Joan of the Sword Hand

by S. R. Crockett

  CHAPTER XXVII

  WIFE AND PRIEST

  "I have a right to call myself the widow of the Duke Henry of Kernsbergand Hohenstein," said Theresa von Lynar, in reply to Conrad's questionas to whom he might thank for rescue and shelter.

  "And therefore the mother of the Duchess Joan?" he continued.

  Theresa shook her head.

  "No," she said sadly; "I am not her mother, but--and even that only in asense--her stepmother. A promise to a dead man has kept me from claimingany privileges save that of living unknown on this desolate isle of sandand mist. My son is an officer in the service of the Duchess Joan."

  The face of the Prince-Bishop lighted up instantaneously.

  "Most surely, then, I know him. Did he not come to Courtland with myLord Dessauer, the Ambassador of Plassenburg?"

  The lady of Isle Rugen nodded indifferently.

  "Yes," she said; "I believe he went to Courtland with the embassy fromPlassenburg."

  "Indeed, I was much drawn to him," said the Prince eagerly; "I rememberhim most vividly. He was of an olive complexion, his features withoutcolour, but graven even as the Greeks cut those of a young god on agem."

  "Yes," said Theresa von Lynar serenely, "he has his father's face andcarriage, which are those also of the Duchess Joan."

  "And why," said the young man, "if I may ask without offence, is yourson not the heir to the Dukedom?"

  There was a downcast sadness in the woman's voice and eye as shereplied, "Because when I wedded Duke Henry it was agreed between us thataught which might be thereafter should never stand between his daughterand her heritage; and, in spite of deadly wrong done to those of myhouse, I have kept my word."

  The Prince-Cardinal thought long with knitted brow.

  "The Duchess is my brother Louis's wife," he said slowly.

  "In name!" retorted Theresa, quickly and breathlessly, like one calledon unexpectedly to defend an absent friend.

  "She is his wife--I married them. I am a priest," he made answer.

  A gleam, sharp and quick as lightning jetted from a thunder cloud,sprang into the woman's eye.

  "In this matter I, Theresa von Lynar, am wiser than all the priests inthe world. Joan of Hohenstein is no more his wife than I am!"

  "Holy Church, the mother of us all, made them one!" said the Cardinalsententiously. For such words come easily to dignitaries even when theyare young.

  She bent towards him and looked long into his eyes.

  "No," she said; "you do not know. How indeed is it possible? You are tooyoung to have learned the deep things--too certain of your ownrighteousness. But you will learn some day. I, Theresa von Lynar,know--aye, though I bear the name of my father and not that of myhusband!" And at this imperious word the Prince was silent and thoughtwith gravity upon these things.

  Theresa sat motionless and silent by his bed till the day rose cool anduntroubled out of the east, softly aglow with the sheen of clouded silk,pearl-grey and delicate. Prince Conrad, being greatly wearied andbruised inwardly with the buffeting of the waves and the stones of theshore, slumbered restlessly, with many tossings and turnings. But as oftas he moved, the hands of the woman who had been a wife were upon him,ordering his bruised limbs with swift knowledgeable tenderness, so thathe did not wake, but gradually fell back again into dreamless andrefreshing sleep. This was easy to her, because the secret of pain wasnot hid from Theresa, the widow of the Duke of Hohenstein--though Henrythe Lion's daughter, as yet, knew it not.

  In the morning Joan came to bid the patient good-morrow, while Wernervon Orseln stood in the doorway with his steel cap doffed in his hand,and Boris and Jorian bent the knee for a priestly blessing. But Theresadid not again appear till night and darkness had wrapped the earth. Sobeing all alone he listened to the heavy plunge of the breakers on thebeach among which his life had been so nearly sped. The sound grewslower and slower after the storm, until at last only the wavelets ofthe sheltered sea lapsed on the shingle in a sort of breathing whisper.

  "Peace! Peace! Great peace!" they seemed to say hour after hour as theyfell on his ear.

  And so day passed and came again. Long nights, too, at first with hourlytendance and then presently without. But Joan sat no more with the youngman after that first watch, though his soul longed for her, that hemight again tell the girl that she was his brother's wife, and urge herto do her duty by him who was her wedded husband. So in her absenceConrad contented himself and salved his conscience by thinking austerethoughts of his mission and high place in the hierarchy of the onlyCatholic and Apostolic Church. So that presently he would rise up andseek Werner von Orseln in order to persuade him to let him go, that hemight proceed to Rome at the command of the Holy Father, whose servanthe was.

  But Werner only laughed and put him off.

  "When we have sure word of what your brother does at Kernsberg, then wewill talk of this matter. Till then it cannot be hid from you that nohostage half so valuable can we keep in hold. For if your brother lovesmy Lord Cardinal, then he will desire to ransom him. On the other hand,if he fear him, then we will keep your Highness alive to threaten him,as the Pope did with Djem, the Sultan's brother!"

  So after many days it was permitted to the Prince to walk abroad withinthe narrow bounds of the Isle Rugen, the Wordless Man guarding him atfifty paces distance, impassive and inevitable as an ambulant rock ofthe seaboard.

  As he went Prince Conrad's eyes glanced this way and that, looking for ameans of escape. Yet they saw none, for Werner von Orseln with his tenmen of Kernsberg and the two Captains of Plassenburg were not soldiersto make mistakes. There was but one boat on the island, and that waslocked in a strong house by the inner shore, and over against it asentry paced night and day. It chanced, however, upon a warm andgracious afternoon, when the breezes played wanderingly among the gardentrees before losing themselves in the solemn aisles of the pines as in apillared temple, that Conrad, stepping painfully westwards along thebeach, arrived at the place of his rescue, and, descending the steepbank of shingle to look for any traces of the disaster, came suddenlyupon the Duchess Joan gazing thoughtfully out to sea.

