"No," replied the palmer. "It was but merciful chastening. Yet my heart burns when I behold Christians cursing and slaying one another, while so many infidels rage unslain and the Holy City mourns their captive. Therefore I stand here, Sanctissime, to reproach you for your sin."
Again Gregory broke forth: "Unjust Sebastian, eleven years since I pleaded with King Henry, setting forth the miseries of Jerusalem; ever has my soul been torn for her captivity. Did I not profess myself ready to lead over land and sea to the Holy Sepulchre? Then the devil stirred Henry to his onslaught on the Church, and God has opened no door for this righteous warfare."
Sebastian leaned over, speaking into the Pope's face.
"You have put your hand to the plough and looked back. You promised Michael Ducas the Greek aid against the Turks. You anathematized him for heresy. You wrote of holy war. War blazed forth in Saxony, where your underling, Rudolf of Swabia, slew his fellow-Christians with your blessing, while Christ's children in the East were perishing. You called to Rome Robert Guiscard, that man of sin, whose half-paynim army spared neither nun nor matron in its violence when it sacked, and led thousands of Roman captives to endless bondage in Calabria. Where then your anathemas? You cared more for humiliating Cæsar than for removing the humiliation of Christ. Therefore I reproach."
There were great beads of sweat on the Pope's forehead; he was panting in agony; again and again the splinter of the cross was pressed to his breast, as if the very touch would quench the raging flame within. "Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa!" he was repeating. Next he spoke aloud: "Sweet friends, bear witness,—all my life I have loved righteousness and hated iniquity; therefore, in exile, here at Salerno, I die. Yet our old enemy, Satan, has been too strong. I am a very sinful man, thinking too much of the glory of Peter, too little of the sorrow of Christ. Pray for me,—for Hildebrand, chief of sinners; for Gregory the Pope is nigh his end."
When the pontiff's breath failed, there were again shadows in the doorway, and two figures entered treading softly; the one a tall and handsome churchman, in a high prelate's dress, the second a cavalier, not tall, but mighty of limb and shoulder, the jewels flashing on his baldric, the gold spurs at his heels. The warrior threw back his helm, and all saw the long, fair beard, the steel-blue eyes, the mien of high command.
"Odon, Cardinal of Ostia, my dear son!" cried the fainting Pope, as the prelate knelt at the bedside, beseeching the blessing. "But—you?" and he wondered, looking upon the knight. The other bowed his head.
"Holy Father," said he, in the tongue of northern France, "do you not know me? I have greatly sinned: I have fought with Henry against Holy Church. I repent; assign any penance—for from Rome I have come, seeking absolution at the hands of the true Vicar of Christ."
"And you are—?" came from Hildebrand's thin lips.
"Godfrey of Bouillon." And the knight knelt beside the cardinal.