by Max Brand, Achmed Abdullah, E. K. Means, and Perley Poore Sheehan
FOURTH TALE
PRINCESS OR PERCHERON
BY PERLEY POORE SHEEHAN
I.
Some queer things had taken place in this same hall--some very queerthings; but there were indications that this present affair was going tobe queerer yet.
The old duke always had been a worthy descendant of his ancestors; likethem, a little mad, with flashes of genius, very fine, very brutal, amurderer at heart, with a love for poetry and philosophic speculation.
The guests were already in a smiling tremor of curiosity when theyarrived. Some of them whispered among themselves:
"It's on account of the Princess Gabrielle."
"They say the duke is furious."
"Not astonishing. But--a marriage! How can there be a marriage?"
Yet it looked as if a marriage there would be. Manifestly, the hall hadbeen prepared for some such event.
It was a chamber long, lofty and broad, walled and floored with thenative Burgundy rock, richly carpeted, hung with tapestry. And down aportion of the length of this ran a wide table already spread with theviands of a wedding-feast--huge cold pasties, hams and boarheadsbeautifully jellied, fresh and candied fruits from Spain and Sicily,flagons and goblets of crystal, silver, and gold.
What aroused curiosity and conjecture to the highest point, however, wasthe discovery that the immense fireplace of the hall had beentransformed into a forge. It was a forge complete--bellows and hearth,anvil and tub, hammers and tongs. There was even a smutty-faced impthere to tend the forge fire, which already hissed and glowed as heworked the bellows.
"Aha! So there _was_ a smith mixed up in the affair, after all!"
"_Mais oui!_ Gaspard, the smith, whose forge is down there on the banksof the Rhone."
"But what does the duke intend to do?"
It was a question which more than one was asking. There was never anyforecasting what a whim of the duke might lead him to do even inordinary circumstances--declare war on France, call a new Crusade. Andnow, with this menace of scandal in his family!
There in front of the fireplace where the forge had been set up, thevalets had placed the ducal chair. All the same, the arrangements hadsomething sinister about them. There fell a period of silence touchedwith panic. But not for long. Curiosity was too acute and powerful to belong suppressed. The whispering resumed:
"The duke surprised them together--the princess and her smith."
"It looks like the torture for one or both."
"They say the fellow's an Apollo, a Hercules."
"You wait until the duke--"
"Silence! He comes."
One of the large doors toward the farther end of the hall was thrownopen, and through this there came a surge of music--hautboys, viols, andflutes. Two guardsmen came in, helmeted, swords drawn, and took up theirstations at either side of the door.
There entered the duke.
He looked the philosopher, perhaps, if not the student--tall, bent,bony; a brush of white hair bristling over the top of his high andnarrow head; a fleshless face, sardonic and humorous. The guests werepleased to see that his mood was amiable. He came forward smiling, wavedhis musicians into retreat; and half a dozen valets were assisting himinto his chair as he greeted his guests. They all bent the knee to him.Some kissed his hand--and some he kissed, especially those who were fairand of the opposite sex.
If Princess Gabrielle had shown herself fragile in the matter of heraffections, well, she had come by her failing honestly.
Seated in his chair, the duke delivered himself of a little pun whichconvulsed his audience--something about "court and courtship": "_Jefais--la cour._"
And with no other preliminary he spoke to a page:
"Summon _mademoiselle_."
Then to another:
"Fetch in the smith."
There was a bitter smile on his face as he sank back into his chair andstudied the forge set up in the fireplace. The imp went white under hissmudge and worked the bellows until the fire on the hearth was spoutinglike a miniature Vesuvius.
The wait was brief.
Once more the musicians struck into the royal march of Burgundy, andthere was the Princess Gabrielle.
Every one who looked at her must have experienced some thrill of theheart--envy, desire, pure admiration. It was impossible to look at herwithout some emotion; for she was eighteen, slender, white andpassionate; with dusky, copper-colored hair hanging in two heavy curlsforward over her brilliantly tender shoulders; and she had a broad, redmouth, and slightly dilated nostrils; dark eyes, liquid and heavilyfringed, with disquieting shadows under them.
