"I declare that had you both died, your soul would have gone to heaven, or purgatory, and his to the nethermost hell, to lie bound forever with the false prophet and rebel angels."
Richard's thoughts were very dark after Sebastian's words. Was there a great gulf sundering him eternally from the Spaniard? But soon he had little time for brooding on puzzles for the churchmen. The walls had barely been manned on Duke Godfrey's orders, and the foraying parties called in, before the hosts of Kerbogha swarmed down the valley, seemingly numberless. The Moslem garrison of the citadel made desperate sallies. On the day following Richard's return the party led by the gallant Roger de Barnville was cut to pieces before the walls. Each day the bread-loaves grew dearer and smaller. There was ceaseless fighting by sunlight and starlight. Each day the taunts of the Arabs were flung in the Crusaders' teeth, "Franks, you are well on the way to Jerusalem!" Truly the besiegers were become the besieged. As the days crept by the Christians were few who did not expect to view the Holy City in heaven before the Holy City on earth.
CHAPTER XXXIX
HOW PETER BARTHELMY HAD A DREAM
On Saturday, the fifth day of June, in the Year of Grace one thousand and ninety-eight, Kerbogha appeared before Antioch with a countless host. On the Saturday following a small loaf of bread sold among the Christians for a gold byzant; an egg was worth six deniers; a pound of silver was none too much for the head of a horse. Men who had endured bitter sieges in the home-land, who had marched across the parching deserts of Isauria without a groan, now at last began to confess their sins to the priest, and to prepare to die. For help seemed possible from none save God—and God was visibly angry with His servants for the blood and passion at the city's sack.
On the day after his entrance, Richard Longsword showed three red shields on the minaret, and after a little, to his unspeakable joy, there were three lances with red pennons set close together before the Gate of St. George. Mary and Musa were safe in the camp of Kerbogha, and Richard blessed St. Michael and our Lady ever Virgin. Yet for a while he was angry with Heaven. If he had entered the city so easily, might not Mary have come in at his side? What need of parting? But he did not keep these feelings long; and his thankfulness was deep when he knew that at least his wife was not seeing gallant seigneurs, even the very Count of Flanders, begging in the city streets for a bit of bread, nor was herself enduring the awful hunger.
For the famine was the last stroke of the wrath of God upon His unworthy people. Thousands had died when the first hordes, led by Peter the Hermit and Walter Lackpenny, had been cut off by Kilidge Arslan; thousands more at Dorylæum; tens of thousands when they tracked the desert and besieged Antioch. But this was the crowning agony. When the news came that Kerbogha was approaching, the princes had indeed done what they could. Messengers had rushed down to the coast to bring up provisions landed by the friendly Italian merchants; foraging parties had been sent to sweep the country. But nine months long Syria had been harried by the armies. In a few days all the Christians were face to face with starvation. Pleasanter far to spend their last strength in the daily battles with Kerbogha, who ever pressed nearer, than to endure the slow agony in the city. Yet the infidels won success upon success. The Moslem garrison of the castle made continual sorties; the outlying forts of the Christians were defended gallantly, but in vain. Each day drifted into the starving city some tale of the pride and confidence of Kerbogha—how when squalid Frankish prisoners were haled before him, his atabegs had roared at his jest, "Are these shrunken-limbed creatures the men who chatter of taking Jerusalem?" and how he had written to the arch-sultan: "Eat, drink, be merry! The Franks are in my clutch. The wolf is less terrible than he boasted!"
In the city the cry again was, "God wills it!" But the meaning was, "God wills we should all perish or become slaves;" and on every hand was dumb lethargy or mad blasphemy.
New misfortunes trod upon old. In a sortie Bohemond the crafty and brave was wounded; Tancred's and Godfrey's valor ended in repulse. The foe pressed closer, damming the last tiny stream of provisions that trickled into the doomed city. Boiled grass, roots, leaves, leathern shields, and shoes; the corpses of slain Saracens—the Franks had come even to this! Richard feasted with Duke Godfrey on a morsel from a starved camel. The good Duke sacrificed his last war-horse except Marchegai, and then the lord of Lorraine was more pinched for food than the meanest villain on his distant lands. As day passed into day despair became deeper. Many, once among the bravest, strove to flee in the darkness down to the port of St. Simeon and escape by sea. Many went boldly to the Moslem camp, and confessed Islam in return for a bit of bread. "Rope-dancers," howled the survivors, of those who by night lowered themselves from the walls. And Bishop Adhemar talked of the fate of Judas Iscariot. But still desertions continued, from the great counts of Blois and of Melun down to the humblest.