by Eugène Sue
“By the navel of the Pope! No feebleness,” replied Jocelyn with emphasis and alarmed at the despondent voice of his principal. “Where is your courage? This morning from a lambkin you became a wolf.”
“To now live with my poor wife would be a daily torture to me,” murmured the serf. “I would rather the knight killed me outright.”
Thus conversing, half the field had been covered by Mazurec in company with his seconds. The latter, more and more alarmed at the unhappy young man’s despondency, were at that moment passing at the foot of the amphitheater where the nobility of the neighborhood were seated with the fair Gloriande in their midst. Casting an expressive look at the champion, Adam the Devil nudged Mazurec with his elbow and said to him in a low voice: “Take a look at the betrothed of our seigneur.... I swear she’s handsome!... That will make a pretty wedding! Hm!... Won’t the two lovers be happy?” At these words, which fell like molten lead upon the bleeding wound in his heart, the vassal shook convulsively. “Take a good look at the handsome young lady,” proceeded Adam the Devil. “See how happy she is in her rich clothes. Do you hear her laugh?... Go to! No doubt she’s laughing at you and at your wife, who was violated last night by our seigneur.... But do take a look at the beauty! I wager she is jeering at you.”
Drawn from his dejection, and rage mounting to his heart, Mazurec brusquely raised his head. For an instant his eyes fiery and red with weeping, fastened on the betrothed of his seigneur, the haughty damosel, resplendent in attire and personal beauty, radiant with happiness, and surrounded by brilliant knights, who, courting her smiles, crowded near her.
“At this hour,” the caustic voice of Adam the Devil whispered to the ear of Mazurec, “your own bride is drinking her shame and her tears. What! In order to avenge Aveline and yourself would you not make an attempt to kill the nobleman who robbed you!... That thief is the cause of all your misfortune.”
“My stick!” cried the vassal leaping forward, transported with rage, at the same instant that one of the sergeants-at-arms hurried by to notify him that it was not allowed to stop on the arena and look at the ladies, but that he was to betake himself to one of the tents in order, before the combat, to take the customary oaths with the vicar of Nointel. Now inflamed with hatred and rage, Mazurec quickly followed the sergeant-at-arms, while, walking more slowly, Jocelyn said to Adam the Devil:
“You must have suffered a great deal in your lifetime ... I overheard you a minute ago. You know how to fire hatred—”
“Three years ago,” broke in the serf with a wild look, “I killed my wife with an axe, and yet I loved her to distraction—”
“Was that at Bourcy — near Senlis?”
“Who told you of it? How come you to know it?”
“I happened to ride through the village on the day of the murder. You preferred to see your wife dead rather than disgraced by your episcopal seigneur.”
“Exactly. That’s the way I felt on the subject.”
“But how did you become a serf of this seigniory?”
“After I killed my wife, I kept in hiding for a month in the forest of Senlis, where I lived on roots; thereupon I came to this country. Caillet gave me shelter. I offered my services as a butcher to the superintendent of the seigniory of Nointel. After the lapse of a year I was numbered among the vassals of the domain. I remained here out of friendship for Caillet.”
During this conversation between his two seconds Mazurec had arrived near the tent where he, as well as the Knight of Chaumontel, was to take the customary oath. Clad in his sacerdotal robes and holding a crucifix in his hands, the vicar addressed the serf and the knight.
“Appellant and appellee, do not ye shut your eyes to the danger to which you expose your souls in combating for a bad cause. If either of you wishes to withdraw and place himself at the mercy of his seigneur and the King, it is still time. It will soon be too late. One of you is about to cross the gates of the other world. You will there find seated a God who is merciless to the perjurer. Appellant and appellee, think of that. All men are equally weak before the tribunal of divine justice. The eternal kingdom is not entered in armor. Is either of you willing to recede?”
“I shall maintain unto death that this knight has robbed me; he has caused my misfortunes; if God is just, I shall kill this man,” answered Mazurec in a voice of concentrated rage.
“And I,” cried the knight of Chaumontel, “swear to God that that vassal lies in his throat, and outrageously slanders me. I shall prove his imposture with the intercession of our Lord and all his saints, especially with the good help of St. James, my blessed patron.”