She came forward with a number of maidens in her train, but she sodominated them that she appeared to be alone. She took her time. She wasa trifle rebellious, perhaps. But she was brave, not to say bold. Shetossed her head slightly. She smiled. She and her maidens, familiar withthe duke's intentions, grouped themselves at one side of the improvisedforge. Every one present was still looking at her when there came arough command:
"Stand aside!"
A good many of the guests were not in the habit of hearing orders exceptfrom the duke himself; but the command came again:
"Stand aside! Let me pass--me and my people!"
At that there was a rapid shifting of the crowd and a whispered cry:
"The smith! It's Gaspard the smith!"
And he attracted even more attention than the princess had done; for,manifestly, here was not only a man who could play the game of love, butcould play the game of life and death as well--to shout out like this,and come striding like this into the presence of his ruler.
But he looked the part.
He was all of six feet tall, blond and supple and beautifully fleshed.He was wearing his blacksmith's outfit of doeskin and leather, but hewas scoured and shaven to the pink. His great arms were bare; and theexquisitely sculptured muscles of these slipped and played under a skinas white as a woman's.
He stood there with his shoulders back, his arms folded, feet apart.But, curiously, there was no insolence in the posture. Insolence is aquality of the little heart, the little soul, and shows itself in theeyes. Gaspard the smith had gentle blue eyes, large, dark, fearless, andwith a certain brooding pride in them. There may have been even a hintof virgin bashfulness in them as well, during that moment he glanced atthe Princess Gabrielle. Then he had looked at the duke, and all hiscourage had come back to him, perhaps also a suggestion of challenge.
But neither had the smith come into the ducal presence alone.
There were two old people--a man and a woman, peasants, both of themvery poor, very humble, so frightened that they could breathe only withtheir mouths open; and so soon as they were inside the circle of guests,they had dropped to their knees. The other member of the smith's partywould have done the same had he permitted. This was a girl of twenty orso, likewise a peasant, healthy, painfully abashed, but otherwise notnotable. To her the smith had given a nudge and a word of encouragement,so that now she stood close to him and back of him.
"Our friends," said the duke, with studied nonchalance, "we are about topresent to you the initial operation of scientific experiment. Like allscientific research, this also should be judged solely by its possiblecontribution to the advancement of human happiness. Ourself, we feelthat this contribution will be great. God knows it is concerned with aproblem that is both elusive and poignant."
All this was rather above Gaspard's head. He turned to the imp at thebellows.
"Stop blowing that fire so hard," he whispered. "You're wastingcharcoal."
The duke smiled grimly.
"The problem," he continued, "is this: Can any man and woman, howeverdevoted, continue to love each other if they are too closely heldtogether?"
There was a slight movement among some of the younger gentlemen andladies present--a few knowing smiles.
"There have always been those who answered _No_; there have always beenthose who answered _Yes_," the duke went on. "Which were right?" Noanswer. "My grandda
ughter here, while having her horse shod some weeksago, became enamored of this worthy subject of mine." He nodded towardthe smith. "She would have him. She would have no one else. We knew howhopeless would be any attempt to impose our will--in an affair of theheart." He smiled gallantly. "We are familiar with the breed."
"Long live the House of Burgundy," cried the chivalrous young Vicomte deMacon. But the duke silenced him with a look.
"And now," said the duke, "we wish to test this so great passion ofhers--test it under conditions that while apparently extraordinary arenone the less classical and scientific. Our experiment is this--"
For the first time since he began to speak the duke now leaned forward,and both his face and his voice took on that quality which made his namea source of trembling from Spain to Denmark.
"Our experiment is this:
"_To have the princess and her smith, whom she is so sure she loves,handcuffed and linked together by a ten-foot chain._"
II.
There was a gasp from the audience. Every one stared at the princess.Even the duke himself. Without turning his head he took her in with hisfurtive eyes.
"_Mlle. la Princess_," he said icily, "was good enough to insist uponthe sacrifice."
At this, a stain of richer color slowly crept up the throat of thePrincess Gabrielle; there came a touch of extra fire to her eyes.Perhaps she would have spoken. But the duke hadn't finished yet.
"We'll see whether she loves him so much or not," said the duke. "We'llgive them three days of it--three days to go and come as they wish--andto do as they wish--together--always together--bound to each other bytheir ten-foot chain."
