Domnei: A Comedy of Woman-Worship

by James Branch Cabell

  So when night fell Demetrios and Bracciolini sat snug and sang of love,of joy, and arms. The fire burned bright, and the floor was wellcovered with gaily tinted mats. White wines and red were on the table.

  Presently they turned to canzons of a more indecorous nature. Demetriossang the loves of Douzi and Ishtar, which the gaoler found remarkable.He said so and crossed himself. "Man, man, you must have been afishingin the mid-pit of hell to net such filth."

  "I learned that song in Nacumera," said Demetrios, "when I was aprisoner there with Messire de la Foret. It was a favourite song withhim."

  "Ay?" said Bracciolini. He looked at Demetrios very hard, andBracciolini pursed his lips as if to whistle. The gaoler scented fromafar a bribe, but the face of Demetrios was all vacant cheerfulness.

  Bracciolini said, idly:

  "So you served under him? I remember that he was taken by the heathen.A woman ransomed him, they say."

  Demetrios, able to tell a tale against any man, told now the tale ofMelicent's immolation, speaking with vivacity and truthfulness in allpoints save that he represented himself to have been one of theransomed Free Companions.

  Bracciolini's careful epilogue was that the proconsul had actedfoolishly in not keeping the emeralds.

  "He gave his enemy a weapon against him," Bracciolini said, and waited.

  "Oh, but that weapon was never used. Sire Perion found service at once,under King Bernart, you will remember. Therefore Sire Perion hid awaythese emeralds against future need--under an oak in Sannazaro, he toldme. I suppose they lie there yet."

  "Humph!" said Bracciolini. He for a while was silent. Demetrios satadjusting the strings of the lute, not looking at him.

  Bracciolini said, "There were eighteen of them, you tell me? and allfine stones?"

  "Ey?--oh, the emeralds? Yes, they were flawless, messire. The smallestwas larger than a robin's egg. But I recall another song we learned atNacumera--"

  Demetrios sang the loves of Lucius and Fotis. Bracciolini grunted,"Admirable" in an abstracted fashion, muttered something about theduties of his office, and left the room. Demetrios heard him lock thedoor outside and waited stolidly.

  Presently Bracciolini returned in full armour, a naked sword in hishand.

  "My man,"--and his voice rasped--"I believe you to be a rogue. Ibelieve that you are contriving the escape of this infamous Comte de laForet. I believe you are attempting to bribe me into conniving athis escape. I shall do nothing of the sort, because, in the firstplace, it would be an abominable violation of my oath of office, and inthe second place, it would result in my being hanged."

  "Messire, I swear to you--!" Demetrios cried, in excellently feignedperturbation.

  "And in addition, I believe you have lied to me throughout. I do notbelieve you ever saw this Comte de la Foret. I very certainly do notbelieve you are a friend of this Comte de la Foret's, because inthat event you would never have been mad enough to admit it. Thestatement is enough to hang you twice over. In short, the only thing Ican be certain of is that you are out of your wits."

  "They say that I am moonstruck," Demetrios answered; "but I will tellyou a secret. There is a wisdom lies beyond the moon, and it is becauseof this that the stars are glad and admirable."

  "That appears to me to be nonsense," the gaoler commented; and he wenton: "Now I am going to confront you with Messire de la Foret. If yourstory prove to be false, it will be the worse for you."

  "It is a true tale. But sensible men close the door to him who alwaysspeaks the truth."

  "These reflections are not to the purpose," Bracciolini submitted, andcontinued his argument: "In that event Messire de la Foret willundoubtedly be moved by your fidelity in having sought out him whom allthe rest of the world has forsaken. You will remember that this samefidelity has touched me to such an extent that I am granting you aninterview with your former master. Messire de la Foret will naturallyreflect that a man once torn in four pieces has no particular use foremeralds. He will, I repeat, be moved. In his emotion, in hisgratitude, in mere decency, he will reveal to you the location of thoseeighteen stones, all flawless. If he should not evince a sufficiency ofsuch appropriate and laudable feeling, I tell you candidly, it will bethe worse for you. And now get on!"

  Bracciolini pointed the way and Demetrios cringed through the door.Bracciolini followed with drawn sword. The corridors were deserted. Thehead-gaoler had seen to that.

