The Black Wolf's Breed Part 27

"Thy mother was--?"

"Nanon Esculas, whom thy father abducted in Spain to desert in France."

"My heart sank; I had seen the woman, and knew her son for one of the most courageous and unprincipled adventurers who hung about the Court and held their swords for hire. When the noisy troop rode up to the gates of Cartillon their leader paused, a head appeared upon the battlements.

"Guise," cried Ortez, giving the watchword of that day of slaughter.

The drawbridge lowered, and open swung the gates.

"Welcome to Cartillon, d'Artin," Ortez bowed. "Here at last we find rest and refreshment. Let a feast be spread in the great hall, ransack the place for good cheer. We've done brave work this glorious day, my lads, and a merry ending we'll have before the night is gone."

Everywhere in the courtyard were evidences of b.l.o.o.d.y conflict. Singly, in groups and in hideous crimson-splashed piles lay Catholics and Huguenots together, peaceful enough in death.

"By my faith, and a gallant set of gentlemen we have here," laughed Ortez. "What think you, brother mine?"

And even as he spoke he leaned from his saddle to strike down a half dying wretch who lifted his head from among the slain.

"Perez," he called to his sergeant riding behind him, "dispose of these bodies. Throw the heretic dogs into the old well yonder. Give our martyred friends Christian burial."

He sat his horse idly toying with his dagger, and forced me to watch my servants, the wounded and the dead, being cast into the yawning darkness of the well.

"G.o.d's blood! here is our sweet young Philip. What, not yet dead!

Why, it matters not, cast him in." This in answer to a questioning look from the more merciful Perez.

The men at arms had extricated from a heap of slain the limp body of my youngest brother, a boy of twenty, his pallid face gaping open from a cut across the cheek. He lifted his eyes languidly to mine.

"Oh brother, you are come. Some water, water," he murmured.

"Throw him in, men," Ortez interrupted.

Perez yet hesitated.

"Shall we not first dispatch him, sire?"

"No, I would not harm my gentle brother; throw him in. Be not slow about it either, thou chicken-hearted bullies; pitch him in."

The men started to obey this savage order.

"Hound of h.e.l.l!" I screamed, tortured beyond endurance, and struggling at my bonds.

Ortez slapped me in the face with his gauntlet, then laying his hand upon my shoulder said with a.s.sumed gentleness:

"Calm yourself, my dear brother; think of your unbandaged wounds; they may bleed afresh."

Philip was conscious as the men bore him to the edge of the well, but powerless to resist four stout fellows who cast him headlong amongst the dead and dying to mingle his groans and blood with theirs. Oh, that G.o.d should permit to men such deeds, and grant that men should witness them! When the last body had been disposed of, Ortez led the way to the banquet hall, inviting all his rabble to join the feast.

The banquet hall, used as it was to scenes of turbulence, never perhaps had looked upon such a throng as that. I occupied the head of my own table, strapped helpless in my seat. On either side were vacant chairs. Ortez sat at the foot. Between, the soldiery ranged themselves as they pleased. One of the troopers coming in late would have taken his place beside me, but his Captain stopped him:

"Not there, Gardier; we have other and fairer guests for whom those seats are kept."

Almost as he spoke the chairs on either side of me were slipped away, and after awhile as silently returned to their places.

Sacrament of pa.s.sion! In one of them was bound the mutilated corpse of my queenly wife, her fingers hacked off and her ears torn out for the gems which had decked them. Upon my left sat little Celia. But for one lurid stripe of crimson across her girlish breast she might well have been asleep, so lightly death had touched her. Behind them I saw a tall, gaunt woman, wearing a man's helm and carrying a pike. She directed the men. This was a woman's h.e.l.lish work.

Ortez rose with studied politeness:

"Your wife and child, d'Artin; our charming family reunion would be incomplete without them." And the woman laughed aloud.

My brain burned; something seemed to strain and give way. I lost all sense of pain, all capacity to suffer. How long this lasted I know not. When the revelry was at its height, when the wine had dulled every human instinct of these rough "Soldiers of the Church," Ortez raised his voice above the tumult; he knew his men were in the humor for a diversion he was about to propose.

"Now comrades," he said, "for the crowning joy of this most blessed day, now for our last sacred duty to Mother Church."

He came round the table and taking a cord from the hands of one of his men he threw the noose over my head. With feet bound together, hands free, I stood amongst them, this throng of butchers, each with the white Cross of Christ in his cap, the white scarf of Guise upon his arm, drunk and eager for blood.

"Henri Francois Placide d'Artin, what hast thou to say why we shall not declare thy blood attainted, thy name dishonored, thy estate forfeited, why we shall not hang thee for a Huguenot dog, traitor to King and church? Speak."

All the defiance of my race burned fearless in my eyes; I felt my face flush an instant at the shame of such a death, but replied as steadily as might be:

"Not a word to you, thou infamous one, thou base-born coward, murderer of the helpless; not to you!"

The cool, polite manner of Ortez fell from him like a mask. He seized the cord with his own hand, jerking me p.r.o.ne upon the floor and commenced to drag me from the hall. A dozen willing hands lent aid. I clutched instinctively at everything which came in my way, being torn from each hold by the ruthless villains at the rope.

Desperate, I grasped the leg of a trooper, but a savage kick in the face wrenched him free, and down the stair they started for the open court. At the end of the cord came tumbling, rolling, b.u.mping down the stone steps this almost senseless heap which was yet a man.

Arrived beside the well, whose great overhanging sweep offered a convenient scaffold, Ortez paused to look at his victim. My breath came slow, I could hardly hear their words.

"Think you his senses will return?"

"Possibly, sire," replied the man to whom this was addressed.

"Then we will wait; my sweet brother would weep to miss so brave a spectacle as his own hanging."

He sat there upon the edge of the well, whence came the groans of the dying, the hot, fresh odors of the dead, and waited, fiendish in the patient ferocity of his more than mortal hate.

After a little I opened my eyes and stared about me, scarcely comprehending where I was or what had happened. Ortez called upon his men to raise me. Being placed erect the cord was drawn just taut enough to sustain me standing. Now the ghastly woman I had seen in the hall pushed her way through the crowd.

"Her son," she hissed, and savagely struck me in the mouth until blood followed the blow. The cord instantly tightened and I felt myself swing across the well. First only a dizziness and a parched mouth.

Then the tumultuous blood surged to my throat, beating, struggling, gurgling like some pent-up mountain stream against the rocks. I threw both hands up to grasp the rope--heard a laugh, not a human laugh, yet it sounded so far, so very far away, away back upon the earth.

A gigantic merciful hand seemed to take my head within its gripe and press out all the pain.

Fiery circles swam before my eyes; great crimson blotches floated about in restless clouds of flame; then dreams, dreams, long delicious dreams. And out of endless years of rhythmic music, the laughter of low-voiced women, and many colored lights, came at length oblivion.

Thus the tale ended. It was the same I had heard in far away Louisiana, told again with all the grim earnestness of desperate truth.

I stood now in the great courtyard again, beside the ancient well, drinking eagerly every inspired syllable. When the speaker had done, he shrank back into the darkness, and was gone.

It was as though I witnessed in my own person the wretched death of Henri d'Artin, and stood within his castle's court when the ruthless deed was done. Verily man knoweth not the rebellious vagaries of an unhinged brain; knoweth not what be but unmeaning phantasies, or what be solemn revelations from the very lips of G.o.d.

In the deep gloom the ruined castle loomed darkly, a ghastly monument of evil deeds. I looked about for the madman but saw him not. The weirdness of the place, the horror of its secret, crept into my blood.