“Aye,” put in Jocelyn, “and above all with the good help of your armor, your lance and your sword. Infamous man! To battle on horseback, helmet on head, cuirass on body, sword at your side, lance in your hand, against a poor man on foot and armed only with a stick. Aye, you behave like a coward. Cowards are thieves; consequently, you stole the purse of my principal!”
“How dare you address me in such words!” cried the knight of Chaumontel. “Such a common fellow as you! Miserable vagabond! Intolerable criminal!”
“Heavens be praised! He utters insults!” exclaimed Jocelyn with delight. “Oh, Sir thief, if you are not the most cowardly of two-legged hares, you will follow me on the spot behind yonder pavillion, or else I shall slap your ignoble scamp’s face with the scabbard of my sword.”
Livid with rage, Gerard of Chaumontel was, to the extreme joy of Jocelyn, about to accept the latter’s challenge, when one of his seconds said to him:
“That bandit is trying to save his principal by provoking you to a fight. Fall not into the trap. Do not mind him, mind the vassal.”
Taking this prudent advice, Gerard of Chaumontel contemptuously answered Jocelyn: “When arms in hand I shall have convicted this other varlet of imposture, I shall then consider whether you deserve that I accept your insolent challenge.”
“You evidently desire to taste the scabbard of my sword,” cried Jocelyn. “By heaven, I shall not deprive you of the dish; and if your hang-dog face does not redden with shame, it will redden under my slaps. Coward and felon—”
“Not another word, or I shall order one of my men to expel you from the arena,” said the herald-at-arms to Jocelyn; “a second has no right to insult the adversary of his own principal.”
Jocelyn realized that he would be compelled to yield to force, held his tongue, and cast a distracted look at Mazurec. The vicar of Nointel raised the crucifix and resumed in his nasal voice: “Appellant and appellee, do you and each of you still insist that your cause is just? Do you swear on the image of the Saviour of mankind?” and the vicar presented the crucifix to the knight, who took off his iron gauntlet and placing his hand upon the image of Christ, declared:
“My cause is just, I swear to God!”
“My cause is just,” said in turn Mazurec; “and I take God for my witness; but let us combat quickly; oh, quickly!”
“Do you swear,” proceeded the vicar, “that neither of you carries about his person either stone, or herb, or any other magic charm, amulet or incantation of the enemy of man?”
“I swear,” said the knight.
“I swear,” said Mazurec panting with rage. “Oh, how much time is lost!”
“And now, appellant and appellee,” cried the herald-at-arms, “the lists are open to you. Do your duty.”
The knight of Chaumontel seized his long lance and jumped upon his horse, which one of his seconds held for him, while Jocelyn, pale and deeply moved, said to Mazurec, while giving him his stick: “Courage!... Follow my advice ... I expect you will kill that coward ... But one last word.... It regards your mother ... Did she never tell you the name of your father?”
“Never ... as I told you this morning in prison. My mother always avoided speaking to me of my father.”
“And her name was Gervaise?” asked Jocelyn pensively. “What was the color of her hair and eyes?”
“Her hair was blonde, her eyes
black. Poor mother.”
“And had she no other mark?”
“She had a small scar above her right eye-brow—”
The clarions sounded at this point. It was the signal for the judicial duel. Unable to restrain his tears, Jocelyn pressed Mazurec in his arms and said to him: “I may not at a moment like this reveal to you the cause of the double interest that you inspire me ... My suspicions and hopes, perhaps, deceive me ... But courage ... Hit your enemy on the head.”
“Courage!” put in Adam the Devil in an undertone. “In order to keep your blood boiling, think of your wife ... remember the betrothed of your seigneur laughed at you.... Kill the thief, and patience.... It will some day be our turn to laugh at the noble damosel.... Think above all of your wife ... of her last nights shame and of your own.... Remember that you have both been made forever unhappy, and fall to bravely upon that nobleman! Be brave.... You have a cane, nails and teeth!”