  His position was simple. Armed, he was certainly not afraid of anycombination between a weaponless man and a fettered one. If thisjongleur had lied, Bracciolini meant to kill him for his insolence.Bracciolini's own haphazard youth had taught him that a jongleur had nocivil rights, was a creature to be beaten, robbed, or stabbed withimpunity.

  Upon the other hand, if the vagabond's tale were true, one of twothings would happen. Either Perion would not be brought to tell wherethe emeralds were hidden, in which event Bracciolini would kill thejongleur for his bungling; or else the prisoner would tell everythingnecessary, in which event Bracciolini would kill the jongleur forknowing more than was convenient. This Bracciolini had an honestrespect for gems and considered them to be equally misplaced when underan oak or in a vagabond's wallet.

  Consideration of such avarice may well have heartened Demetrios whenthe well-armoured gaoler knelt in order to unlock the door of Perion'scell. As an asp leaps, the big and supple hands of the proconsulgripped Bracciolini's neck from behind, and silenced speech.

  Demetrios, who was not tall, lifted the gaoler as high as possible,lest the beating of armoured feet upon the slabs disturb any of theother keepers, and Demetrios strangled his dupe painstakingly. Thekeys, as Demetrios reflected, were luckily attached to the belt of thiswrithing thing, and in consequence had not jangled on the floor. It wasan inaudible affair and consumed in all some ten minutes. Then with thesword of Bracciolini Demetrios cut Bracciolini's throat. In suchmatters Demetrios was thorough.

  18.

  _How They Cried Quits_

  Demetrios went into Perion's cell and filed away the chains of Perionof the Forest. Demetrios thrust the gaoler's corpse under the bed, andwashed away all stains before the door of the cell, so that no awkwardtraces might remain. Demetrios locked the door of an unoccupiedapartment and grinned as Old Legion must have done when Judas fell.

  More thanks to Bracciolini's precautions, these two got safely from theconfines of San' Alessandro, and afterward from the city of Megaris.They trudged on a familiar road. Perion would have spoken, butDemetrios growled, "Not now, messire." They came by night to that passin Sannazaro which Perion had held against a score of men-at-arms.

  Demetrios turned. Moonlight illuminated the warriors' faces and showedthe face of Demetrios as sly and leering. It was less the countenanceof a proud lord than a carved head on some old waterspout.

  "Messire de la Foret," Demetrios said, "now we cry quits. Here our wayspart till one of us has killed the other, as one of us must surely do."

  You saw that Perion was tremulous with fury. "You knave," he said,"because of your pride you have imperilled your accursed life--yourlife on which the life of Melicent depends! You must need delay andrescue me, while your spawn inflicted hideous infamies on Melicent! Oh,I had never hated you until to-night!"

  Demetrios was pleased.

  "Behold the increment," he said, "of the turned cheek and of thecontriving of good for him that had despitefully used me! Be satisfied,O young and zealous servitor of Love and Christ. I am alone, unarmedand penniless, among a people whom I have never been at pains even todespise. Presently I shall be taken by this vermin, and afterward Ishall be burned alive. Theodoret is quite resolved to make of me acandle which will light his way to heaven."

  "That is true," said Perion; "and I cannot permit that you be killed byanyone save me, as soon as I can afford to kill you."

  The two men talked together, leagued against entire Christendom.Demetrios had thirty sequins and Perion no money at all. Then Perionshowed the ring which Melicent had given him, as a lo
ve-token, longago, when she was young and ignorant of misery. He valued it as he didnothing else.

  Perion said:

  "Oh, very dear to me is this dear ring which once touched a finger ofthat dear young Melicent whom you know nothing of! Its gold is my lostyouth, the gems of it are the tears she has shed because of me. Kissit, Messire Demetrios, as I do now for the last time. It is a favouryou have earned."

  Then these two went as mendicants--for no one marks a beggar upon thehighway--into Narenta, and they sold this ring, in order that Demetriosmight be conveyed oversea, and that the life of Melicent might bepreserved. They found another vessel which was about to venture intoheathendom. Their gold was given to the captain; and, in exchange, thebargain ran, his ship would touch at Assignano, a little after theensuing dawn, and take Demetrios aboard.

