The Black Douglas Part 40

"Come, laddie," said the Earl, "ye understand not these matters. I will explain to you when we gang back to the braw things in Edinbra'

toon!"

"No, no," cried the boy, stooping to pick up his sword, "I will bide with my brothers, and help to kill the murderers of my cousins. What William says, I say."

Then the five young men went out and called for their horses, their youngest brother following them. And as the flap of the tent fell, and he was left alone, James the Gross sank his head between his soft, moist palms, and sobbed aloud.

For he was a weak, s.h.i.+fty, unstable man, loving approval, and a burden to himself in soul and body when left to bear the consequences of his acts.

"Oh, my bairns," he cried over and over, "why was I born? I am not sufficient for these things!"

And even as he sobbed and mourned, the hoofs of his sons' horses rang down the wind as they rode through the camp towards Galloway. And little Henry rode betwixt William and James.

CHAPTER XLI

THE WITHERED GARLAND

Meanwhile Sholto fared onwards down the side of the sullen water of Dee. The dwellers along the bank were all on the alert, and cried many questions to him about the death of the Earl, most thinking him a merchant travelling from Edinburgh to take s.h.i.+p at Kirkcudbright.

Sholto answered shortly but civilly, for the inquirers were mostly decent folk well on in years, whose lads had gone to the levy, and who naturally desired to know wherefore their sons had been summoned.

In return he asked everywhere for news of any cavalcade which might have pa.s.sed that way, but neither from the country folk, nor yet from hoof-marks upon the gra.s.sy banks, could he glean the least information pertinent to the purpose of his quest.

Not till he came within a few miles of the town did he meet with man or woman who could give him any material a.s.sistance. It was by the Fords of Tongland that he first met with one Tib MacLellan, who with much volubility and some sagacity retailed fresh fish to the burghers of Kirkcudbright and the whole countryside, giving a day to each district so long as the supply of her staple did not fail.

"Fair good day to ye, mistress!" said Sholto, taking off his bonnet to the sonsy upstanding fishwife.

"And to you, bonny lad," replied the complimented dame, dropping a courtesy, "may the corbie never cry at ye nor ill-faured pie juik at your left elbow. May candle creesh never fa' on ye, red fire burn ye, nor water scald ye."

Tib was reeling off her catalogue of blessings when Sholto cut her short.

"Can you tell me, good lady," he asked, in his most insinuating tones, "if there has been any vessel cleared from the port during these last weeks?"

"'Deed, sir, that I should ken, for is no my ain sister marriet on Jock Wabster, wha's cousin by marriage twice removed is the bailie officer o' the port? So I can advise ye that there was a boat frae the Isle o' Man wi' herrin's for the great houses, though never a fin o'

them like the halesome fish I carry here in my creel. Wad ye like to see them, to buy a dozen for the bonny la.s.s that's waiting for ye?

That were a present to recommend ye, indeed--far mair than your gaudy flowers, fule ballads, and sic like tras.h.!.+"

"You cannot remember any other s.h.i.+p of larger size than the Manx fis.h.i.+ng-boat?" continued Sholto.

"Weel, no to ca' cleared frae the port," Tib went on, "but there was a pair o' uncanny-looking foreign s.h.i.+ps that lay oot there by the Manxman's Lake for eight days, and the nicht afore yestreen they gaed oot with the tide. They were saying aboot the foresh.o.r.e that they gaed west to some other port to tak' on board the French monzie that cam'

to the Thrieve at the great tournaying! But I kenna what wad tak' him awa' to the Fleet or the Ferry Toon o' Cree, and leave a' the pleasures o' Kirkcudbright ahint him. Forbye sic herrin's as are supplied by me, Tib MacLellan, at less than cost price--as I houp your honour will no forget, when in the course o' natur' and the providence o' G.o.d you and her comes to hae a family atween ye."

Sholto promised that he would not forget when the time alluded to arrived. Then, turning his jennet off the direct road to Kirkcudbright town, and betaking him through the Ardendee fords, he made all speed towards a little port upon the water of Fleet, at the point where that fair moorland stream winds lazily through the water-meadows for a mile or two, after its brawling pa.s.sage down from the hills of heather and before it commits itself to the mother sea.

But it was not until he had long crossed it and reached the lonely Ca.s.sencary sh.o.r.e that Sholto found his first trace of the lost maidens. For as he rode along the cliffs his keen eye noted a well-marked trail through the heather approaching the sh.o.r.e at right angles to his own line of march. The tracks, still perfectly evident in the gra.s.sy places, showed that as many as twenty horses had pa.s.sed that way within the last two or three days. He stood awhile examining the marks, and then, leading his beast slowly by the bridle, he continued to follow them westward till they became confused and lost near a little jetty erected by the lairds of Cree and Ca.s.sencary for convenience of traffic with c.u.mberland and the Isle of Man. Here on the very edge of the foresh.o.r.e, blown by some chance wind behind a stone and wonderfully preserved there, Sholto found a child's chain of woodbine entwined with daisies and autumnal pheasant's eye. He took it up and examined it. Some of the flowers were not yet withered. The inter-weaving was done after a fas.h.i.+on he had taught the little Maid of Galloway himself, one happy day when he had walked on air with the glamour of Maud Lindesay's smiles uplifting his heart. For that tricksome grace had asked him to teach her also, and he remembered the lingering touch of her fingers ere she could compa.s.s the quaint device of the pheasant's eye peeping out from the midst of each white festoon.

Then a deep despair settled down on Sholto's spirit. He knew that Maud Lindesay and the fair Maid of Galloway had undoubtedly fallen into the power of the terrible Marshal de Retz, Sieur of Machecoul, amba.s.sador of the King of France, and also many things else which need not in this place be put on record.

