CHAPTER VI.

WARRIOR AND ABBESS.

Refreshed by his bath and daintily dressed, Berthoald was half an hour later led by Ricarik to the apartment of the abbess. When he appeared in the hall where Meroflede awaited him, he found her alone. The abbess had doffed her black vestments to array herself in a long white robe. A light veil half hid the tresses of her thick and reddish hair. A necklace and bracelets of precious stones ornamented her neck and bare arms. The Franks, having preserved the custom, introduced before them in Gaul by the Romans, of surrounding their banquet tables with couches, the abbess, extended almost at full length upon a long and wide lounge furnished with cushions, made a sign to the young chief to sit down near her. Berthoald obeyed, increasingly taken with the unusual beauty of Meroflede. A large fire flamed in the hearth. Rich vessels of silver glistened on the table, which was covered with embroidered linen; daintily carved flagons stood near gold cups; the plates held toothsome dishes; a candelabrum, on which two little wax candles were burning, barely lighted the spacious apartment, which was thrown into semi-obscurity a few paces away from Meroflede and her guest, and into complete darkness at its further ends. The lounge stood against a wainscoted wall from which hung two portraits, one of them, coarsely painted on an oak panel in Byzantine style, representing a Frankish warrior barbarously accoutred after the fashion of the leudes of Clovis three centuries earlier. Below the painting was the inscription: "Gonthram Neroweg." Beside this picture was one of the abbess Meroflede herself, draped in her long black and white veils; in one hand she held her abbatial crosier, in the other a naked sword. The second picture was much smaller than the first; it was painted on parchment, in the style of the miniatures that sacred books were then commonly illuminated with. Berthoald's eyes fell upon the two pictures at the moment when he was about to sit down beside his hostess. At their sight a tremor ran through him, and he remained as if thunder-struck. Presently he looked from Gonthram Neroweg to Meroflede, and from the abbess back to the former. He seemed to compare the resemblance between the two, an obvious resemblance; like Neroweg, Meroflede's hair was reddish, her nose beaked, her eyes green. The young chief could not conceal his astonishment.

"You seem to contemplate with deep interest the portrait of one of my ancestors, deceased several centuries ago!"

"You are of the race of Neroweg!"

"Yes, and my family still inhabits its vast domains of Auvergne, conquered by my ancestors' swords, or bestowed upon them by royal gifts.... But that is quite enough for the past. Glory to the dead, joy to the living! Sit down here near me, and let us take supper.... I am an odd abbess. But by Venus, I live like the other abbots and bishops of my time, with the only difference that these mitred folks sup with young girls, while I shall spend the night with a handsome soldier.... Will that be to your taste?" and raising one of the heavy silver flagons with a virile hand, she filled to the brim the gold cup that was placed near her guest. After merely moistening her own red lips in the cup, she reached it to the young chief and said resolutely:

"Let us drink your welcome to this convent!"

Berthoald held the cup for a moment between his two hands, and casting one more look at the portrait of Neroweg, he smiled caustically, fixed upon the abbess a look as bold as that which she cast at him, and replied: "Let us drink, beautiful abbess!" and emptying the cup at one draught, he added: "Let us drink to love!... which overpowers the abbesses as it does the simple maids!"

"Aye! Let us drink to love, the god of the world, as the pagans used to say!" answered Meroflede, and filling her own cup from a little red flagon, and replenishing the cup of the young chief, who fixedly gazed at her with eyes that shot fire, she added: "I have drunk to your toast; now drink to mine!"

"Whatever it be, holy abbess, and even though this cup be filled with poison, I shall empty it to your toast, I swear by your snow-white arms!--by your beautiful eyes!--by your voluptuous lips! I drink to Venus Callipyge!"

"Well, then," said the abbess, fixing a penetrating look upon the young man, "let us drink to the Jew Mordecai!"

Berthoald had his cup at his lips, but at the name of the Jew he shivered, laid his cup down abruptly, his face grew dark and he cried in terror:

"Drink to the Jew Mordecai?"

"Come, by Venus, the patroness of lovers, do not tremble like that, my brave friend!"

"Drink to the Jew Mordecai!... I----"

"You said to me: 'Let us drink to Love!'" replied the abbess, without losing the effect of her words upon Berthoald; "you swore by the whiteness of this arm," and she raised her sleeves, "you swore to drink my toast. Fulfill your promise!"

"Woman!" cried Berthoald with impatience and embarrassment, "what whim is that? Why do you wish me to drink to the Jew Mordecai, to a merchant of human flesh?"