  Thus the two lovers of Melicent foreplanned the future, and did notadmit into their accounting vagarious Dame Chance.

  19.

  _How Flamberge Was Lost_

  These hunted men spent the following night upon the Needle, since thereit was not possible for an adversary to surprise them. Perion's was theearlier watch, until midnight, and during this time Demetrios slept.Then the proconsul took his equitable turn. When Perion awakened thehour was after dawn.

  What Perion noted first, and within thirty feet of him, was a tallgalley with blue and yellow sails. He perceived that the promontory wasthronged with heathen sailors, who were unlading the ship of variousbales and chests. Demetrios, now in the costume of his native country,stood among them giving orders. And it seemed, too, to Perion, in themoment of waking, that Dame Melusine, whom Perion had loved so longago, also stood among them; yet, now that Perion rose and facedDemetrios, she was not visible anywhere, and Perion wondered dimly overhis wild dream that she had been there at all. But more importunatematters were in hand.

  The proconsul grinned malevolently.

  "This is a ship that once was mine," he said. "Do you not find it drollthat Euthyclos here should have loved me sufficiently to hazard hislife in order to come in search of me? Personally, I consider itpreposterous. For the rest, you slept so soundly, Messire de la Foret,that I was unwilling to waken you. Then, too, such was the advice of aperson who has some influence with the waterfolk, people say, and whowas perhaps the means of bringing this ship hither so opportunely. I donot know. She is gone now, you see, intent as always on her own ends.Well, well! her ways are not our ways, and it is wiser not to meddlewith them."

  But Perion, unarmed and thus surrounded, understood only that he waslost.

  "Messire Demetrios," said Perion, "I never thought to ask a favour ofyou. I ask it now. For the ring's sake, give me at least a knife,Messire Demetrios. Let me die fighting."

  "Why, but who spoke of fighting? For the ring's sake, I have caused theship to be rifled of what valuables they had aboard. It is not much,but it is all I have. And you are to accept my apologies for thesomewhat miscellaneous nature of the cargo, Messire de laForet--consisting, as it does, of armours and gems, camphor andambergris, carpets of raw silk, teakwood and precious metals, rugs ofYemen leather, enamels, and I hardly know what else besides. ForEuthyclos, as you will readily understand, was compelled to masqueradeas a merchant-trader."

  Perion shook his head, and declared: "You offer enough to make me awealthy man. But I would prefer a sword."

  At that Demetrios grimaced, saying, "I had hoped to get off morecheaply." He unbuckled the crosshandled sword which he now wore andhanded it to Perion. "This is Flamberge," Demetrios continued--"thatmagic blade which Galas made, in the old time's heyday, forCharlemaigne. It was with this sword that I slew my father, and thissword is as dear to me as your ring was to you. The man who wields itis reputed to be unconquerable. I do not know about that, but in anyevent I yield Flamberge to you as a free gift. I might have known itwas the only gift you would accept." His swart face lighted. "Comepresently and fight with me for Melicent. Perhaps it will amuse me toride out to battle and know I shall not live to see the sunset. Alreadyit seems laughable that you will probably kill me with this very swordwhich I am touching now."

  The champions faced each other, Demetrios in a half-wistful mirth, andPerion in half-grudging pity. Long and long they looked.

  Demetrios shrugged. Demetrios said:

  "For such as I am, to love is dangerous. For such as I am, nor fire normeteor hurls a mightier bolt than Aphrodite's shaft, or marks itspassage by more direful ruin. But you do not know Euripides?--afidgety-footed liar, Messire the Comte, who occasionally blunders intothe clumsiest truths. Yes, he is perfectly right; all things thisgoddess laughingly demolishes while she essays haphazard flights aboutthe world as unforeseeably as travels a bee. And, like the bee, shewilfully dispenses honey, and at other times a wound."

  Said Perion, who was no scholar:

  "I glory in our difference. For such as I am, love is sufficient proofthat man was fashioned in God's image."

  "Ey, there is no accounting for a taste in aphorisms," Demetriosreplied. He said, "Now I embark." Yet he delayed, and spoke withunaccustomed awkwardness. "Come, you who have been generous till this!will you compel me to desert you here--quite penniless?"

