CHAPTER IX

A SOLITARY HOUSE IN THE WOODS

The rest of that day passed pleasantly enough. To be sure, there were wayfarers whom I met. I remember most distinctly a few scattered soldiers with heavy beards who talked deep and boastingly in their throats. Then there came a barber with a satchel in his hand. He had a white curled wig on his head and a comb tucked jauntily in the side of it over his ear. No doubt he was going the rounds among his customers, the gentry of the neighborhood. By the mincing way in which he walked, the fancy lace upon his sleeves and collar, together with the display of a red waistcoat and a pair of polished silver-buckled shoes he must have thought himself equal to any doctor of Physic of the great university of Bologna.

He doffed his cap to me with some show of delicacy. He began to ask me if any great houses lay in the direction from which I had come, where he could earn a handful of groats. He told me that if there were any sick in the neighborhood, he could make them well again by the skill he had in cupping and leeching. I knew that barbers had the reputation as idle gossips, so I answered as evasively as I could. Then, when he saw that he was strumming on the wrong string, he grew bolder and more direct. He said flatly that I needed a little care myself. He invited me down from the horse. He assured me that, if I would sit on a stone on the side of the road for the space of half an hour, he would make a new man of me by the application of his art.

But my experience with the scrivener had been enough. I knew that it was best to deal with this new nuisance as deftly as I might. I first said that he looked the master of his trade in every way. At which he puffed up like a pigeon and seemed highly flattered. Then I slowly let him know that my stock of money was very low, that I could hardly reckon on a resting place for the night (which of course was true) and that I was cautioned to be careful in the expenditure of every single coin.

I might have gone further. But when my lack of money became known to him, he dropped his smile and shot a look at me that had poison in it. He picked up his satchel, grumbling and growling under his breath, and with a remark about beggars riding on horseback, quickly strode away.

The next was a fellow with a cart, or rather a wagon on two wheels. He had shafts to it and instead of a horse had fastened himself to them by a strap similar to a yoke which reached over his shoulders. He was twice the size of an ordinary man. The rolls of fat hung under his chin and across his stomach in great layers. He came along puffing and snorting and mopping the sweat from his brow. At the same time he seemed as happy as a lark, for he was whistling a light tune as merrily as could be.

He no sooner saw me than he lowered the cart on two props and disengaged himself from his harness. I was now so near that I saw that he had a kind of traveling show such as often stopped in our village in the early Spring. Only this fellow had no performing bear on a rope or a monkey or an acrobatic clown, but piled high on the cart, row after row, were small wooden cages. In each cage was a bird. Along the bottom were the parrots and then the further up they went the smaller the birds became until at the top sat perched the tiniest of wrens.

I was agog with curiosity. When I came within earshot the big fellow stepped out into the middle of the road. His smile spread the width of his broad face. He bowed to me from afar and then screwed his mouth into a knot and puffed out his cheeks. With such suddenness that it startled me he ran the gamut of a score of notes from the lowest to the highest, lingering now and then to warble and trill some of them in the most entrancing fashion.

At the first sound of the man’s whistling there was a flutter in all the cages. Before he had uttered half a dozen notes the birds began to sing. When he had no more breath and was forced to let off, they had reached a harmony that was truly surprising. The sounds rose higher and higher. It was like the early morning at home when I awoke but even more thrilling and delightful. Then, just as I approached, the fellow put his knuckle in his mouth. He blew one loud shrill blast. The birds in the next instant were as silent as the grave.

I could not help smiling. And the man himself was even more pleased than I. He stood in the road grinning like a great calf. His eyes sparkled. He was beaming with joy as though he had just performed a truly remarkable feat. He stuck his thumb under his arm and straightened himself up as proud as an emperor.

“Greetings, sir Traveler,” he cried, “from the King of the Birds.”

I drew in my horse. He took this as a sign that I was interested. He screwed up his mouth again and let out a short shrill note. Of a sudden, as though they had been waiting for it, every bird in the cages started once more to sing. They were soon at the highest point. The fellow had his head cocked on one side with his ear turned towards the cages like a music master trying to detect a false note. Then, as he did before, he put his knuckle in his mouth. He blew one quick blast and the sounds died away as quickly as though the birds had been stricken dead.

