Told by the Death's Head Part 6

The secret of this inexhaustible food supply was known only to the leader and his daughter. No matter how much was taken from the provision chamber, no decrease was ever noticeable.

The first evening of our return, the successful expedition was celebrated by a feast. After the robbers had eaten their fill, they lighted a huge fire and danced wildly around it; and when they had drunk all they wanted, they gathered about their leader and his daughter, who had taken their seats on an estrade draped with purple cloth.

Then a pale-faced young man was dragged into the hall and placed in front of the leader.

I saw now that a sort of trial was about to be held, a singular tribunal, where the judge and the jury first get tipsy!

"Jurko," said the leader to the youth, "you are accused of cowardice--of having run away at the approach of the enemy; also, of having neglected to give warning of the coming of the Tartars."

"I am not guilty," responded the youth in defence. "You placed me on guard to watch for the Tartars. Instead of the Tartars came wolves.

Ten of the beasts attacked me--maybe there were fifty. If I had allowed the wolves to eat me, how could I have signaled to you? I didn't run away--I hid in a hollow tree to defend myself--one against fifty! I call that brave, not cowardly."

"Silly chatter!" bellowed the leader. "No matter what happened, you should have obeyed the command of your leader. If you are not the coward you are accused of being, then prove it by standing the test."

"That I will!" cried the youth, striking his breast with his fist.

The leader rose, took his daughter's hand, stepped down from the estrade, and, bidding his comrades follow, moved with the maid toward the rear of the cavern, which, until now, had been buried in midnight gloom.

Here the ground slopes steeply downward, and I could see by the light of the torches that we were on the verge of an abyss, at the bottom of which was water.

The leader held a wisp of straw to a torch, then tossed it into the abyss, which was lighted for a few seconds by the circling wreath of blazing straw; but it was quite long enough for me to see the terrible grandeur of the yawning gulf.

After tossing the straw into the abyss, the leader s.n.a.t.c.hed the red and yellow striped silken kerchief from his daughter's neck, leaving the lovely snow-white shoulders and bosom uncovered, and flung it also into the abyss.

"There, Jurko," he cried, "you have often boasted that you are the bravest of our band, and you have aspired to the hand of my daughter Madus. If you are what you pretend to be, fetch the bride's kerchief from the lake down yonder."

The youth stepped boldly enough to the rim of the yawning gulf, and every one believed he was going to dive into it. But he halted on the edge, leaned forward and peered down at the water far below. After a moment's survey, he drew back, rubbed his ear with his fingers and made a wry face.

"Why don't you jump?" cried his comrades, tauntingly.

Jurko cautiously thrust one leg over the edge, bent forward and took another look; then he drew back his leg and rose to his feet.

"The devil may jump into this h.e.l.l for me!" he exclaimed; "there's no getting out of it again for him who is fool enough to enter it!"

"Ho, coward! coward!" derisively shouted his comrades, rus.h.i.+ng upon him. They disarmed him and dragged him by the hair toward a cleft in the wall of the cavern, wide enough only to admit the body of a man.

This opening was closed by a block of granite that required the combined strength of six men to move it. A lighted candle was placed in the trembling youth's hand; then he was thrust into the rock-tomb, and the granite door moved back to its place. The wild laughter of his comrades drowned the shrieks of the victim who had been buried alive.

Then followed the "dance of death," and I never witnessed anything more terrifying. The lovely Madus feigned death and looked it, too!

and every member had to dance a turn with her. When it came my turn, the leader said to me:

"Hold, lad, you may not dance with Madus until you have become really one of us--until you have stood the test. Moreover, you, too, presume to aspire to the hand of my daughter."

"Yes, I do!" I replied, "and I will do whatever I am bid."

"Very good; the bride's kerchief lies down yonder in the lake; let us see if you are courageous enough to go after it."

"You surely did not undertake so foolhardy a task?" here interrupted the prince; and the chair dictated to the notary as follows:

"Sinful tempting of providence, prompted by criminal desire for an impure female."

"Yes, your highness, I performed the task," continued Hugo, "but I beg your honors not to register the leap as an additional transgression. I am not responsible for it. I was compelled to jump or be buried alive in the wall of the cavern. Besides, I knew the danger was not so great as it appeared. When a boy, I once visited a salt mine. I had seen by the light of the blazing straw that the walls of the abyss were formed of the dark blue strata peculiar to salt mines, and guessed that the lake was strongly impregnated with salt. I had also noticed on the further wall of the abyss a flight of steps hewn in the rock, and concluded that I had nothing to fear from drowning in the buoyant water, if I reached it in safety. But, before I proceed farther, I desire to enter a formal protest against the chair's designating my beloved Madus an 'impure female.' She was pure and innocent--an angel on earth, a saint in heaven. He that defames her must do battle with me--my adversary in coat of mail, I in doublet of silk. The weapons: lances, swords, or maces--whatever he may select; and I positively refuse to proceed with my confession until his honor, the mayor, has given me satisfaction, or amended the protocol."

