The Red Axe Part 18

"Get home with you!" cried Ysolinde; "I cannot have thee following us. There are two men presently to meet us, to guard us to Pla.s.senburg, and we do not need you, Jan Lubber Fiend. Get back and take care of my father."

"Oh, as for him," said the monster, sitting down squat upon the plain road in the dust, "he is a tough old c.o.c.k, and will come to no harm. We can e'en leave him with a good cook, a prime cellar, and an easy mind.

But this young man is not to trust to with so many pretty maids. Jan will come and look after him."

And with that he nodded his hay-stack of a head three times at me, and going to the hedge-root he laid hold of the top of a young poplar and turned him about, keeping the stem of it over his shoulder. Then he set himself to pull like a horse that starts a load, and presently, without apparently distressing himself in the least, he walked away with the young tree, roots and all.

Having shaken off the earth roughly, he pulled out a sheath-knife and trimmed the branches till he had made him a kind of club, with which he threatened me, saying, "If I catch that young man at any tricks, with this club will Jan Lubber Fiend break every bone in his skin, like the sh.e.l.ls of so many broken eggs."

Then laughing a little, and seeing that nothing could be made of the fellow, the Lady Ysolinde rode on and we followed her. We thought that surely there would be no difficulty in shaking him off long ere we reached our lodging-place of the evening, and that he would find his way back to the city of Thorn.

But even though we set our horses to their speed, it seemed to make no difference to the unwieldy giant. He merely stretched his legs a little farther, and caused his great gaskined feet to pa.s.s each other as fast as if they had been shod with seven-league boots. So he not only kept up with us easily, but oftentimes made a detour through the fields and over the wild country on either side, as a questing dog does, ever returning to us with some quaint vagrant fancy or quip of childish simplicity.

But what pleased me better than the appearance of the Lubber Fiend was that ere we had gone quite two miles out of the city we found two well-armed and stanch-looking soldiers waiting for us at a kind of cross-road. They were armed with the curious powder-guns which were coming into fas.h.i.+on from France. These went off with a n.o.ble report, and killed sometimes at as much as fifteen or twenty paces when the aim was good. The fellows had swords also, and little polished s.h.i.+elds on their left arms--altogether worthy and notable body-guards.

"These two are soldiers of the Guard from Pla.s.senburg," said the Lady Ysolinde, "though now they are travelling as members of a Free Company desiring to enter upon new engagements. But they will make the way easier and pleasanter for us, as well as infinitely safer, being veterans well accustomed to the work of quartering and foraging."

As indeed we were to find ere the day ended.

So we rode on in the brilliant light, and the long, long day seemed all too brief to us who were young, and scarce delivered from the prison-house of Thorn. And to my shame I admit that my heart rose with every mile that I put between me and the Red Tower.

Indeed, I hardly had a thought to spend on my father. The hot quadrangle of the Wolfsberg, ever smelling of horses and the swelter of shed blood, the howling, fox-colored demons in the kennels, the black Duke Casimir --right gladly I forgot them all. Aye, I forgot even my father, and everything save that I was riding with two fair women through a world where all was love and spring, and where it was ever the prime of a young morning.

The Lady Ysolinde could not make enough of our Little Playmate. She laughed back at her over her shoulder when she let her horse out for a canter. She marvelled loudly at Helene's good riding, and at the unbound beauty of the crisp ringlets which cl.u.s.tered round her head like a boy's. And our Helene smiled, well pleased, and ceased to watch my eyes or to grow silent if I checked my horse too long by the side of the Lady Ysolinde.

Mostly we three rode abreast over the pleasant country. So long as we were crossing the plain of the Wolfmark we saw few tilled fields, and the farm-houses were fewer still. But wherever these were to be seen they were fortified and defended like castles, and had gates, great and high, with iron plates upon them and k.n.o.bs like the points of spears beaten blunt.

The Lady Ysolinde, who had often ridden that way, told us that these were all in the Duke Casimir's country, and were mostly possessed by the kin of his chief captains--feudal tenants, who for the right of possession were compelled to furnish so many riders to the Duke's Companies.

"But wait," she said, "till you come to the dominions of the Prince of Pla.s.senburg. You will find that he is indeed a ruler that can make the broom-bush keep the cow."

So we rode on, and pa.s.sed pleasant and exciting things, more than I had ever seen in all my life before.

Once we saw half a dozen men driving cattle across our path, and it was curious to mark how readily they drew their swords and couched their lances at us, turning themselves about this way and that like a quintain till we were quite gone by, which made us laugh. For it seemed a strange thing that men so well armed should fear a company of no more than their own numbers, and two of them maids upon palfreys.

But Ysolinde said: "It is not, after all, so strange, for over yonder blue hills dwells Joan of the Swordhand, who can lead a foray as well as any man, and once worsted Duke Casimir himself when he beset her castle."

So the day went past swiftly, with good company and the converse of folk well liking one another. And ever I wondered how we were to spend the night, and what sort of cheer we should find at our inn.

CHAPTER XIX

WENDISH WIT

The gray plain of the Wolfmark, which we had been traversing ever since we descended out of the steep Weiss Thor of the city of Thorn, had now begun to break into ridges and mounded hills of stiff red clay. And I, who had often kept my watch on the highest pinnacle of the Red Tower, looked with astonishment back upon the city I had left behind. Seen from the plain, Thorn had an aspect almost imperial.