But while the excitement caused by the duke's announcement was stillcrisping the nerves of every one present, the smith had cast one moreglance in the direction of the Princess Gabrielle. And this time theireyes met. There were those who saw a glint of terror--of deliciousterror--in the eyes of the princess; and in the eyes of Gaspard a lookintended to be reassuring.
Then the smith had unfolded his arms, thrust them forward.
"Wait," he cried.
At that there was a fresh sensation.
For it was seen that one of his wrists--his left--was already encircledby a bracelet of shining steel, forged there of a single piece, and thatto the bracelet itself there was forged a link, fine but powerful, andthat other links ran back over his shoulder.
"Ha!" snarled the duke. "So you've come prepared!"
"By the grace of God!" replied Gaspard the smith, unafraid. He cast alook about him, brought his eyes back to the duke. "_Moi_, Gaspard," hesaid, "I forge my own chains--always! I'm a smith, I am."
The two old people kneeling just back of him began to sob and to groan.Gaspard turned and looked down at them.
"Shut up," he ordered; "I'm talking."
He smiled at the duke. He explained.
"You see, they're frightened," he said. "When I found out what yourhighness and your highness's lady-granddaughter were planning up herein the castle, why, I went to these old folks and told them that Iwanted their daughter Susette."
"I suppose you loved her," the duke put in with ironical intent.
But the smith saw no reason for irony.
"Eh, _bon Dieu_!" he ejaculated. "And save your highness's respect,we've loved each other ever since we were out of the cradle, we have. SoI made the old folks consent. I'm a smith, I am. I forge my own chains.Stand around, Susette! His highness won't hurt you. Look!"
He stepped aside. He gave a gentle thrust to the girl who had beensheltering back of him. The chain rattled.
And there was another cry of surprise.
One of the girl's wrist's also was ornamented with a steel handcufftightly welded. Not only that, but to this also was attached a chain.The smith threw up his arm. It was the same chain that was welded to hisown handcuff--ten feet of it, glistening steel, unbreakable.
"There's your ten-foot chain, highness," cried Gaspard. "And it's notrick-chain, either," he added. "It's a chain that will hold. You betit will. I forged it myself, and I know. It's a chain you couldn't buy.Why? Because--because the iron of it's mixed with love. Nor can it becut, nor filed, nor broken. I'm a smith, I am. And each link of it Itempered myself--with sweat and blood."
There for a time it was a question--possibly a question in the mind ofthe duke himself--just how many minutes the smith still had to live.Many a valet had been executed for less. During a period of about thirtyseconds the duke's face went black. Then the blackness dispersed. Heslowly smiled.
After all, he wasn't to be cheated of his experiment.
But he answered the question that was in his own mind and the minds ofall the others there as he looked at the smith and said:
"Fool, you'll be sufficiently punished--by your own device."
He let his eyes drift again to the Princess Gabrielle.
"And thou," he said, "art sufficiently punished already."
III.
It happened to be a day of late spring; and as Gaspard and thisstrangely wedded bride of his and her parents came out of the castle,both fed and forgiven, it must have seemed to all of them that this wasthe most auspicious moment of their lives. The old folks, who hadpartaken freely of the generous wines pressed upon them, had now passedfrom their trembling terror to a spirit of frolic. Arm in arm, theirsabots clogging, they did a rigadoon down the winding road. It was aspirit of tender elation, though, that dominated Gaspard and Susette.They were like two beings distilled complete from the mild and fragrantair, the sweet mistiness of the verdant valley, the purpling solemnityof the Juras.
"What did he mean, his highness?" asked Susette as she pressed thesmith's arm closer to her side. "What did he mean that you'd be punishedby your own device?"
Gaspard looked down at her, pressed her manacled wrist to his lips, tookthought.
"I don't know," he answered gently. "He must be crazy. It's like callingit punishment when a true believer receives the reward of paradise."
"You love me so much as that?"
"_Pardi!_" he ejaculated. "And thou?"
"So much," she palpitated, "so much that when you looked at the princesslike that--I wished you were blind!"
At the bottom of the hill, the old folks, Burgundians to the souls ofthem, happily bade the young couple to be off about their own affairs.They knew how it was with young married people. The old wereobstacles--so they themselves well recalled--albeit that was more thantwenty years ago.
