The Casque's Lark Part 4

"Victorin will always be loved as he has been."

"Yes, but it is a great pity!" remarked Douarnek shaking his head sadly, after the other soldiers had thus given vent to their thoughts and feelings. "Yes, it is a great pity! Oh! Victorin is no longer the child of the camps that we, old soldiers with grey moustaches, knew as a baby, rode on our knees, and, down to only recently, looked upon with pride and friends.h.i.+p!"

The words of these soldiers struck me with deeper apprehension than Sampso's words did a few hours before. Not only did I often have to defend Victorin with the severe Sampso, but I had latterly noticed in the army a silent feeling of resentment towards my foster-sister's son, who until then, was the idol of the soldiers.

"What have you to reproach Victorin with?" I asked Douarnek and his companions. "Is he not brave among the bravest? Have you not watched his conduct in war?"

"Oh! If a battle is on, he fights bravely, as bravely as yourself, Schanvoch, when you are at his side, on your large bay horse, and more intent upon defending the son of your foster-sister than upon defending yourself. '_Your scars would declare it, if they could speak through the mouths of your wounds_,' as our old proverb says!"

"I fight as a soldier; Victorin fights as a captain. And has not that young captain of only twenty-two years already won five great battles against the Germans and the Franks?"

"His mother, well named Victoria, must have contributed with her counsel towards his victories. He confers with her upon his plans of campaign.

But, anyhow, it is true, Victorin is a brave soldier and good captain."

"And is not his purse open to all, so long as there is anything in it?

Do you know of any invalid who ever vainly applied to him?"

"Victorin is generous--that also is true."

"Is he not the friend and comrade of the soldiers? Is he ever haughty?"

"No, he is a good comrade, and always cheerful. Besides, what should he be proud about? Are not his father, his glorious mother and himself from the Gallic plebs, like the rest of us?"

"Do you not know, Douarnek, that often it happens that the proudest people are the very ones who have risen from the lowest ranks?"

"Victorin is not proud!"

"Does he not, during war, sleep unsheltered with his head upon the saddle of his horse, like the rest of us hors.e.m.e.n?"

"Brought up by so virile a mother as his, he was bound to grow up a rough soldier, as he is."

"Are you not aware that in council he displays a maturity of judgment that many men of our age do not possess? In short, is it not his bravery, his kindness, his good judgment, his rare military qualities as a soldier and captain that caused him to be acclaimed general by the army, and one of the two Chiefs of Gaul?"

"Yes, but in electing him, all of us knew that his mother Victoria would always be near him, guiding him, instructing him, schooling him in the art of governing men, without neglecting, worthy matron that she is, to sew her linen near the cradle of her grandson, as is her thrifty habit."

"No one knows better than I how precious the advices of Victoria to her son are to our country. But what is it, then, that has changed? Is she not always there, watching over Victorin and Gaul that she loves with equal and paternal devotion? Come, now, Douarnek, answer me with a soldier's frankness. Whence comes the hostility that, I fear, is ever spreading and deepening against Victorin, our young and brave general?"

"Listen, Schanvoch. I am, like yourself, a seasoned soldier. Your moustache, although younger than mine, begins to show grey streaks. Do you want to know the truth? Here it is: We are all aware that the life of the camp does not make people chaste and reserved like young girls who are brought up by our venerated female druids. We also know, because we have emptied many a cup, that our Gallic wines throw us into a merry and riotous humor. We know, furthermore, that when he is in a garrison, the young soldier who proudly carries a c.o.c.kade on his casque and caresses his brown or blonde moustache, does not long preserve the friends.h.i.+p of fathers who have handsome daughters, or of husbands who have handsome wives. But, for all that, you will have to admit, Schanvoch, that a soldier who is habitually intoxicated like a brute, and takes cowardly advantage of women, would deserve to be treated to a hundred or more stripes laid on well upon his back, and to be ignominiously driven from camp. Is not that so?"

"That is all very true, but what connection has it with Victorin?"

"Listen, friend Schanvoch, and then answer me. If an obscure soldier deserves such treatment for his shameful conduct, what should be done to an army chief who disgraces himself in such fas.h.i.+on?"