Mazurec the Lambkin uttered a cry of rage and rushed into the lists at the moment when, in answer to a motion from the Sire of Nointel, the marshal of the tourney gave the signal for the combat to the appellant and appellee by calling three times the consecrated words: “Let them go!”
The noble spectators on the platform laughed in advance at the sorry discomfiture of Jacques Bonhomme; but among the plebeian crowd all hearts stopped beating with anxiety at this decisive moment. The knight of Chaumontel, a vigorous man, armed in full panoply, mounted on a tall charger covered with iron, and his long lance in rest, occupied the center of the arena, while Mazurec dashed to the spot barefoot, clad in his blouse and holding his stick in his hands. At sight of the serf, the knight, who, out of contempt for such an adversary, had disdained to lower his visor, put the spurs to his horse, and lowering his pointed iron-headed lance, charged upon the serf certain of transfixing him then and there, and then trampling over him with his horse. But Mazurec, mindful of Jocelyn’s recommendations, avoided the lance thrust by suddenly letting himself down flat upon his face; and then, partly rising up at the moment when the horse was about to grind him under its hoofs, he dealt the animal two such heavy blows with his stick on its forelegs that the courser, stung with pain, reared, slipped its footing and almost fell over, while its rider was shaken out of position on the saddle.
“Felony!” cried the Sire of Nointel with indignation. “It is forbidden to strike a horse!”
“Well done, my brave woolen cap!” cried the populace on the outside, palpitating with suspense and clapping their hands, despite the strictness and severity of the royal ordinances which commanded profound silence to the spectators at a tourney.
“Fall to, Mazurec!” simultaneously cried Jocelyn and Adam the Devil. “Courage! Kill the nobleman! Kill him! Death to the thief!”
Mazurec rose, and seeing the knight out of poise and holding to the bow of his saddle, dropped his stick, picked up a fistful of sand, leaped upon the horse behind Gerard of Chaumontel, while the latter was seeking to regain his equilibrium, lost no time in clutching the knight around the neck with one hand, turned him half over backward, and with the other rubbed his eyes with the sand he had just picked up. Almost half-blinded, the noble robber dropped his lance and reins and sought to carry his hands to his eyes. Mazurec seeing the movement, put his arms around the knight, and, after a short struggle, succeeded in making him wholly lose his balance and tumble down to the ground, where both fell rolling on the arena, while the crowd of serfs, now considering the serf the victor over the knight, clapped their hands, stamped on the ground with joy and cried: “Victory for the woolen cap!”
Gerard of Chaumontel, however, although blinded by the sand and dazed by the fall, gathered fresh strength from the rage that took possession of him at finding himself unhorsed by a peasant, and with little difficulty regained the upper hand over his unskilled adversary. In the unequal struggle against the man clad in iron, the tight clasp of the virtually naked serf was in vain; his nails broke off against, or glided harmlessly over the polished armor of his adversary, while the latter, finally succeeding in planting his two knees upon the serf’s chest, bruised his head and face with a shower of hammer blows dealt with his iron gauntlet. His face beaten to pulp and bleeding, Mazurec pronounced once more the name of Aveline and remained motionless. Gerard of Chaumontel, who was gradually regaining his sight, not satisfied with having almost beaten the serf’s face out of shape, then drew his dagger to finish his victim. But quickly recalling himself, and animated by a feeling of refined cruelty, he replaced the dagger in his belt, rose upright, and placing one of his iron shod feet upon the chest of the prostrate and moaning Mazurec, cried in a stentorian voice: “Let this vile impostor be bound up, put in a bag and thrown into the river as he deserves. It is the law of the duel; let it be carried out!”
CHAPTER V.
SHEET LIGHTNINGS.
