The Poniard's Hilt; Or, Karadeucq and Ronan. A Tale of Bagauders and Vagres

"Parried! Mine remains the daisy!"

"I'm wounded! Help, my belle!"

"I die! Good-bye to my love!"

The wounded Vagre was attended to; the dead one was covered with leaves. Honor to the brave who will be born anew in yonder worlds, and long live the feasts of the Vagrery! And the exchange of repartees continued – some were mirthful, others strange, and not a few sad. The repartees reflected the state of affairs in Gaul, her people, and the miseries of the nation as she lay debased and demoralized at the feet of the conquerors; the repartees produced a picture better than chroniclers or historians could ever reproduce it, even if ever this country of iron should find its historian.

"Ah! What happy days these are!" exclaimed Wolf's-Tooth as he gnawed on the ivory of his second shoulder of doe. "Ah! what jolly days do we owe to these times of disorder, of pillage, of combats on the highways, of sieges of burgs and episcopal villas and of their smoldering embers that we leave behind! Ah! What rollicking times do not these Frankish Kings furnish us with!"

"Ronan said it – old Gaul is on fire – let us dance and drink upon the ruins – let us make love on the ashes of the palaces and upon the extinguished coals of the episcopal villas that we turned into bonfires!"

"Oh, great bishop! Oh, great St. Remi! Blessings upon you, who, at the basilica of Reims, in the midst of incense and flowers, now over fifty years ago baptized Clovis as a submissive son of the Roman Church! Blessings upon you, St. Remi, the patron of highwaymen and bandits!"

"Where is she? Aye, where is she, the proud and powerful Gaul of the days of the Chief of the Hundred Valleys, of the Sacrovirs, the Vindexes, the Civiles, the Victorias?"

"Who is the present inheritor of Gaul's one-time valor? The Vagres, the 'Wolves-Heads,' the 'Wolves!' It is they alone who still carry on the struggle against the barbarians!"

"And yet we are hunted like wild beasts, put to the rack and hanged if taken!"

"But our nails are sharp and our teeth trenchant to tear to pieces and devour our enemies!"

"And yet they call us robbers!"

"And murderers!"

"And sacrilegious wretches!"

"Brothers, we but follow the example of our glorious new masters – the Frankish kings, dukes and counts; they kill, we massacre; they pillage, we steal; they lay waste, we burn down. Death to the seigniory!"

"Sad are the times in which we live!" said the bishopess as she unloosened her long black tresses to the wind. "These are days of sanguinary fury! days of unbridled debauchery! days of vertigo, in which one rushes into evil paths with wild ecstasy. Oh, holy virtue of our mothers! tender chastity! noble and undefiled love! Where shall we look for you in these days? Shall we look for you in the hut of the female slave whom her masters outrage? Shall we look for you in the house of the free woman, whose very hearth is turned under her own eyes into a brothel? Oh! Let us shut our eyes, and die young! Will you die, my Vagre? To-morrow, at the first rays of the sun; to-morrow, at the hour when the birds awake; to-morrow put your hand in mine, and let us depart together for those unknown worlds, whither our ancestors bravely and willingly took their departure in order to live together!"

"Let love reign until to-morrow! And until then, a sweet kiss, my Vagress!"

The Master of the Hounds received the kiss, while his neighbor, grave like a man half-seas over, said in a magisterial voice:

"Brothers, I have an idea – "

"Your idea, Symphorien, seems to be to drain that amphora to the very bottom."

"Yes, to begin with – and then to prove to you —logice and a priori– "

"To the devil with your Roman tongue!"

"Brothers, not because one is a Vagre does it follow that he can not be versed in letters and philosophy. I used to teach rhetoric to the young clerks of the Bishop of Limoges. I received a call from the Bishop of Tulle for the same office. As I was crossing the Jargeaux mountains on the way from the one town to the other, I was captured in the woods by a band of bad Vagres – there are good and bad Vagres. And those Vagres sold me to a slave merchant, and he sold me again to the bishop of – "

"The devil take this rhetorician! Look at him traveling up hills and down dales."

"Such is frequently the effect of rhetoric. It carries one across the plains of imagination. But let me return to what I wanted to prove to you logice– it is this: We need not worry ourselves over the leudes nor any other armed bands that might be in pursuit of us, because, logice– the Lord God will perform a miracle in our favor to disengage us of our enemies."

"A miracle in favor of us, Vagres? Are we, perchance, on such good terms with heaven?"

"We are on all the better terms with heaven for living like wolves, like true wolves. Therefore, logice, the Lord will deliver us from our enemies by miracles. And that I shall now proceed to prove to you."