Said Gaspard fondly: "This business has put me back in my work; butwe'll call this a holiday. Shall we go to my cottage or into the forest?I know of a secret place--"
"Into the forest," whispered Susette. "I don't like the forge. It makesme think--think of that cursed princess--and of the work that almostlost you to me." Her blue eyes filmed as she looked up at him. "Oh,Gaspard, I also have dreamed so much--of love--a life of love withthee!"
There was no one there to see. Some day, perhaps, in the far distantfuture, this part of the world would be thickly populated. But this wasnot yet the case. Gaspard brought his bride close to his breast, smiledgravely into her upturned face. He kissed her tears away. Sweet Susette!She was such a child! How little she knew of life!
And yet what was that fragile, fluttering, elusive, tiny suggestion of aregret in the back of his brain? Now he saw it; now it was gone--asilver moth of a thought, yet one, some instinct warned him, was thereto gnaw a hole in his happiness.
He said nothing about this to Susette, of course; he chased it from hisown joy. And this joy was a beautiful, tumultuous thing.
"It's like the source of the Rhone, which I saw one time--this joy ofours," he said with placid rapture. "All sparkling it was, and wildcataracts, and deep places, clean and full of mystery."
"Ah, I want it to be always like this," said Susette.
Gaspard let himself go in clear-sighted thought. They were seated on agrassy shelf that overhung the great river. The forest hemmed them inon three sides like a wedding-bower fashioned to order; but h
ere theycould follow the Rhone for miles--with its drifting barges, itsred-sailed shallops, its hamlets, and villages.
"Yes, ever like the Rhone," he said; "but growing, like the Rhone, untilit's broad and majestic and strong to carry burdens--"
Susette interrupted him.
"Kiss me," she said. "Kiss me again. No--not like that; like you did awhile ago."
And Gaspard, laughing, did as he was bidden. But what was that silverglint of something like a regret, something like a loss, that camefluttering once more across the atmosphere of his thought? Susette,though, kept him diverted. She was forever popping in upon hisreflections with innocent, childish questions; and he found thisinfinitely amusing.
"Did you desire me--more than the princess?"
"Beloved, I have desired you for years."
"Did you think me more beautiful--than she?"
Again Gaspard laughed; but it set him to thinking. He liked to think. Hethought at his forge, at his meals, nights when he happened to beawake.
"Love and beauty," he said, "these are created by desire. As astone-cutter desires what is hidden in the rock, and hews it out andloves the thing he shapes, though it be as ugly as a gargoyle, becauseof the desire that brought it forth--"
"Do you think that I'm a gargoyle?" queried Susette hastily.
"Certainly not."
"Then, why did you call me one?"
So he had to console her again, and took a certain joy in it, althoughshe protracted the dear, silly dispute by telling him that he hadchained her to him simply so that he could torture her, and that he hadwanted to spare the princess such suffering, and that therefore it wasclear that he loved the princess more.
"Why, no," said Gaspard; "as for that, she's really in love with thatyoung Sieur de Macon."
But thereupon Susette wanted to know how he came to be so well informedas to the contents of the lady's heart. So the smith gave over anyattempt to reason, except in the silences of his brain; and justconfined his outer activities to cooings and caresses, as Susette wouldhave him do.
Yet his thought would persist.
That was the trail of a great truth he had almost stated back there,about the place held by desire in the origins of love and beauty. He hadwatched a certain Italian named Botticelli do a mural painting in theduke's private chapel. Lord, there was a passion! He had helped in thebuilding of the cathedral at Sens. Lord, what fervor the builders putinto their work! They were all like young lovers.
The smith sat up. It was almost as if he had cornered that glinting mothof doubt.
Yes, they had been like young lovers--Sieur Botticelli, in pursuit ofthe beautiful; the church-builders in pursuit of God. But--and here wasthe point--what if their desire had been satisfied? The quest would havestopped. The vision of the artist would have faded. The steeple wouldhave fallen down. For desire would have ceased to exist.
"I'm hungry and I'm thirsty," said Susette.
He kissed her pensively. They started home.
IV.
"Gaspard! Gaspard!"
The smith sat up swiftly on his couch.
"What's the matter?" he demanded.