It rose above the colorless flat of gray suddenly, unexpectedly, almost insolently. The city, with its numberless gables, spires of churches, turreted gate-houses, occupied a ridge of gradually swelling ground which rose like a huge whale-back from the misty plain. Its walls were grim, high, and far-stretching. But as we travelled farther into the Wolfmark the city seemed to sink deeper into the plain and the dark castle of Duke Casimir to shoot ever higher into the skies. So that presently, as we looked back, we could only see the Wolfsberg itself, the abode of cruelty and wrong, standing black against the white sky of noon.

Its flanking towers stood up above the battlemented wall, their turrets climbing higher and higher towards heaven, till the topmost Red Tower--that in which my father's garrot was, and in which I had spent my entire life until this day--soared straight upward above them all, like a threatening index-finger pointing, not into the clear sky of a summer's noon, but into clouds and thick darkness.

I was glad when at last we lost sight of it. Then, indeed, I felt that I had left my old life behind me. And, in spite of the Lady Ysolinde's ink-pool prophecy and my love for my father (such as it was), I did not mean ever to trust myself within that baleful circle of gray and weary plain upon which the Red Tower looked down.

Seeing that the maids were inclined to talk the one with the other, or rather that the Lady Ysolinde spoke confidentially with Helene, and that Helene now answered her without embarra.s.sment and with frank, equal glances, I dropped gradually behind and rode with the two stout men-at-arms. These I found to be honest lads enough, but of a strangely reserved and taciturn nature, each ever waiting for the other to answer--being, like most Wendish men, much averse to questioning and still more stiff as to replying.

"You are men of Pla.s.senburg?" I said to the nearest, simply and innocently enough, for the purpose of improving the cordiality of our relations.

Whereupon he turned his head slowly about to his neighbor, as it were to consult him. The glance said as clearly as monk's script: "What shall we answer to this troublesome, inquisitive fellow?"

At first I thought that perhaps they spoke not the common dialect, and that as we were travelling towards regions roughly Wendish and but lately heathen, they might have some uncouth speech of their own. So, as is ever the custom with folk that are not accustomed to the speaking of foreign tongues, I repeated the question in mine own language in a louder tone, supposing that that would do as well.

"You are men of the country of Pla.s.senburg?" cried I, as loud as I could bawl.

"We are not deaf--we have all our faculties, praise the saints!" said the more distant of the two, looking not at me but at his companion. He, on his part, nodded back at his comrade's reply, as if it had been delicately calculated at once to answer my question and at the same time not to commit them to any dangerous opinions.

I tried again.

"Your prince, I hear, is a true man, brave, and well-versed in war?"

The shorter and stouter man, who rode beside me, glanced once at my face, and slowly screwed round his head to his companion in a long, questioning gaze. Then as slowly he turned his head back again.

"Umph!" he said, judicially, with a movement of his head, which seemed a successful compromise between a nod and a shake, just as his remark might very well have resulted from an attempt to say "Yes" and "No" at the same time.

This was not encouraging to one who, like myself, was in high spirits and much inclined for conversation. But I was not to be so easily beaten off.

"The Prince of Pla.s.senburg has a Princess," I said, "who is often upon her travels?"

It was an innocent remark, and, so far as I could see, not one in itself highly humorous. But it broke up the gravity of these red-haired northern bears as if it had been the latest gay sally of the court-fool.

"Ha! ha!" laughed the more distant, lanky man, rocking himself in his saddle till the pennon on his lance shook and the point dipped towards his horse's ear.

"Ho! ho!" chorused his companion, slapping his thigh jovially. "Jorian, did you hear that? 'The Prince of Pla.s.senburg hath a Princess, and she is often upon her travels.' Ha! ha! ha! Ho! ho! ho!"

"He hath said it! Ho! ho! He hath said it! He is a wise fellow, after all, this beardless Jack-pudding of Thorn!" cried the other, tee-heeing with laughter till he nearly wept upon his own saddle-bow.

I began to get very angry. For we men of Thorn were not accustomed to be so flouted by any strangers, keeping mostly our own customs, and reining in the few strangers who ventured to visit Duke Casimir's dominions pretty tightly. Least of all could I brook insolence from these Wendish boors from the outskirts of half-pagan Borrussia.

"The Prince of Pla.s.senburg hath churls among his retinue," said I, hotly, "if they be all like you two Jacks, that cannot answer a simple question without singing out like donkeys upon a common where there are no thistles to keep them quiet."

Sir Thicksides, the fat jolter-head nearest me set his thumb out to stick it into the side armor of Longlegs, his companion, who rode cheek by jowl with him.

"Oo-oo-ahoo!" cried he, crowing with mirth, as if I had said a yet more facetious thing. "'Tis a simple question--'Hath the Prince of Pla.s.senburg a Princess, and is she not oft--ahoo!' Boris, prod me with thy lance-shaft hard, to keep me from doing myself an ill turn with this fellow's innocence."

"Hold up, Jorian !" answered the long man, promptly pounding him on the back with the b.u.t.t of his spear. "Hold up, fat Jorian! Let not thy love of mirth do thee any injury. For thou art a good comrade, and fools were ever apt to divert thee too much. I have seen thee at this before--that time we went to Wilna, and the fellow in motley gave thee griping spasms with his tomfoolery."

Then was I mainly angry, as indeed I had sufficient occasion.