"To the proof, learned Symphorien – to the proof! We are waiting for your arguments."

CHAPTER VIII

THE MIRACLE OF ST. MARTIN

The rhetorician straightened himself up and proceeded to the proof.

"I'm at it," he said. "But first of all, brothers, answer me this question: Under whose royal claws did this beautiful land of Auvergne fall?"

"Under the claws of Clotaire, the last and worthy son of King Clovis. Having married the widow of his second nephew Theobald, Clotaire now owns Auvergne by double right. He is now in this year 558 the sole king of all conquered Gaul. Glory to the Saints in heaven! Now, then, that Clotaire is the wedder of the whole human race. The bishops have married him as many times as it has pleased him to celebrate fresh weddings; they remarried him even during the lives of most of his wives. They married him to Gundiogue, the wife of his own brother; they married him to Radegonde, to Ingonde and, a fortnight later to the latter's sister, called Aregonde; they married him to Chemesne, to several others, and finally to Waltrade, the widow of his second nephew Theobald. But all these are only peccadillos – "

"Learned, very learned Symphorien, you promised to prove to us logice that heaven would rain miracles in our favor; but your rhetoric tends to prove just one thing – that Clotaire is an eternal wedder – "

"My rhetoric first establishes the premises, you will presently see what conclusions flow from them —ergo, I shall establish one more prefigurement, which I shall also need for my argument. It is this: Among other crimes, this Clotaire committed one before which even Clovis might have recoiled. The affair happened in Paris in the year 533, in the old Roman palace inhabited by the Frankish kings. Now listen – "

"We are listening, learned Symphorien. It is pleasant to the ear to hear the praises of kings."

"Accordingly, it was about twenty-five years ago. Clovis had long before gone to paradise upon the recommendation of the bishops and after having partitioned Gaul between his four sons – Thierry, Childebert, Clodomir and this Clotaire, who is to-day the sole king of all these conquered provinces. Clodomir died shortly after and left two children. These were taken in charge by their grandmother, the widow of Clovis, old Queen Clotilde. She had her two little grandsons brought up beside her, until they should be of age to assure the inheritance of their father's kingdom. One day, when she was in Paris, Childebert, who lived in that city, sent secretly one of his confidential servants to the kind-hearted Clotaire with the message: 'Our mother Clotilde keeps the children of our brother near her, and she wishes them to enter into possession of his kingdom; come quickly to Paris in order that we may consider what is to be done with them, whether we shall have their hair cut short like the rest of the people, and have them locked up in a monastery, or whether we shall kill them and thus share among ourselves the kingdom of their father, our brother' – "

"The story begins to be affectionate."

"It is the fraternity in vogue among the Franks."

"What Vagre would ever think of killing his own brother's children in order to seize their property?"

"None! None would think of such a thing."

"We are wolves, and wolves do not devour one another – my brothers – "

"And were those children whom they sought to slay still young, learned Symphorien?"

"One was ten, the other seven – "

"Poor little creatures – "

"I pursue my narrative. Clotaire arrived in Paris, deliberated with his brother, and the two acting in concert visited old Queen Clotilde and said to her: 'Send us your grandchildren that we may embrace them, and forthwith announce them to the people as the heirs of their father's kingdom.' "

"Oh! These Frankish kings are ever as wily as they are bloodthirsty! It was a lure, was it not, learned Symphorien?"

"You will soon see what their project was. Clovis' widow was happy, and sent the little children to their uncles, saying to the little ones: 'I shall forget that I lost your father when I see you succeed him in his kingdom.' The moment the children arrived at their uncles' they were separated from their slaves and governors, and kept in close confinement. Clotaire and Childebert then sent an emissary to the children's grandmother. In one hand he carried a pair of shears, in the other a naked sword. He said to old Queen Clotilde: 'Glorious Queen, our lords, your sons, desire to know your preference with regard to your grandsons – do you wish them to be shorn, that is, locked up in a convent, or would you prefer to have them slain?' 'If they are to renounce their father's throne,' cried the old Queen indignant, 'I would prefer to see them dead rather than shorn.' The emissary returned and said to the two kings: 'You have the Queen's wishes to finish the work that you began.' Immediately thereupon King Clotaire takes the eldest by the arm, throws him on the ground, and plunges his knife under the boy's arm-pit."

"Poor, dear little one!" murmured Odille weeping. "He must have died calling to his mother for help – "

"The royal butcher knew the right spot to plunge his knife in the child's body," observed Ronan; "that is the proper way to kill lambkins. Proceed, learned Symphorien."