Masters of the Guild Part 21

"When the donkey climbs the ladder he may find carrots on the tiles," was the Paduan's reply. The weasel-like face of the Templar contorted in a wry grin.

"You bandy words like an Aristotelian, sir alchemist," he said sharply, "therefore we will be plain with you. You shall be lodged here with suitable means for your experiments until such time as your pretensions are justified--if they are. Should you prove yourself a wizard, a dabbler in the black art and a deceiver of the people, you shall be so punished that all men may know we share not in your guilt. Reflection hereupon may perchance quicken your understanding. Until you have news of importance for our hearing, farewell."

With what he could summon of dignity, the Preceptor turned from the calm gaze of the physician and left the guards to conduct him to his lodging.

There was really nothing else to do. It was a risk, of course. Tomaso was well known. He had the confidence of the King himself. But the situation was difficult. Prince John, who was usually in straits despite his father's generosity, had hinted to Gregory lately that he meant to inquire in person about the reported making of gold in the Temple. Could he have guessed somehow that two chests of ingots from a Cadiz galley had come to Temple a.s.sheton instead of to the King's treasury? Or did he believe the story of the making of gold?

Gregory was but too certain that if John found any treasure of doubtful t.i.tle he would seize it, and he was acutely unhappy. However, if Tomaso possessed the secret--or some other secret of value--there was yet a chance to save the Cadiz ingots. If this plan failed the scapegoat would not be a Templar.

Tomaso knew what was pa.s.sing in his enemy's mind, not through any supernatural means, but by his knowledge of human nature. He was aware, as he lay on his narrow straw bed, that his life was in imminent danger. No one knew where he was; no message could reach his friends. A discredited wizard could count on no popular sympathy. The record of his studies for many years would vanish like the wind-blown candle-flame. Yet after some hours of wakefulness he slept, as tranquilly as a child.

A red-headed youth in the dress of a clerk, who was to have met Tomaso on the morrow, waited for him in vain. On the second day he started in search of his old friend, and weary and mud-bespattered, came at last to Temple a.s.sheton. On the road he fell in with Swart the drover, who told him of the reported alchemy. "Gold would be common as fodder if any man could make it," Swart growled, "and when a man's wise beyond others in the art of healing, 'tis wicked folly to burn him alive for't."

Padraig's face lost every trace of color. "W-who says that?"

"The crows and herons, I suppose," said the drover coolly. "Anyhow none of the folk in the village know where the story started, and n.o.body but a bird on the wing could see over those walls. 'Tis said that ten days hence, if the old doctor don't make gold for them, they'll burn him for a wizard. Now that's no sense, for if he could make gold he'd be a wizard no bounds, and they'd not burn him then, I reckon."

Padraig looked down the valley at the tender gold-green gra.s.s and the snowdrift apple-boughs of spring, It seemed impossible that those grim gray walls held within them this cruel and implacable spirit. "Can I get a trustworthy messenger?" he asked. "I would send a letter to the Master's friends."

With the ready understanding of men who see and judge strange faces constantly, Swart and Padraig had taken each other's measure and been satisfied. "My nephew Hod will go," Swart answered. Hod was the son of the farmer whose house Tomaso had visited.

Padraig was busy with tablets and inkhorn. He folded and sealed his note, written in the clear stubbed hand of the monasteries. "I am Padraig," he said, "a scribe of the Irish Benedictines. If the Master comes to harm there will be a heavy reckoning, but that will come too late. I will rescue him or die with him--are you with me?"

Swart pulled at his huge beard. "The Swarts of Aschenrugge," he said, "have dwelt too long in these parts to bow neck to a Templar. Hod shall ride with the letter, and if it be thy choice to risk thine own life for thy master's I've no call to betray thee."

A dark-browed yokel came to the door with the bridle of Swart's best horse over his arm. "Take this," Padraig directed, "to Robert Edrupt, the wool merchant at Long Lea near Stratton. If he be from home give it to his wife Barbara and tell her to open and read it. She is wise and will do what is right. Here is money--all I have--but you shall be paid well when the errand is done; I have asked Edrupt to see to that."

Hod stuck his thumbs in his belt. "Put up thy money," he muttered. "The old doctor he cured our Cicely, he did."

The messenger gone, Padraig went straight to the Temple and asked to see the Preceptor. Gregory listened at first with suspicion, then with wonder, to what the stranger told. It seemed that, hearing that a famous alchemist was at work in the Temple, he had come to crave the privilege of acting as his servant. It was, he said, absolutely necessary that such a master should have a disciple at hand for the actual work, and be left undisturbed in meditation meanwhile."

"Is this necessary to the making of gold?" asked Gregory.