  Said Perion:

  "I may accept a sword from you. I do accept it gladly. But I may notaccept anything else."

  "That would have been my answer. I am a lucky man," Demetrios said, "tohave provoked an enemy so worthy of my opposition. We two have foughtan honest and notable duel, wherein our weapons were not made of steel.I pray you harry me as quickly as you may; and then we will fight withswords till I am rid of you or you of me."

  "Assuredly, I shall not fail you," answered Perion.

  These two embraced and kissed each other. Afterward Demetrios went intohis own country, and Perion remained, girt with the magic swordFlamberge. It was not all at once Perion recollected that the wearer ofFlamberge is unconquerable, if ancient histories are to be believed,for in deduction Perion was leisurely.

  Now on a sudden he perceived that Demetrios had flung control of thefuture to Perion, as one gives money to a sot, entirely prescient ofhow it will be used. Perion had his moment of bleak rage.

  "I will not cog the dice to my advantage any more than you!" saidPerion. He drew the sword of Charlemaigne and brandished it and cast itas far as even strong Perion could cast, and the sea swallowed it. "NowGod alone is arbiter!" cried Perion, "and I am not afraid."

  He stood a pauper and a friendless man. Beside his thigh hung asorcerer's scabbard of blue leather, curiously ornamented, but it wasemptied of power. Yet Perion laughed exultingly, because he was elatewith dreams of the future. And for the rest, he was aware it is lessgrateful to remember plaudits than to recall the exercise of that in uswhich is not merely human.

  20.

  _How Perion Got Aid_

  Then Perion turned from the Needle of Assignano, and went westward intothe Forest of Columbiers. He had no plan. He wandered in the high woodsthat had never yet been felled or ordered, as a beast does in watchfulcare of hunters.

  He came presently to a glade which the sunlight flooded withoutobstruction. There was in this place a fountain, which oozed from underan iron-coloured boulder incrusted with grey lichens and green moss.Upon the rock a woman sat, her chin propped by one hand, and sheappeared to consider remote and pleasant happenings. She was clothedthroughout in white, with metal bands about her neck and arms; and herloosened hair, which was coloured like straw, and was as pale as thehair of children, glittered about her, and shone frostily where it layoutspread upon the rock behind her.

  She turned toward Perion without any haste or surprise, and Perion sawthat this woman was Dame Melusine, whom he had loved to his own hurt(as you have heard) when Perion served King Helmas. She did not speakfor a long while, but she lazily considered Perion's honest face in asort of whimsical regret for the adoration she no longer found there.

  "Then it was really you," he said, in wonder, "whom I saw talking withDemetrios when I awakened to-day."
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  "You may be sure," she answered, "that my talking was in no wayinjurious to you. Ah, no, had I been elsewhere, Perion, I think youwould by this have been in Paradise." Then Melusine fell again tomeditation. "And so you do not any longer either love or hate me,Perion?" Here was an odd echo of the complaint Demetrios had made.

  "That I once loved you is a truth which neither of us, I think, mayever quite forget," said Perion, very quiet. "I alone know how utterlyI loved you--no, it was not I who loved you, but a boy that is deadnow. King's daughter, all of stone, O cruel woman and hateful, O sleek,smiling traitress! to-day no man remembers how utterly I loved you, forthe years are as a mist between the heart of the dead boy and me, sothat I may no longer see the boy's heart clearly. Yes, I have forgottenmuch. ...Yet even to-day there is that in me which is faithful to you,and I cannot give you the hatred which your treachery has earned."

  Melusine spoke shrewdly. She had a sweet, shrill voice.

  "But I loved you, Perion--oh, yes, in part I loved you, just as onecannot help but love a large and faithful mastiff. But you weretedious, you annoyed me by your egotism. Yes, my friend, you think toomuch of what you owe to Perion's honour; you are perpetually squaringaccounts with heaven, and you are too intent on keeping the balance inyour favour to make a satisfactory lover." You saw that Melusine wassmiling in the shadow of her pale hair. "And yet you are very drollwhen you are unhappy," she said, as of two minds.