All the same, in spite of certain disquieting dreams, it struck him assweet and curious to be awakened like that by Susette. But he perceivedthat she was alarmed.
"Some one hammers at the door," she said.
Then he heard it himself, that thing he had already been hearingobscurely in his sleep.
"Coming!" he yelled. And he smilingly explained to Susette: "It's myold friend, Joseph, the carter. He'd bring his work to me if he hadto travel five leagues." And he was for jumping up and running tothe door.
"Wait," cried Susette. "I'll have to go with you, and I can't be seenlike this."
"That's right," said Gaspard. "That confounded chain! I'd forgotten allabout it." So he called out again to his friend, and the two of themheld quite a conversation while Susette tried to make herselfpresentable. But Gaspard turned to her as she shook her hair out for thethird time, starting to rearrange it. "Quick!" he urged. "He's in ahurry. One of his horses has cast a shoe."
"You can't show yourself like that, either," cried Susette, playing fortime.
"Me?" laughed Gaspard. "I'm a smith. I'd like to see a smith whocouldn't show himself in singlet and apron!"
"You look like a brigand."
But he merely laughed: "Joseph won't mind."
And, indeed, Joseph the carter did appear to have but little thought foranything except the work in hand. For that matter, neither, apparently,did Gaspard. After the first few brief civilities and the inevitablejests about the chain, their attention was absorbed at once by thehorses. There were four of these--Percherons, huge monsters with shaggyfetlocks and massive feet; yet Joseph and Gaspard went about liftingthese colossal hoofs, and considering them as tenderly as if the two hadbeen young mothers concerned with the feet of babes.
At last Susette let out a little cry, and both men turned to look ather.
"I faint," she said weakly.
And Gaspard sprang over and caught her in his arms. He was filled withpity. He was all gentleness.
"Are you sick?" he asked.
"It was the odor of the horses," Susette replied in her small voice.
Joseph the carter seemed to take this as some aspersion on himself."Those horses don't smell," he asserted stoutly.
But Gaspard signaled him to hold his place. "You'll be all right in asecond or so," he told his wife. He spoke gently; although, as a matterof fact, he himself could find nothing about those magnificent animalsto offend the most delicate sensibility. "You'll be all right. You cancome into the forge and sit down while I shoe the big gray."
"That will be worse than ever," wailed Susette.
Joseph the carter was an outspoken man, gruff and honest.
"And there's a woman for you," he said, "to be not only wed but weldedto a smith! _Nom d'un tonnerre!_ Say, then, Gaspard, I'm in a hurry.Shall we start with the gray?"
"Yes," Gaspard answered softly, as he continued to support Susette.
"No, no, no!" cried Susette. "Not to-day! I'm too sick."
"_Mais, cherie_," Gaspard began.
"You love your work better than you do me," sobbed Susette.
"_Nom d'un pourceau!_" droned Joseph.
"But this work is important," Gaspard argued desperately. "The gray hasnot only cast a shoe, but the shoes on the others are loose. They've gotto be attended to. It's work that will bring me in a whole _ecu_."
"I don't care," said Susette. "I can't stand the smell of those horses,and I could never, never bear the smell of the hot iron on their hoofs."
"But I'm a smith," argued Gaspard.
It was his ultimate appeal.
"I told you that you loved your work more than you did me," whimperedSusette, beginning to cry. "'_I'm a smith; I'm a smith_'--that's allyou've talked about since you got me in your power."
Joseph the carter went away. He did so shaking his head, followed by hisshining Percherons, which were as majestic as elephants, but as gentleas sheep. There was a tugging at Gaspard's heart as he saw them go.Such horses! And no one could shoe a horse as could he. He looked downat Susette's bowed head as she lay there cuddled in his arms. Thatdespairing cry was again swelling in his chest: "But I'm a smith." Hesilenced it. He stroked the girl's head.
As he did so, he was mindful as never before of the clink and jangle ofthe chain.
V.
"What do you want me to do?" he asked that afternoon as they lay out inthe shade of the poplars along the river bank.
"I want you to love me," she answered.
"I do love you. But we can't live on love--can we, Susette?--howeverpleasant that would be. I've got to work."
"Ah, your _sacre_ work!"
"Still, you'll admit that you can't pick up _ecus_ in the road."
