Barbarossa, and Other Tales

by Paul Heyse

"To tell the simple truth I ween,

May be unwise, but 'tis not sin."

But she was all the more vexed and put out because the handsome youth by her side treated her as so perfect a stranger, while she for her part remembered him so well, and how glad she used to be when their childish games were so arranged that "Jaufret"--so they called him then--should be on her side to deliver her from a dragon, or to wake her by a kiss out of magic sleep. And while she now engaged the servant in commonplace talk, she could not help stealing frequent glances at her other companion, noticing how handsome and manly he had become; how with a slight turn of the wrist he could rein in a fiery horse, and yet had such a sad and earnest beauty in his eyes as would have become the very saints in the church of Mont Salvair. What could make him so silent, she kept wondering; and if she were below the attention of so noble a gentleman, how was it that he abstained from all attempt to find favour in the eyes of his lady-cousin? All this perplexed her so much that she gradually left off talking, and entirely forgot the slight anger she had felt at the admonition received. Meanwhile the youth on his side, who had so impatiently watched for this day, wished, as the sun rose higher, that it had never dawned upon him at all, instead of looking down on his joy and sorrow with so heartless a splendour. It is true that from his boyish years he had preserved the image of his cousin as his ideal of all beauty and loveliness, but the spark had smouldered on as a quiet memory in a well-guarded portion of his heart; but now at the first greeting from her lips, at the perfume that floated over to him from her hair, this spark burst out into a mighty flame, and he suffered tortures such as he had never known before. And then her apparent estrangement from him increased his anguish, for although he did not know whether it were disinclination to him personally, or the calm contempt of the Count's daughter for her father's poor retainer which closed her lips and kept her eyes averted, he had leisure enough in these silent hours to estimate with miserable accuracy the social gulf between them, and the duty of crushing every foolish hope. Then, again, his thoughts turned to conjectures as to what possessor he would have to make over the jewel entrusted to him, whether her hand would be given away without her heart, or whether her father in the gloom of sickness had so yearned for his only child, as suddenly to recall her to his deserted home. Even were it so, would his case be less hopeless if he had longer time to learn the full preciousness of the treasure which must at length be surrendered to another?

Thus he sank more and more into a profound melancholy, so that even Garcinde, who was not herself joyous, remarked it, and asked him whether he were suffering, whether he would rest and refresh himself with a draught of wine? Geoffroy, crimsoning to the roots of his hair, excused himself for his absent mood, accounted for it by a sleepless night, and did all he could to appear more cheerful. And at noon when they halted in a wood beside a spring to recruit themselves with the provisions with which the pious sisterhood had laden the baggage-horse, his spirits in a measure revived, while Aigleta, who had long got over her fit of sullenness, recovered the audacity of her mood, and flavoured the mid-day meal with the drollest freaks of fancy. Garcinde sat in the shadow of a tall black-thorn, and patiently endured that the little witch who could not rest a moment, should adorn the whole party with garlands, even to the servant and the grazing horses, singing merry songs the while, not always of spiritual import, at which even the servant laughed, so that the young Countess rose with a grave air, removed the wreath from her brow, and proposed that they should ride on again. The last to rise from the green grass was Geoffroy; to him the spot seemed a Paradise where he would willingly have dreamed his days away, yet when he lifted his cousin into her saddle, he did not dare to bestow on the little foot that she placed in his hand, anything more than the very slightest pressure. She turned her face away from him, and he was for an instant's space veiled in the flow of soft tresses that fell down to her girdle. Then she put her horse into a gentle canter. Thus they all rode on for a while, men and beasts refreshed by their hour's repose, and even Geoffroy carried his head higher, as though the red wine that Aigleta had given him in a cup garlanded with flowers, had put new life into his veins, and inspired him with energy to enjoy the bliss of the present hour.