  She turned quickly, hearing the sound of footsteps, and at sight of thePrince-Bishop glanced east and west along the shore as if meditatingretreat.

  But the proximity of Max Ulrich and the encompassing banks of water-wornpebbles convinced her of the awkwardness, if not the impossibility, ofescape.

  "Joan looked steadily across the steel-grey sea."[_Page 179_]]

  Conrad the prisoner greeted Joan with the sweet gravity which had beencharacteristic of him as Conrad the prince, and his eyes shone upon herwith the same affectionate kindliness that had dwelt in them in thepavilion of the rose garden. But after one glance Joan looked steadilyaway across the steel-grey sea. Her feet turned instinctively to walkback towards the house, and the Prince turned with her.

  "If we are two fellow-prisoners," said Conrad, "we ought to see more ofeach other. Is it not so?"

  "That we may concert plans of escape?" said Joan. "You desire tocontinue your pilgrimage--I to return to my people, who, alas, thinkthemselves better off without me!"

  "I do, indeed, greatly desire to see Rome," replied the Prince. "TheHoly Father Sixtus has sent me the red biretta, and has commanded me tocome to Rome within a year to exchange it for the Cardinal's hat, andalso to visit the tombs of the Apostles."

  But Joan was not listening. She went on to speak of the matters whichoccupied her own mind.

  "If you were a priest, why did you ride in the great tournament of theBlacks and the Whites at Courtland not a year ago?"

  The Prince-Cardinal smiled indulgently.

  "I was not then fledged full priest; hardly am I one now, though theyhave made me a Prince of Holy Church. Yet the tournaying was in amanner, perhaps, what her bridal dress is to a nun ere she takes theveil. But, my Lady Joan, what know you of the strife of Blacks andWhites at Courtland?"

  "Your sister, the Princess Margaret, spoke of it, and also the Count von
Loeen, an officer of mine," answered Joan disingenuously.

  "I am indeed a soldier by training and desire," continued the young man."In Italy I have played at stratagem and countermarch with the Orsiniand Colonna. But in this matter the younger son of the house ofCourtland has no choice. We are the bulwark of the Church alike againstheretic Muscovite to the north and furious Hussite to the south. We ofCourtland must stand for the Holy See along all the Baltic edges; andfor this reason the Pope has always chosen from amongst us hisrepresentative upon the Diet of the Empire, till the office has becomealmost hereditary."

  "Then you are not really a priest?" said Joan, woman-like fixing uponthat part of the young man's reply, which somehow had the greatestinterest for her.

  "In a sense, yes--in truth, no. They say that the Pope, in order toforward the Church's polity, makes and unmakes cardinals every day, someeven for money payments; but these are doubtless Hussite lies. Yetthough by prescript right and the command of the head of the Church I amboth priest and bishop, in my heart I am but Prince Conrad of Courtlandand a simple knight, even as I was before."

  They paced along together with their eyes on the ground, the WordlessMan keeping a uniform distance behind them. Then the Prince laughed astrange grating laugh, like one who mocks at himself.

  "By this time I ought to have been well on my way to the tombs of theApostles; yet in my heart I cannot be sorry, for--God forgive me!--I hadliefer be walking this northern shore, a young man along with a fairmaiden."

  "A priest walking with his brother's wife!" said Joan, turning quicklyupon him and flashing a look into the eyes that regarded her with somewonder at her imperiousness.

  "That is true, in a sense," he answered; "yet I am a priest with noconsent of my desire--you a wife without love. We are, at least, alikein this--that we are wife and priest chiefly in name."

  "Save that you are on your way to take on you the duties of your office,while I am more concerned in evading mine."

  The Cardinal meditated deeply.

  "The world is ill arranged," he said slowly; "my brother Louis wouldhave made a far better Churchman than I. And strange it is to think thatbut a year ago the knights and chief councillors of Courtland came tome to propose that, because of his bodily weakness, my brother should bedeposed and that I should take over the government and direction ofaffairs."

  He went on without noticing the colour rising in Joan's cheek, smiling alittle to himself and talking with more animation.

  "Then, had I assented, my brother might have been walking here withtonsured head by your side, while I would doubtless have been knockingat the gates of Kernsberg, seeking at the spear's point for a runawaybride."

  "Nay!" cried Joan, with sudden vehemence; "that would you not----"

  And as suddenly she stopped, stricken dumb by the sound of her ownwords.

  The Prince turned his head full upon her. He saw a face all suffusedwith hot blushes, haughtiest pride struggling with angry tears in eyesthat fairly blazed upon him, and a slender figure drawn up into anattitude of defiance--at sight of all which something took him instantlyby the throat.

  "You mean--you mean----" he stammered, and for a moment was silent. "ForGod's sake, tell me what you mean!"

  "I mean nothing at all!" said Joan, stamping her foot in anger.

  And turning upon her heel she left him standing fixed in wonder anddoubt upon the margin of the sea.

  Then the wife of Louis, Prince of Courtland, walked eastward to thehouse upon the Isle Rugen with her face set as sternly as for battle,but her nether lip quivering--while Conrad, Cardinal and Prince of HolyChurch, paced slowly to the west with a bitter and downcast look uponhis ordinarily so sunny countenance.

  For Fate had been exceeding cruel to these two.