"I shall satisfy your curiosity.... Had not Mordecai sold you as a slave to the Seigneur Bodegesil, you would not have stolen your master's horse and armor to go in search of adventures, and palmed yourself off upon that devil of a Charles Martel--you, a Gaul of the subject race--for a noble of the Frankish race and son of a dispossessed beneficiary, and finally, Charles, one of whose best captains you have become, would not have presented you with this abbey. Consequently, you would not be here now, at my side, at this table, where we are together drinking to Love.... That is the reason why, my valiant warrior, I empty this cup to the memory of that filthy Jew! And now, will you drink to the Jew Mordecai?"

While Meroflede was uttering these words, Berthoald contemplated her with increased astonishment, now mixed with fear, and could find not one word in answer.

"Ah! Ah! Ah!" said the abbess laughing, "see how dumb he has become. Why grow alternately pale and red? What does it matter whether you are of Gallic or Frankish race? Does that render your eyes less blue, your hair less black, your shape less comely? Come, shame upon you, my warrior! Must I teach a soldier how cups are emptied, and how love is made?"

Berthoald felt as if in a dream. Meroflede did not seem to despise him; she did not seem to triumph at the advantage that she had gained over him by the knowledge of his secret. Frank in her cynicism, she contemplated the young chief with mild and ardent eyes. Her looks that at once troubled his mind and fired his veins; the strangeness of the adventure; the effect of the large cup that he had just drained at one draught, either a heady wine or perchance mixed with some philtre, and that began to throw his brain into disorder;--all these thoughts crowded upon Berthoald's mind. He took a sudden resolve--to vie with the abbess in audacity, and said resolutely to her: "You are of the race of Neroweg, I of that of Joel!"

"We shall drink to Joel ... he has raised a breed of handsome soldiers."

"Are you acquainted with the death of the son of Gonthram Neroweg, whose portrait I see there on the wall?"

"A tradition in my family has it that he was killed in his domain of Auvergne by the chief of a troop of bandits and revolted slaves. May the devil keep his soul!"

"The chief of those bandits was named Karadeucq ... he was the great grandfather of my grandfather!"

"By heaven! That is a singular coincidence! And how did the bandit kill Neroweg?"

"Your ancestor and mine fought valiantly with axes, and the count succumbed. The Gaul triumphed over the Frank!"

"Indeed ... you refresh the recollections of my childhood. Did not your ancestor cut some words in the trunk of a tree with the point of a dagger after the combat?"

"Yes--'_Karadeucq, a descendant of Joel, killed Count Neroweg_'!"

"A few months after her husband's death, the count's wife, Godegisele, gave birth to a son, who was the grandfather of my grandfather."

"Strange coincidence, indeed ... and you, my beautiful abbess, listen to the story with great calmness!"

"What are those combats of our ancestors and of our races to me? By Venus! By her beautiful hips! I know but one race in all the world--the race of lovers! Empty your cup, my valiant warrior, and let us sup merrily. To-night there is a truce between us two.... War to-morrow!"

"Shame! Remorse! Reason! Duty!--let them all be drowned in wine!... I know not whether I am awake or dreaming on this strange night!" cried the young chief, and taking up his full cup, he rose and proceeded with an air of feverish defiance while turning towards the somber and savage portrait of the Frankish warrior: "To you, Neroweg!" Having emptied his cup, Berthoald felt seized with a vertigo and threw himself upon the lounge, saying to Meroflede: "Long live Love, abbess of the devil! Let us love each other to-night, and fight to-morrow!"

"We shall fight on the spot!" cried a hoarse and strangling voice, that seemed to proceed from the extremity of the large hall that lay in utter darkness, and, the curtains of one of the doors being thrust aside, Broute-Saule, who, without the knowledge of the abbess and driven by savage jealousy, had managed to penetrate into the apartment, rushed forward agile like a tiger. With two bounds he reached Berthoald, seized him by the hair with one hand and raised a dagger over him with the other, determined to plunge the weapon into the young chief's throat. The latter, however, although taken by surprise, quickly drew his sword, held with his iron grip the armed hand of Broute-Saule, and ran his weapon through the unfortunate lad. Deadly wounded, Broute-Saule staggered about for a few seconds and then dropped, crying: "Meroflede ... my beautiful mistress ... I die under your eyes!"

Still holding his bloody sword in his hand, and aware that the powerful wine was making further inroads upon his senses, Berthoald mechanically fell back upon the lounge. The dazed chief for a moment scrutinized the darkness of the apartment, apprehensive of further attempts upon his life, when he saw the abbess knock over with her fist the candelabrum which alone lighted the room, and in the midst of the total darkness that now pervaded the place he felt himself in the close embrace of the monster. Hardly any recollection remained to him of what happened during the rest of that night of drunkenness and debauchery.