"You're thinking still of that miserable carter."
"No; but I'm thinking of his horses. Somebody's got to shoe them. Youcan't let them go lame-
-or be lamed by a bungler. I could have donethat job as it should have been done."
"But I tell you," declared Susette, pronouncing each word with anindividual stress, "I can't support the grime and the odors and theracket of your forge. You ought to find some work that I do like. Wecould collect wild salads together--pick wild-flowers and sellthem--something like that."
Gaspard sighed.
"But a man's work is his work," he averred.
"There you go again," said Susette, and the accusation was all the moredamning in that it was spoken not in anger, but in grief. "Now that I'vegiven myself to you--done all that you wished--you want to get rid ofme; you want me to die."
"Haven't I told you a thousand times," cried Gaspard softly andpassionately, "that I love you more than any man has ever loved anywoman? Haven't I spent whole days and nights--yes, years--of my lifedesiring you? Haven't I proven it? Come into my arms, Susette. Ah, whenI have you in my arms like this--"
"And it's only like this that I know happiness, my love," breathed thegirl. "Yes; I'm jealous! Jealous of everything that can take you fromme, body or spirit, if even for a moment. All women are like that. Welive in jealousy. What's work? What's ambition, honor, duty, gold ascompared with love?"
But late that night Gaspard the smith roused himself softly from hiscouch. He lay there leaning on his elbow and stared out of the window ofhis cottage. Susette stirred at his side, undisturbed by the metallicclinking. Otherwise the night was one of engulfing, mystical silence.
Just outside the cottage the great river Rhone flowed placid and free inthe light of the young moon. Up from the river-bottoms ran the vine-cladslopes of Burgundy as fragrant as gardens. There was no wind. It was allswoon and mystery.
"Lord God!" cried Gaspard the smith in his heart.
It was a prayer as much as anything--an inspiration that he couldn't getotherwise into words.
He was of that race of artist-craftsmen whose forged iron and frettedsteel would continue to stir all lovers of beauty for centuries to come.
"It's true," that inner voice of his spoke again, "that desire is thedriving force of the world. 'Twas desire in the heart of God that led tocreation. 'Tis so with us, His creatures--desire that makes us love andembellish. But when desire is satisfied, then desire is dead, andthen--and then--"
And yet, as he lay there, buffeted by an emotion which he either wouldnot or could not express, his eyes gradually focused on the castle ofthe great Duke of Burgundy up there on top of the hill--washed inmoonlight, dim and vast; and it was as if he could see the PrincessGabrielle at her casement, kneeling there, communing with the night ashe was doing.
Did she weep?
He had caught that message in her eyes as she had looked at him up therein the castle hall--had seen the same message before.
But never had she looked so beautiful--or as she looked now inretrospect--skin so white, mouth so tender, shape so stately, yet soslim and graceful. Oddly enough, thought of her now filled him with avibrancy, with a longing.
And brave! Hadn't she shown herself to be brave though--to stand up likethat there before her grandfather, him whom all Europe called Louis theTerrible, and declare herself ready to be welded to the man of herchoice! She wouldn't faint in the presence of horses! And where couldn'ta man go if led by a guardian angel like that? Slaves had becomeemperors; blacksmiths had forged armies, become the architects ofcathedrals.
His breathing went deep, then deeper yet. The sweat was on his brow. Hesat up. He seized the chain in his powerful hands, made as if he weregoing to tear it asunder.
But after that moment of straining silence he again lifted his face.
"_Seigneur-Dieu_," he panted; "if--if I only had it to do over again!"
VI.
"It's Gaspard the smith," said the frightened page. "He craves the honorof an interview."
The duke looked up from his parchment.
"Gaspard the smith?"
The duke was seated before the fireplace in the hall. The forge hadbeen removed; and instead there were some logs smoldering there, for themorning was cool. But his glance recalled the circumstances of his lastencounter with the smith. The watchful page was quick to seize his cue.
"He comes alone," the page announced.
The duke gave a start, then began to chuckle.
"_Tiens! Tiens!_ He comes alone! 'Tis true, this is the time limit Iset. Send the creature in."
And his highness continued to laugh all the time that the page was gone.But he laughed softly, for he was alone. Presently he heard a subduedclinking of steel. He greeted his subject with a sly smile.