"Do you venture to say that Victorin has offered violence to women and that he is daily drunk?" I cried indignantly. "I say that you lie, or those who carried such tales to you lied. So, these are the unworthy rumors that circulate in the camp against Victorin! And can you be credulous enough to attach faith to them?"

"Soldiers are not quite so credulous, friend Schanvoch, but they are aware of the old Gallic proverb--'The lost sheep are charged to the shepherd.' Now, for instance, you know Captain Marion, the old blacksmith?"

"Yes, I know the brave fellow to be one of the best officers in the army."

"The famous Captain Marion, who can carry an ox on his shoulders," put in one of the soldiers, "and who can knock down the same ox with a blow of his fist--his arm is as heavy as the iron mace of a butcher."

"And Captain Marion," added another oarsman, "is a good comrade, for all that, despite his strength and military renown. He took a simple soldier, a former fellow blacksmith, for his 'friend in war,' or, as they used to say in olden times, took the 'pledge of brotherhood' with him."

"I am aware of the bravery, modesty, good judgment and austerity of Captain Marion," I answered him, "but why do you now bring in his name?"

"Have a little patience, friend Schanvoch, I shall satisfy you in a minute. Did you see the two Bohemian girls enter Mayence a few days ago in a wagon drawn by mules covered with tinkling bells and led by a Negro lad?"

"I did not see the women, but have heard them mentioned. But I must insist upon it, what has all this got to do with Victorin?"

"I have reminded you of the proverb--'The lost sheep are charged to the shepherd.' It would be idle to attribute habits of drunkenness and incontinence to Captain Marion, would it not? Despite all his simpleness, the soldier would not believe a word of such slanders; not so? While, on the other hand, the soldier would be ready to believe any story of debauchery about the said Bohemian strollers, and he would trust the narrator of the tale, do you understand?"

"I understand you, Douarnek, and I shall be frank in turn. Yes, Victorin loves wine and indulges in it with some of his companions in arms. Yes, having been left a widower at the age of twenty, only a few months after his marriage, Victorin has occasionally yielded to the headlong impulses of youth. Often did his mother, as well as myself, regret that he was not endowed with greater austerity in morals, a virtue, however, that is extremely rare at his age. But, by the anger of the G.o.ds! I, who have never been from Victorin's side since his earliest childhood, deny that drunkenness is habitual with him; above all I deny that he ever was base enough to do violence to a woman!"

"Schanvoch, you defend the son of your foster-sister out of the goodness of your heart, although you know him to be guilty--unless you really are ignorant of what you deny--"

"What am I ignorant of?"

"An adventure that has raised a great scandal, and that everybody in camp knows."

"What adventure?"

"A short time ago Victorin and several officers of the army went to a tavern on one of the isles near the border of the Rhine to drink and make merry. In the evening, being by that time drunk as usual, Victorin violated the tavern-keeper's wife, who, in her despair, threw herself into the river and was drowned."

"The soldier who misdemeaned himself in that manner," remarked one of the oarsmen, "would speedily have his head cut off by a strict chief."

"And he would have deserved the punishment," added another oarsman. "As much as the next man, I would find pleasure in bantering with the tavern-keeper's wife. But to offer her violence, that is an act of savagery worthy only of those Frankish butchers, whose priestesses, veritable devil's cooks, boil their prisoners alive in their caldrons."

I was so stupefied by the accusation made against Victorin that I remained silent for a moment. But my voice soon came to me and I cried:

"Calumny! A calumny as infamous as the act would have been. Who is it dares accuse Victoria's son of such a crime?"

"A well informed man," Douarnek answered me.

"His name! Give me the liar's name!"

"His name is Morix. He was the secretary of one of Victoria's relatives.

He came to the camp about a month ago to confer upon grave matters."

"The relative is Tetrik, the Governor of Gascony," I said with increased stupefaction. "The man is the incarnation of kindness and loyalty; he is one of Victoria's oldest and most faithful friends."

"All of which renders the man's testimony all the more reliable."

"What! He, Tetrik! Did Tetrik confirm what you have just said?"

"He communicated it to his secretary, and confirmed the occurrence, while deploring the shocking excesses of Victorin's dissoluteness."

"Calumny! Tetrik has only words of kindness and esteem for Victoria's son."

"Schanvoch, I have served in the army for the last twenty-five years.