“Sir,” said the King of the Birds with a wave of his hand, “the parrot there can tell your fortune. He is like the owl, one of the wisest of birds.” To suit his action to his words he tapped the parrot on the head. He placed a box which held a number of pieces of parchment before it. The parrot bent over and with its beak tossed one of the small sheets out on the ground. The King pounced upon it and held it out before my astonished eyes.

“Unfold it, sir, and read it at your leisure,” said the man. “It may help you on your way.”

With that he bowed and stood rubbing his hands. I smiled of course at his simplicity. A sort of pity took hold of me. In bulk he was almost the size of an ox. Without doubt he was as poor as any of his birds. He was dependent for all that he got upon his ability to amuse those who fell across his path. Yet, with all that, the seriousness of the world had no resting place upon his shoulders. In his own province he was, as he claimed, as absolute as a king, and to my way of thinking far happier than any of whom I have ever heard.

I did not want to wound his feelings. With the pretext that I must be going, I leaned over and tossed a handful of small silver into his hands. At the same time I clapped my heels against the horse’s flanks and with a wave of my arm bade him “Adieu.”

I thought I had done with him. I had given him more than he had counted on, I am sure. I had no other idea but that he would gather up his cart and make his way to the nearest village. But my horse had scarcely carried me ten steps when there fell upon my ears the same whistling with which he had first greeted me. Then followed the chorus of the birds. I turned in the saddle and looked back. The great fellow was standing in the middle of the road. His hands were extended towards me. His chest was heaving like a bellows and the sweat was streaming from his forehead. For all that he was smiling like a pleased child. His little eyes were twinkling and blinking in the light of the sun. When he saw that I had turned about, he struck still higher notes and the birds with him.

I rode slowly on and on. I turned now and then to wave back at him. At each turning I saw the same figure in the middle of the road and heard the same trilling sounds. They grew fainter and fainter. The man himself grew dimmer and dimmer. At length the warbling ceased. For the last time I waved “farewell.” But as I did, there he was with his head thrown back, his thumb under his arm and one foot proudly before the other. When he realized that I would soon be out of sight he threw both arms out towards me to wish me good fortune on my way.

So it went with me. On that great highway I found myself in a new and varied world. One strange character passed after the other with each quite different from the one before. At first I thought them only the odds and ends of all humanity driving forward without aim or purpose. But after a while I had to acknowledge that of the people I met, I was the least in experience of them all. I began to make a fresh estimate of men and their manners. They soon impressed me with the thought that they knew what they were about as well as I. The only difference between them and me was that they had interests other than my own. And to cap it all a certain shrewdness warned me that if I were to continue to cope with them, I must sharpen my wits to the keenness of theirs.

I went on and on. I took time to feed my horse and eat a bite myself in the shade of the trees. The afternoon came and went. The sun was dropping behind the hills. An uneasiness took hold of me lest I be forced to lie out in the open exposed to the uncertainties of the night. It was rapidly getting dark. My uneasiness was turning into fear, when I came upon a bend in the road and behind it a broad stretch of thick woods.

I stopped and looked circumspectly around. I might have passed on, but, as I gazed, I spied a little house or cottage hidden far in among the trees. Not a soul was in sight. It seemed a place deserted. The walls were of stone and very old for they were covered with moss in patches here and there. There was a blackness about them from the dust of the road, besides, on the corners and the window-ledges they were worn with pieces knocked off. The windows themselves were hardly visible. They were matted with cobwebs and dirt so that it was scarcely possible that any light could shine through them.

An old slab of stone served as a door-step, but it was surrounded with weeds that grew waist-high even as far as the edge of the road. There was little inviting about the house. Indeed, the more I examined it, the more I felt that I should leave it as it was.

I was about to give my horse the rein when I observed a thin curl of smoke lifting lazily in the air from a chimney in the rear. I knitted my brows in surprise. I looked again to make certain. Then, with curiosity getting the better of me, I got down from the horse, led him by the bridle and tied him to the nearest tree.

I cannot tell you why I did it. I suppose it was the mystery and the strangeness about the place, but before I gave thought to the consequences, I had brushed my way through the weeds and was knocking at the antiquated door.