La Vaquiera, which they reached early in the afternoon, was a dairy-farm, beautifully situated between richest pastures and wooded grounds; until late years in the possession of the house of Malaspina, but staked and lost at play, by the Count to a neighbouring noble, Pierre de Gaillac, who had, however, something else to do than to look after herds of cattle and flocks of sheep in this quiet corner. The farmer himself and his wife, who lived here with a troop of shepherds and milkmaids, and whom Sir Hugo greeted as usual whenever he rode past, had not a notion that they no longer held under him, and they received his daughter--whom they well remembered in her childhood--with all the reverence and attention due to their young mistress. They had only a small house, as the servants slept in the stables, but they at once gave up their one sleeping-chamber to the two girls, and themselves found a resting-place in the kitchen. Geoffroy had to put up with a loft reached by a ladder, fortunately an airy one having plenty of fresh hay. It was late, however, when he betook himself to it, for the best part of the starry night had been spent in such earnest and serious converse, that his impetuous feelings were somewhat subdued, and spite of the vicinity of Garcinde, he made up for the lost sleep of the night before. The two girls, on the contrary, although they too--what with the long ride and the strong wine--owned to being very tired, yet enlivened themselves during their unrobing, by much of that seeming confidential talk common to maidens who share the same couch, and yet would fain conceal their heart's secrets from each other. For girls believe there is no better way of holding their tongue on one subject than letting it run on unguardedly on every other. "Why have you been so little glad all day long, and are you sure you are not still angry with me for all the nonsense I have talked, out of sheer delight at getting back into the world?" said Aigleta to her friend, while helping her to braid and bind her hair. "Not so, dear heart," replied her thoughtful companion, letting her delicate arms drop into her lap. "I envy you your light-heartedness, I do not censure it. But my heart is heavy. Oh, Aigleta, I used to have such happy dreams of returning to my father, of breathing free air, and seeing the world as it lay beyond the hill of Mont Salvair. And now--"

"Does not the world seem to you fair enough, the sky blue enough, the meadows green enough, the stream clear enough to reflect back your beauty?" laughed Aigleta.

"How can you mock at my anxiety and gloom?" returned the Count's daughter. "Just think--on the very day when I re-enter the world, my dear father is absent from me. I cannot grasp his hand or hear his voice. Oh believe me, there is something mysterious, dark, perhaps appalling, that is kept back from me, the foreboding of which has--spite of all the sunshine--darkened for me this much longed for day."

"Nonsense!" said Aigleta. "Shall I tell you where the cloud lay that threw its dull shadow over you? On the brow and in the eyes of that simple Sir Jaufret. Deny it as you will I know what I know, and have not got eyes in my head for nothing. And have you not, indeed, every right to be offended with his uncourteous, indifferent manner? Fie! To make such a melancholy face when one has the good fortune to serve as knight to two sweet young ladies, one of whom, moreover, is a high-born countess and his own first cousin! And this evening, too, when we walked round the pastures, could he not have found something more lively to talk of than the stars above us, and whether we went to them after death, and horrid subjects of that kind? I think he might have found some stars nearer at hand, and only to talk about dying we need not have left Mont Salvair! He is certainly--as one can see--likely to die of love, but that is no excuse. Such gloom may do very well for poems when he writes you them, but while you were together and alone--for as for me, I closed my eyes and pretended to be asleep--"

"What art thou prating about, foolish one?" said Garcinde, trying to look angry, although a sweet emotion sent the blood tingling to her cheeks. "Dost thou not know why he is so grave and sad, and never, indeed, will be quite happy all his life long? Not though that he need take his birth thus to heart. If he would only go to the court of some foreign prince, and there gain renown, no one would reproach him with what he could not help; and he might win wealth, and land, and fame, and be a fit wooer for any count's daughter. But even though he be a dreamer, and does not understand his own advantage, he is not so foolish as to turn his thoughts towards me, for well he knows my father would never give me to him. Nay I rather think that he hates me as being my father's daughter--above him in position--though I for my part would always behave to him as in our childish days, and do everything in my power to renew the old intimacy."

"Hm," said Aigleta, as she unlaced her bodice, "it may be that you are right, and yet I wish he hated me in the way he hates thee. I should desire nothing better, but I am a servant's daughter. Who would give himself the trouble to look and see whether I deserve love or hate? And yet I think," and so saying she shook her thick hair over her white shoulders, "it might be well worth their while too, and whether high-born or not, you shall see, Domna Comtessa, in the net of these black hairs. I shall catch gay-plumaged birds as well as you with your gold threads, and even if that black crow Jaufret keeps out of them--"