! You would have done as much for me at any time if you had"—he never finished his sentence, but the wistful admiration of the man with empty pockets always added the right clause—"if you had had the brains."

Now the Gentle Robber, it need hardly be said, was highly successful in his chosen calling, or, as he put it, "the holy saints had given him rich possessions." He had started out moderately in a remote corner of the forest, as became a young and unassuming retail cut-purse, but soon his domain extended from his own retired dell to the adjacent glade, and the merry outlaw who had prospered there gave up the business and became a scrivener's clerk. It was not long before the Robber Chief owned the whole forest: the title-deeds, to be sure, belonged to the Abbey, which lay in a fat green meadow at the edge of the wood, but the monks could not work the forest as the robber could, and whatever harvest of gold and of silver, of jewels, of rich cloths from the packs of merchants of the East was to be gathered there, this one man reaped in his own apologetic way, which always seemed to beg pardon of those who were despoiled, for doing them so much good at one time. Soon the country round the forest was his, and yokel, franklin, and squire, Sir Bertram from the Castle, and the Prior from the Abbey, began to render him accounts, and it came to pass that the Bishop at the capital city, Mertoun, and the King upon his throne, and the strong nobles about him trembled at the robber's name, for the waves of his power flowed out until they met the waves of the sea.

Dearly the Gentle Robber loved his work in all its aspects, and he was master of its least details. A brave fight with a sturdy yeoman going home from market with a half-year's gains was joy to him, and merry in his ears was the sound of the thwack, thwack, thwack of the oaken staves as they fell on head and shoulders; an encounter with a rich merchant's train brought him naught but exhilaration, and the deft, swift hand that emptied the pack and purse thrilled as it went about its chosen task. There was slow, sensuous pleasure in stripping off the garments of knight and of squire and leaving their limbs uncovered to the cold. Daintiest amusement of all was the spoiling of widow and of orphan: something of the ascetic lingered in the bosom of the Robber Chief, and rare and delicate was the task of emptying the scantily furnished larder, of carrying away the worn clothes, and the single jewel saved from the wreck of happier days. He found delight in feeling about his knees the clasp of the thin arms of the naked orphan as it wept for food, for genius knows no distinction of small and great, and yeoman and squire, knight and merchant, widow and orphan alike, thrilled him with a sense of his power, and through their cries sang in his ear the word "success."

In the course of time it came to pass that he became the chief support of the kingdom which he had caused to totter as he swept its riches into his own bulging pockets. When he came to court, as he sometimes did, wearing grave apparel and showing a modest face, the King leaned lovingly upon him; was he not financing the war with Binnamere and causing a half-dozen universities, which had but lately come into fashion, to rise in different parts of the land? The Bishop conferred weightily with him in quiet corners; was he not building the great cathedral which was to be the glory of the city throughout coming ages?

"Nay, nay, nay!" said the Bishop, waving a white, jeweled hand as the Chief began to divulge some of his larger plans. "Tell me not of thy wicked schemes! Thy methods I must condemn utterly, but if thou bringest me the money, well, I can at least see to it that it be not used for bad purposes. And speaking of money, we need for the walls of the apse a hundred bags of gold. Dost thou think thou couldst manage it?"

"Ay," said the Gentle Robber, and that night he despoiled nine men, killing three that resisted longest, for he was a great lover of Holy Church, and a devout believer, nor could she ask of him any service that he would not perform.

Now the lust for gold is a strange thing. There be that gather it together into stockings and go hungry and dirty to the day's end for gold, and that is the miser's lust. There be that win it and spend it again freely for delicate food and fiery drink, and this is the sensualist's lust. There be that get it by cruel means and scatter it abroad on church and hospital, and this is the philanthropist's lust, which possessed the Robber Chief. Gold and jewels were piled so high in his forest cave that he could not see out of its window, and he hardly knew whether winter snow or the shadow of flickering leaves lay on the ground, nor could hungry church nor greedy halls of learning lessen his piles of treasure enough to let the sunlight in.