CHAPTER XLII

ASTARTE THE SHE-WOLF

In a dark wainscoted room overlooking that branch of the Seine which divides the northern part of Paris from the Isle of the City, Gilles de Retz, lately Chamberlain of the King of France, sat writing. The hotel had recently been redecorated after the sojourn of the English.

Wooden pavements had again been placed in the rooms where the barbarians had strewed their rushes and trampled upon their rotting fishbones. n.o.ble furniture from the lathes of Poitiers, decorated with the royal ermines of Brittany, stood about the many alcoves. The table itself whereon the famous soldier wrote was closed in with drawers and shelves which descended to the floor and seemed to surround the occupant like a cell.

Before de Retz stood a curious inkstand, made by some cunning jeweller out of the upper half of a human skull of small size, cut across at the eye-holes, inverted, and set in silver with a rim of large rubies.

This was filled with ink of a startling vermilion colour.

The doc.u.ment which Gilles de Retz was busy transcribing upon sheets of n.o.ble vellum in this strange ink was of an equally mysterious character. The upper part had the appearance of a charter engrossed by the hand of some deft legal scribe, but the words which followed were as startling as the vehicle by means of which they were made to stand out from the vellum.

"Unto Barran-Sathanas; Lord most glorious and puissant in h.e.l.l beneath and in the earth above, I, his unworthy servitor Gilles de Retz, make my vows, hereby forever renouncing G.o.d, Christ, and the Blessed Saints."

To this appalling introduction succeeded many lines of close and delicate script, interspersed with curious cabalistic signs, in which that of the cross reversed could frequently be detected. Gilles de Retz wrote rapidly, rising only at intervals to throw a fresh log of wood across the vast iron dogs on either side of the wide fireplace, as the rain from the northwest beat more and more fiercely upon the small glazed panes of the window and howled among the innumerable gargoyles and twisted roof-stacks of the Hotel de p.o.r.nic.

Within the chamber itself, in the intervals of the storm, a low continuous growling made itself evident. At first it was disregarded by the writer, but presently, by its sheer pertinacity, the sound so irritated him that he rose from his seat, and, striding to a narrow door covered with a heavy curtain, he threw it wide open to the wall.

Then through the black oblong so made, a huge and s.h.a.ggy she-wolf slouched slowly into the room.

The marshal kicked the brute impatiently with his slippered foot as she entered, and, strange to relate, the wolf slunk past him with the cowed air of a dog conscious of having deserved punishment.

"Astarte, vilest beast," he cried, "have I not a thousand times warned you to be silent and wait outside when I am at work within my chamber?"

The she-wolf eyed her master as he went back towards his table. Then, seeing him lift his pen, with a sigh of content she dropped down upon the warm hearthstone, lying with her haunches towards the blazing logs and her bristling head couched upon her paws. Her yellow s.h.i.+ning eyes blinked sleepily and approvingly at him, while with her tongue she rasped the soft pads of her feet one by one, biting away the fur from between the toes with her long and gleaming teeth. Presently Astarte appeared to doze off. Her eyes were shut, her att.i.tude relaxed. But so soon as ever her master moved even an inch to consult a marked list of dates which hung on a hook beside him, or leaned over to dip a quill in his scarlet ink, the flas.h.i.+ng yellow eye and the gleam of white teeth underneath told that Astarte was awake and intently watching every movement of the worker.

Through the heavy boom of the storm without, the thresh of the rain upon the lattice cas.e.m.e.nt, and the irregular whipping gusts which shook the house, the soft wheeze of the engrossing quill could be heard, the crackle of the burning logs and the heavy regular breathing of the couchant she-wolf being the only other sounds audible within the apartment.

Gilles de Retz wrote on, smiling to himself as he added line after line to his ma.n.u.script. His beard shone with a truculent blue-black l.u.s.tre. For the moment the aged look had quite gone out of his face.

His cheek appeared flushed with the hues of youth and reinvigorated hope, yet withal of a youth without innocence or charm. Rather it seemed as if fresh blood had been injected into the veins of some aged demon, moribund and cruel, giving, instead of health or grace, only a new lease of cruelty and l.u.s.t.

Presently another door opened, the main entrance of the apartment this time, not the small private portal through which Astarte the wolf had been admitted. A girl came in, thrusting aside the curtain, and, for the s.p.a.ce of a moment, holding it outstretched with an arm gowned in pure white before dropping it with a rustle of heavy silken fabric upon the ground.

The Marshal de Retz wrote on without appearing to be conscious of any new presence in his private chamber. The girl stood regarding him, with eyes that blazed with an intent so deadly and a hate so all-possessing that the yellow treachery in those of Astarte the she-wolf appeared kind and affectionate by contrast.

At the girl's entrance that s.h.a.ggy beast had raised herself upon her fore paws, and presently she gave vent to a low growl, half of distrust and half of warning, which at once reached the ears of the busy worker.

Gilles de Retz looked up quickly, and, catching sight of the Lady Sybilla, with a sweep of his hand he thrust his ma.n.u.script into an open drawer of the escritoire.

"Ah, Sybilla," he said, leaning back in his chair with an air of easy familiarity, "you are more sparing of your visits to me than of yore.

To what do I owe the pleasure and honour of this one?"

The girl eyed him long before answering. She stood statue-still by the curtain at the entrance of the apartment, ignoring the chair which the marshal had offered her with a bow and a courteous wave of his hand.

"I have come," she made answer at last, in the deep even tones which she had used before the council of the traitors at Stirling, "to demand from you, Messire Gilles de Retz, what you mean to do with the little Margaret Douglas and her companion, whom you wickedly kidnapped from their own country and have brought with you in your train to France?"