"Well, mayor," said the prince, addressing the chair, "I think the prisoner is justified in his protest. Either you must amend the protocol, or fight him."

The former expedient was chosen, and the notary erased the latter clause of the protocol. It read, when corrected: "Sinful temptation of providence by chaste affection for a respectable maid."

"Now, my son, you may jump."

Hugo thanked the prince and resumed his confession:

I pressed my ankles together, bent forward, and sprang, head foremost, into the abyss. As I sped swiftly downward, there was a sound like swelling thunder in my ears, then I became stone deaf, and the water closed over me. My eyes and mouth told me it was salt water, and whatever apprehension I had had vanished. The next moment I was floating on the surface, my head and shoulders above the water. I soon found the kerchief, which I tied about my neck, amid the acclamations and cheers of my comrades, which were multiplied by the echoing walls to the most infernal roaring. The torches held over the mouth of the abyss gleamed through the darkness like a blood-red star in the firmament of hades.

A few vigorous strokes propelled me to the steps leading from the lake to the upper gallery of the abyss, which is really an abandoned salt mine.

There are one hundred and eighty steps, but by taking two at a time I reduced them to ninety; and three minutes after I had taken my leap, I stood, encrusted from head to foot with salt--like a powdered imp!--before my blus.h.i.+ng Madus.

She received me with a bashful smile when the robbers carried me on their shoulders to her, and I was about to kiss her, when the leader seized me by the collar and drew me back.

"Not yet, lad, not yet!" he cried. "You have only been through the christening ceremony. Confirmation comes next. You must become a member of our faith before you can become my daughter's husband. Every man that marries a princess must adopt her belief."

Now, as your honors may have guessed, the question of religion was one I did not require much time to answer. I consented without a moment's hesitation to adopt my Madus' faith. The leader then signed to one of the band to prepare for the ceremony of confirmation. It was one of the priests of whom I have spoken--I had taken particular notice of him during the feast, because he ate and drank more than any one else.

"He that becomes a member of our society"--the leader informed me--"must take a different name from the one he has borne elsewhere. I am called 'Nyedzviedz,' which signifies either 'the bear,' or 'without equal.' What name shall we give you?"

Some one suggested that, as I was an expert swimmer, I should be called "Szczustak" (perch); another thought "Lyabedz" (swan), more suitable and prettier, but I told them that, as I excelled most in hurling bombs, "Baran" (ram), would be still more appropriate; and Baran it was decided I should be called.

In the meantime the robber priest had donned his vestments. On his plentifully oiled hair rested a tall, gold-embroidered hat; over his coa.r.s.e peasant coat he had drawn a richly decorated ca.s.sock; his feet were thrust into a pair of slippers, also handsomely embroidered--relics, obviously, of some gigantic saint; for the robber priest's feet, from which he had not removed his boots, were quite hidden in them. In his hands he held a silver crucifix; and as I looked at him, the thought came to me that he had, without a doubt, made way with the original wearer and bearer of the rich vestments, and the crucifix.

He ordered me to kneel before him. I did so, and he began to perform all sorts of hocus-pocus over me. I couldn't understand a word of it, for he spoke in Greek, and I had not yet become familiar with that language. I learned it later.

After mumbling over me for several minutes, he smeared some ill-smelling ointment on my nose; then he fumigated me with incense until I was almost suffocated. In concluding, when he bestowed on me my new name, he gave me such a vigorous box on the ear, that it rang for several seconds, and I almost fell backward. The blow was not given with the hand of the priest, but with the st.u.r.dy fist of the robber.

This is carrying the joke too far, I said to myself; and, before the ruffian could guess what I intended, I was on my feet, and had delivered a right-hander on the side of his head that sent his gold hat spinning across the floor, and himself, and his slippers after it.

"_Actus majoris potentiae contra ecclesiasticam personam!_" dictated the mayor to the notary; while his highness, the prince, held his stomach, and laughed until the tears ran down his cheeks.

"I should like to have seen that performance!" he exclaimed when he had got his breath again. "Did the padre excommunicate you?"

Not much, he didn't, your highness! From that moment I became a person of consequence among the haidemaken. The leader slapped me heartily on the shoulder, and said approvingly:

"You're the right sort, lad--we need no further proof."

After a b.u.mper all 'round, to celebrate my entrance to the community, every man wrapped himself in his bear-skin, and lay down on the floor of the cavern. Although the torches had been extinguished I could see, by the faint light which penetrated from the entrance, that Madus ascended a rope ladder to a deep hollow high up in the wall, and drew the ladder up after her.

In a very few minutes the snores from the four hundred robbers proclaimed them oblivious to this work-a-day world.

At day-break the watchman's horn brought every man to his feet; at the same moment the leader appeared from an adjoining chamber, and gave to each one his task for the day.

After we had breakfasted, Nyedzviedz conducted me, in company with Madus and several of the band, to the armory.