"Surely," Padraig a.s.sured him. "The pupil cannot do the work of the master, the master must not be compelled to labor as the pupil. It is written in our books--Feliciter is sapit, qui periculo alieno sapit--Those are fortunate who learn at the risk of another,--and again, He is wise who profits by others' folly."

Gregory eyed the stranger warily, but in Padraig's blue eyes he saw only childlike innocence and fanatical zeal. If a madman, he was a useful one.

By his help the experiments could be carried on without imperiling any Templar. He directed a page to show Padraig the way to Tomaso's chamber.

"My son!" said the physician as he lifted his eyes from his writing and saw who was in the doorway, "how came you here?"

"I came to be with you, Master," Padraig answered with a glance behind him to make sure the page was gone, "to rescue you if I can. What else could I have done?"

Then he related his conversation with Gregory. "Through a drover of this place who is our friend," he ended, "I have sent word to Robert Edrupt asking him to get word of this to the King or to the Bishop. But if help does not come in time--"

"Che sara sara (What will be, will be)," said Tomaso coolly. "I have made a fair copy of these writings in the hope that I might send them to Brother Basil."

Padraig knelt at the physician's feet, his beseeching eyes raised to the kindly, serene old face. "Master Tomaso," he stammered, "they shall not do this thing--I cannot b-bear it! We have--we have the formula for the Apples of Sodom, and--and other things. They would give more than gold for that knowledge."

Tomaso laid a gentle hand upon the young shoulder. "My dear son," he said, "when we learned the secrets of Archiater--those secrets which mean death- -we promised one another, all of us, never to use them save to the glory of G.o.d and the honor of our land. Which of these, think you, would be served by lending them to the evil plots of a traitor?"

Padraig caught the hand of his master in both his own. "It is beyond endurance!" he cried piteously.

"I have knowledge," Tomaso went on, "that this Gregory is partly pledged to the faction of Prince John. The Templars have no country, but they think, with some reason, that they can bend John to their purposes. What would they do, with the power these fires of Tophet would give them?

Padraig, there is no safety in the breaking of a pledge."

A thought came into the boy's mind, and a wild hope with it. "Master Tomaso," he cried, "if I can find a way to use our knowledge without breaking the pledge, will you give me my way?"

The Paduan looked long into the uplifted eager face. "It is good to be so loved," he said. "I will trust you. Yet grieve not, whatever comes,--the stars are my fortress, G.o.d is my lamp. The bridge to eternal life is very short."

Padraig's cell was the one just below, and the window looked out across the moors. Chin on his crossed arms, he pondered long under the stars. The next day he informed the Preceptor that the alchemist was ready to begin the making of Spanish gold, and must on no account be disturbed.

He showed Gregory the formula. It was not very easy to understand, but it was impressive. c.o.c.katrice eggs were to be placed carefully in a nest in a stone walled underground chamber, which must be sealed from the outer air when all was ready. Snakes and toads brooding thereon would in time hatch out baby monsters--creatures with c.o.c.ks' heads and the tails and wings of dragons. Their look was sure death, but they could be poisoned by a draught compounded of agrimony, dill and vervain. This must be prepared beforehand and left in a bason where the c.o.c.katrice when hatched would find and drink of it. When all were dead they were to be brayed in a mortar with other necessary ingredients. When the stars indicated that the fortunate hour was at hand, the compound was to be heated in a crucible over a large brazier, covered with a layer of chaff to absorb the poisonous gases that arose. That which remained in the crucible would be pure gold.

"'Tis a fearsome business," said Padraig naively, "for men hate wizards."

"Let them hate, if they fear us as well," muttered Gregory poring over the mysterious phrases. Visions arose in his mind of a Grand Master whose power should have no limit, whom Kings must serve and Sultans fear. Nay, not only should the Holy Temple be recovered, but it should be built anew, overlaid with gold as in Solomon's day. He called a steward and ordered him to fit up a cellar, formerly a pa.s.sage into the vaults of the oldest part of the building, with all needful utensils. Braziers, crucibles, retorts and all the usual materials in the way of metals and powders were there, but of course, no c.o.c.katrice eggs.

"He brought these from Andalusia," said Padraig, showing seven small eggs mottled with crimson and black in a medicine box. Gregory touched one very gingerly. They were in fact waxen sh.e.l.ls filled with volatile liquids, and Padraig had spent most of the night preparing them. He explained that they were no larger than frogs' eggs when he first had them,--which was perfectly true, the wax having been carried in the form of b.a.l.l.s.

Sulphurous odors came from the cellar where the eggs were supposed to be hatching in their nest. An unwary hound sniffing about the door got a throatful of the stinging smoke and fled yowling. Hydrochloric acid, vitriol and nitre-glycerine are kittle things to meddle with, and the place was religiously avoided.