Most subjects of Louis the Terrible would have been overjoyed to bereceived by their sovereign so graciously. But Gaspard the smith showedno special joy. He wasn't nearly so proud, either, as he had been thatother time he had appeared before his lord. He bent his knee. Heremained kneeling until the duke told him to get up. The duke was stillsmiling.
"So my three days were enough," said his highness.
"Enough and sufficient," quoth the smith.
Now that he was on his feet again he was once more the man. He and theduke looked at each other almost as equals.
"Tell me about it," said Louis.
"Well, I'll tell you," Gaspard began; "you see, I'm a smith."
"But incapable of forging a chain strong enough to hold a woman."
"I'm not so sure," Gaspard replied. "It was a good chain."
He put out his left wrist and examined it. The steel handcuff was stillthere. Up and back from it ran the chain which the smith had beencarrying over his shoulder. He hauled the chain down. He displayed theother end of it, still ornamented by the companion bracelet.
"What happened? How did she get out of it?" queried the duke.
"She got thin," Gaspard responded with melancholy. "She didn't want meto work. She wanted the money that I could earn. Yes. She even wanted meto work. But it had to be her kind of work; something--something--howshall I say it?--something that wouldn't interfere with our love."
"And you didn't love her?"
"Sure I loved her," flared the smith. "Eh--_bon Dieu_! I wouldn't havecoupled up with her if I hadn't loved her; but, also, I loved somethingelse. I loved my work. I'm a smith. I'm a shoer of horses, a forger ofiron, a worker in steel. I'm what the good God made me, and I've thegood God's work to do!
"So after a certain amount of honeymoon I had to get back to my forge.Joseph the carter, his Percherons; who could shoe them but me?"
"And she didn't like that?"
"No. When I made her sit in my forge she pined and whined and refused toeat. I was crazy. But I did my work. And this morning when I awoke Ifound that she had slipped away."
"You were already enchained," said his highness, "by your work."
The smith misunderstood.
"You can see it was no trick chain," he said, holding up the chain hehimself had forged and playing with the links.
"Aye," said the duke, for he loved these philosophic disquisitions, whenhe was in the mood for them. "Aye, chains are the nature of theuniverse. The planets are chained. The immortal soul is chained to themortal body. The body itself is chained to its lusts and frailties."
"I'm a smith," said Gaspard, "and I want to work."
"We're not happy when we are chained," the duke continued to reflectaloud. "But I doubt that we'd be happier were our chains to disappear.No matter." He regarded Gaspard the smith with real benignancy. "Atleast you've proven the fatal quality of one particular chain--thething I wanted to prove. And--you've saved the princess."
"'Twas of her I wanted to speak," Gaspard spoke up. "This is a goodchain. I forged it myself."
"Yes, I know you're a smith," said the duke.
"Well, then," said Gaspard, "I've been thinking. Suppose--now that I'vestill got it on me--that we try it on the princess, after all." Henoticed the duke's look of amazement. "I'm willing," said Gaspard. "I'mwilling to have another try--"
"_Dieu de bon Dieu!_" quoth the duk
e. "Never content!" He recoveredhimself. He felt kindly toward the smith. "Haven't you heard?" hedemanded. "The princess has forged a chain of her own. She eloped withthat young Sieur de Macon the same day you declined to chain her toyourself."
Transcriber's Note:
Spelling, punctuation and grammar have been retained except as follows:
Page 18 bear of leaves _changed to_ bare of leaves
Page 36 enternal laws of logic _changed to_ eternal laws of logic
Page 47 what has love to _changed to_ what has love to do
Page 56 completely locked the hall _changed to_ completely blocked the hall
Page 76 borne a thousand times _changed to_ born a thousand times
Page 78 but the were frozen _changed to_ but they were frozen
Page 85 Flourney studied a moment _changed to_ Flournoy studied a moment
Page 86 "No!" Flourney snapped _changed to_ "No!" Flournoy snapped
Page 111 enlightened her igorance _changed to_ enlightened her ignorance
Page 116 I ain't no bayou _changed to_ "I ain't no bayou
Page 145 Its my old friend _changed to_ It's my old friend
Page 158 No, matter. _changed to_ No matter.