Laughing Bill Hyde and Other Stories Part 46

"I have sinned before G.o.d; but I still acknowledge Him and crave His mercy," said the wretched priest.

"Hark you, Joseph. You are the best of monks. Have you ever done evil before this night?"

"My life has been clean, but the flesh is weak. It was the witchcraft of Satan in that woman's music. I prayed for strength, but I was powerless. My soul shall pay the penalty."

"What sort of G.o.d is this who snares His holiest disciple, with the l.u.s.ts of the flesh?" mocked Abul Malek. "Did not your prayers mount up so high? Or is His power insufficient to forestall the devil? Bah!

There is but one true G.o.d, and Mohammed is His Prophet. These many years have I labored to rend your veil of holiness asunder and to expose your faith to ridicule and laughter. This have I done to-night."

"Stop!" cried the tortured monk. "Bring forth a lance."

"Nay! Nay! You shall hear me through," gloated Abul Malek; and again Joseph bowed his tonsured head, murmuring:

"It is my punishment."

Ringed about thus by his enemies, the priest stood meekly, while the sweat came out upon his face; as the Saracen mocked and jeered at him he made no answer, except to move his lips in whispered grayer. Had it not been for this sign they might have thought him changed to stone, so motionless and so patient did he stand. How long the baiting lasted no one knew; it may have been an hour, then Joseph's pa.s.sive silence roused the anger of the overlord, who became demoniac in his rage.

His followers joined in harrying the victim, until the place became a babel. Finally Elzemah stepped forward, torch in hand, and spat upon the giant black-robed figure.

The monk's face whitened, it grew ghastly; but he made no movement.

Then in a body the infidels rushed forth to follow the example of Abul Malek's son. They swarmed about the Christian, jeering, cursing, spitting, s.n.a.t.c.hing at his garments, until their master cried:

"Enough! The knave has water in his veins. His blood has soured.

Deserted by his G.o.d, his frame has withered and his vigor fled."

"Yes," echoed his daughter. "He is great only in bulk. Had he been a Man I might have loved him; but the evil has fled out of him, leaving nothing but his ca.s.sock. Off with his robe, Elzemah. Let us see if aught remains."

With swift movement her brother tore at the monk's habit, baring his great bosom. At this insult to his cloth a frightful change swept over the victim. He upheaved his ma.s.sive shoulders, his gleaming head rose high, and in the glaring light they saw that his face had lost all sweetness and humility; it was now the visage of a madman. All fleshly pa.s.sion stored through thirty years of cloister life blazed forth, consuming reason and intelligence; with a sweep of his mighty arms he cleared a s.p.a.ce about him, hurling his enemies aside as if they were made of straw. He raised his voice above the din, cursing G.o.d and men and Moors. As they closed in upon him he s.n.a.t.c.hed from the hands of a l.u.s.ty slave a ma.s.sive wrought-iron brazier, and whirling it high above his head, he sent its glowing coals flying into the farthest corners of the room. Then with this weapon he laid about him right and left, while men fell like grain before the reaper.

"At him!" shouted Abul Malek, from his balcony. "Pull down the weapons from the walls! The fool is mad!"

Zahra clutched at her father's sleeve and pointed to a distant corner, where a tongue of flame was licking the dry woodwork and hangings.

Her eyes were flas.h.i.+ng and her lips were parted; she bent forward, following the priest with eagerness.

"Allah be praised!" she breathed. "He is a Man!"

Elzemah strove to sheathe his poinard in the monk's bare breast, but the brazier crushed him down. Across the wide floor raged the contest, but the mighty priest was irresistible. Ha.s.sam, seeing that the priest was fighting toward the balcony, flung himself upon the stairs, crying to his father and his sister to be gone. By now the castle echoed with a frightful din through which arose a sinister crackling. The light increased moment by moment, and there came the acrid smell of smoke.

Men left the maniac to give battle to the other fury. Some fled to the doors and fought with their clumsy fastenings, but as they flung them back a draught sucked through, changing the place into a raging furnace.

With his back against the stairs, Ha.s.sam hewed at the monk with his scimitar; he had done as well had he essayed to fell an oak with a single blow. Up over him rushed the giant, to the balcony above, where Abul Malek and his daughter stood at bay in the trap of their own manufacture. There, in the glare of the mounting flames, Fray Joseph sank his mighty fingers through the Moor's black beard.

The place by now was suffocating, and the roar of the conflagration had drowned all other sounds. Men wrapped their robes about their heads and hurled themselves blindly at the doors, fighting with one another, with the licking flames, with the dead that clogged the slippery flags. But the maid remained. She tore at the tattered ca.s.sock of the priest, crying into his ear:

"Come, Joseph! We may yet escape."

He let the writhing Abul Malek slip from out his grasp and peered at her through the smother.

"Thou knowest me not?" she queried. "I am Zahra." Her arms entwined his neck for a second time that night, but with a furious cry he raised his hands and smote her down at his feet, then he fled back to the stairs and plunged down into the billows that raged ahead of the fresh night wind.

The bells of San Sebastian were clanging the alarm, the good monks were toiling up the path toward the inferno which lit the heavens, when, black against the glare, they saw a giant figure approaching. It came reeling toward them, vast, mighty, misshapen. Not until it was in their very midst did they recognize their brother, Joseph. He was bent and broken, he was singed of body and of raiment, he gibbered foolishly; he pa.s.sed them by and went staggering to his cell. Long ere they reached the castle it was but a seething mountain of flame; and in the morning naught remained of Abul Malek's house but heated ruins.

Strange tales were rife concerning the end of the Moor and of his immediate kin, but the monks could make little out of them, for they were garbled and too ridiculous for belief. No Mussulman who survived the fire could speak coherently of what had happened in the great hall, nor could Fray Joseph tell his story, for he lay stricken with a malady which did not leave him for many weeks. Even when he recovered he did not talk; for although his mind was clear on most matters, nay, although he was as simple and as devout as ever, a kind Providence had blotted out all memory of Zahra, of his sin, and of the temptation that had beset his flesh.

So it is that even to this day "The Teeth of the Moor" remains a term of mystery to most of the monks of San Sebastian.