AN OPPRESSIVE SILENCE followed the close of the judicial combat, as Gerard of Chaumontel, leaving the outstretched body of the serf on the sand, rejoined his seconds while rubbing his irritated eyelids, and jointly they quitted the arena. The sergeant-at-arms had proceeded to pick up the prostrate body of the vassal in order to carry it to the bridge that spanned the near-by river; and the vicar of Nointel had followed on the tracks of the mournful train, in order to administer the last sacraments to the condemned man so soon as he should recover consciousness, and before he was bundled into a bag, agreeable to the ordinance, and cast into the river. For a moment struck dumb with terror by the issue of the judicial combat, the plebs crowd was slowly recovering its voice, and, despite its habit of respect towards the seigneurs, had begun to murmur with rising indignation. Several voices were heard to say that the knight having been unhorsed by the vassal, the latter was to be considered the victor and should not be killed. The turmoil was on the increase, when an unexpected event suddenly drew to itself the attention of the crowd and cut short its criminations. A large troop of men-at-arms, covered with dust and one of whom bore a white flag emblazoned with the fleur-de-lis, hove in sight at a distance over the field and rapidly approached the fenced-in arena. Mazurec was forgotten. Sharing the astonishment of the assembled nobility at the sight of the armed troop that had now reached the barriers, the Sire of Nointel applied both spurs to his horse, rode rapidly forward, and addressing himself to one of the new arrivals, a herald with the fleur-de-lis jacket, saluted him courteously and inquired:
“Sir herald, what brings you hither?”
“An order of the King, my master. I am charged with a message to all the seigneurs and noblemen of Beauvoisis. Having learned that a large number of them were gathered at this place, I came hither. Listen to the envoy of King John.”
“Enter the lists and read your message aloud,” answered Conrad of Nointel to the herald, who, producing a parchment from a richly embroidered bag, rode to the center of the arena and prepared to read.
“This extraordinary message augurs nothing good,” said the seigneur of Chivry to his daughter Gloriande. “King John is going to demand some levy of men of us for his war against the English, unless it be some new edict on coinage, some fresh royal pillage.”
“Oh, father! If, like so many other seigneurs, you had only chosen to go to the court at Paris ... you would then have shared in the largesses of King John, who, we hear, is so magnificently prodigal towards the courtiers. You would then have gained on the one side what you lost on the other. And then also ... they say the court is such a charming place ... continuous royal feasts and dances, enhanced by choicest gallantry. After our marriage Conrad must take me to Paris. I wish to shine at the royal court.”
“You are a giddy-headed girl,” observed the aged seigneur shrugging his shoulders, and half closing his fist, which he applied to his ear for a trumpet, so as to be better able to hear the royal herald, he remarked to himself: “What devil of a song is he going to sing to us?”
“John, by the grace of God, King of the French,” said the herald reading from his parchment, “to his dear,
beloved and faithful seigneurs of Beauvoisis; Greeting!”
“Proceed, proceed; we can do very well without your politeness and greetings,” grumbled the aged seigneur of Chivry. “They are gilding the pill for us to swallow.”
“Pray, father, let me hear the messenger,” said Gloriande impatiently. “The royal language has a court perfume that ravishes me.”
The herald proceeded: “The mortal enemy of the French, the Prince of Wales, son of the King of England, has perfidiously broken the truce that was not to expire for some time longer. He is advancing at the head of a strong army.”
“There we are,” cried the Count of Chivry, angrily stamping with his feet. “It is a levy of men that we are going to be asked for. Blood and massacre! To the devil with the King!”
The herald continued reading: “After having set fire to everything on their route, the English are marching towards the heart of the country. In order to arrest this disastrous invasion, and in view of this great public danger, we impose upon our peoples and our beloved nobility a double tax for this year. Furthermore, we enjoin, order and command all our dear, beloved and faithful seigneurs of Beauvoisis to take up arms themselves, levy their men, and join us within eight days at Bourg, whence we shall take the field against the English, whom we shall vanquish with the aid of God and our valiant nobility. Let everyone be at his post of battle. Such is my will. JOHN.”
This appeal from the King of the French to his valiant nobility of Beauvoisis was received by the noble assemblage with a mute stupor, that speedily made place for murmurs of anger and rebellion.
“We refuse to give men and money. To the devil with King John!” cried the Count of Chivry. “Already has he imposed subsidies upon us for the maintenance of his troops. Let him take them to war! We propose to remain at our manors!”
“Well said!” exclaimed another seigneur. “The King evidently kept up no army. All our moneys have been squandered in pleasures and festivities. The court at Paris is an insatiable maw!”