From the too free tongue of a cellarer one night Padraig learned that this chamber adjoined the treasure-vaults of the Temple, but the communicating door had been walled up. When the gold should be ready it could be conveyed into the treasury direct, by reopening this doorway.

One evening Prince John rode up to the gate with a company of Norman men- at-arms and a few courtiers. It was understood that he had come to investigate the reputed sorceries. On the same day three strangers came into the village and tarried at Swart's house on Aschenrugge. He often lodged travelers for a night, being near the highway. Padraig, spying a white signal on the giant ash which gave the ridge its name, told the impatient Preceptor that the hour was at hand.

Among the villagers it was said that the physician and his disciple were guarded closely night and day, and that the Paduan certainly would be burned at the stake if he did not succeed in making gold. Country folk had seen the stake set up and the f.a.ggots piled. In case the wizard proved a false prophet Gregory meant to make the execution as public as possible.

Padraig explained that the final trial must take place inter canis et lupus--between dog and wolf--in that hour which is neither daylight nor dark. As dusk fell the knights and esquires of the Temple ranged themselves in orderly ranks along the walls, at some distance from the door of the underground chamber. The low archway was now open; the glow of a brazier showed red against the rear wall. Torches lighted the stone- paved yard, and beyond the open gate the white faces of peasants crowded, awe-stricken and expectant. When the physician was brought out by the guards to a seat near the stake, the sobs of a woman were heard in the outer darkness. Padraig, following, cast a swift glance through the gate and saw the dim shapes of hors.e.m.e.n outlined against the sky.

Last of all appeared the Preceptor and Prince John with their immediate followers, and took their seats midway in the ranks of onlookers, directly opposite the door, where they could see every stage of the proceedings.

Gregory, furtively scanning the face of the physician, saw therein not a sign of fear. Padraig advanced into the open s.p.a.ce before the cellar, and bowed to Prince John and the Preceptor. Then from a niche within the door of the chamber he lifted a large crucible, and a siffle of indrawn breath was heard in the crowd as he carried it toward the fire. Gathering pitchy twigs and chaff from a heap of fuel he packed them deftly into the open top, and set the jar on the brazier, returning then to the side of Tomaso.

The minutes pa.s.sed but slowly. The nerves of all the spectators were strung to the snapping-point. Gregory finally began to explain to Prince John, who looked half curious and half skeptical,--

"This crucible, your Grace, is now throwing off the vapors generated by fervent heat. When these have been absorbed by the chaff above, the gold will be found beneath. The possibilities of this priceless formula are not as yet altogether known. We do not know what may come to light. You may be astounded--"

The chaff in the crucible caught fire from a wisp that thrust up into it from the brazier, flared up of a sudden and lighted every corner of the old cellar. It revealed the craning neck and slack jaw of Gregory, the covetous glittering eyes and incredulous smile of Prince John, the scared faces of the huddling peasants. Then there was a crash that shook the earth. Battlements rocked, pavements cracked, blocks of stone leaped into the air like a fountain of masonry. When fire encounters high explosives in a tunnel the results are remarkable. Torches dropped or were blown out, and stumbling, cursing men ran right and left--anywhere to escape the pelting stones. Padraig, holding to his master's arm, guided him out of the gate and toward the sound of trampling hoofs upon a little hillock.

There they found Edrupt, Guy and Alan struggling with their frantic horses. Swart came up with two more horses, and soon the party was beyond all danger of pursuit.

When the stunned and bewildered Templars recovered their breath, they saw nothing of the alchemist or of his disciple. It was felt to be just and right if they had been carried off bodily by the foul fiend. No one else was missing, though broken heads and bruises were everywhere. Only when dawn paled the heavens did the boldest of John's mercenaries venture back to the place of terror.

There was a great hole in the rear wall of the cellar, and among the ruins lay s.h.i.+ning heaps of gold--not bezants or zecchins, but wedges and bars of a strange reddish hue. They touched it warily; it was not red-hot. They filled their pouches, and others came and did likewise. The hard-riding veterans had had no opportunity to plunder for more than a year, and John had little money for himself and none for them. When Gregory came on the scene, white and shaking with rage, and somewhat damaged about the face from flying stones, it was too late to hide his ingots. Gold of Spain or of Beelzebub, it was all one to John Sansterre. What little the troopers had left went into the gaping leather bags of their master, while Gregory looked on, grinding his teeth.

It was not in the nature of Prince John to believe much in miracles, but it suited him to accept this one, whole. With a jesting compliment upon the success of the formula and an intimation that he would like more such entertainment, John departed next day well pleased with his perquisition.

All this came duly to the ears of Swart the drover, and was told by him when he came by Edrupt's house a few days later.

"How did it happen so suitably, Padraig of my heart?" asked Tomaso, his deep eyes twinkling.