I drew a deep breath and stood waiting. The time seemed very long indeed. My heart began to flutter in my breast. A feeling that my actions were rash stole over me. The horse neighed. The sound struck me like a warning that I ought to let well enough alone and be further on my way. I was about to turn when I heard a board creak within. The quick shuffling of feet came to me through the door. Then there fell a silence that was like the hollowness of an empty cave.

I was curious and fearful alike. I walked back to the middle of the road. The smoke came from the chimney in a thicker volume than before. I shifted in my mind to reason out the situation. When I had considered every side of it, I laughed at my fears.

“It is only some poor peasant,” I thought, “—probably too deaf to hear.”

With my mind fixed I strode boldly back. I knocked more loudly and resolutely than before. But no sound came. I waited a moment and knocked again. The only answer was the cawing of a crow that passed soaring over my head. My impatience burst its bounds. I took the latch in my hand, thinking to rattle it, when to my surprise the door yielded to my touch. As by some magic it swung slowly open and I beheld the interior of the room.

I expected to find the place within as uninviting as it was without. A fire was burning at the far end and over it hung on a chain a pot which was bubbling and boiling and giving out a most savory odor. At the side of the wall stood a chair, but of the kind you might think belonged not in a peasant’s hut but in the palace of a king. It was of the finest make. The legs and back were curved and scrolled and gilded like new and the cushions of a velvet delicately blue. In that one flash I saw, too, a table standing in the middle of the room. The top reflected the shine of the fire, for it was polished like wax.

If I was surprised at the first glance, I was the more amazed as my eyes got accustomed to the semi-darkness of the interior. The walls, instead of being black or grimy were as white and cheerful as though they were entirely new and instead of the stone flags which I expected to find, the floor was laid in the smoothest wood.

“Whoever lives here,” I said half aloud, “has gone out for a while. I’ll take a seat. When they return, we can strike a bargain for a lodging for the night.”

To suit the purpose I shut the door. It was swinging slowly when of a sudden it was dashed past my face and struck the door-jam with a bang. The unexpectedness of it made me wink. When I opened my eyes there was a man standing before me. His brows were drawn into an ugly frown. The look on his face was of the blackness of night. His jaws were set but his lips were curled back in a snarl and his fists knotted in anger as though he was about to strike.

“Dog!” The word came from between his teeth in a hiss.

I was so taken unawares that I retreated a step. I glared helplessly at him. Then a bitter smile of hatred slowly crossed his features like that of a savage who has run down an enemy.

“So,” he drawled, “you’ve proved the mouse at last.”

I was too stupefied to reply.

“Why!” I gasped. “There’s some mistake—mouse——?”

“You’ve fallen into a trap, haven’t you?”

By degrees my breath came back to me.

“I’ve never seen you before,” I managed to say. “Surely——”

He cut me off with a growl.

“You don’t have to see a man to do him a harm, do you?” he said, and took a step towards me. “The next time a man is tied to a tree and asks for a drink of water——”

He did not finish, but made a lunge at me with his arms outstretched. It took all my alertness to spring back out of his way. Then, like a flash the thought of the scrivener’s dagger popped into my mind. I jerked it from my belt and raised it menacingly over my head.

The fellow stopped in his tracks. He shot a glance over my shoulder to the back of the room. I swung the dagger in the air with the thought that if I forced him from the door, I might escape. But my arm was hardly half way around when a sharp crack caught me on the wrist. The pain shot through me like the cutting of a knife. I loosed my grasp. The dagger flew across the room and fell clattering onto the wooden floor.

In the next breath my arms were caught from behind. They were pinned together with the firmness of a vise. A foot shot out and entangled itself in mine. A quick twist and I was jerked sideways and sent tumbling like the dagger across the room.

I was stunned from the force of the fall. I got slowly up on one elbow and looked dazedly around. The fire was dancing as though it mocked me. I laid my hand on my hip where it hurt me most. My fingers fumbled aimlessly somehow or other around my pocket. I was so stupefied that I was hardly conscious of what I was doing. My thumb and forefinger touched the bit of parchment which the King of the Birds had given me. I drew it out. By good fortune my assailants were at my back. I unfolded it more by habit than by purpose. When it lay open before the light of the blazing wood I was amazed to read a warning that had come altogether too late:

“Avoid the house in the woods!”

With nervous fingers I put the parchment back again. The one fellow who had faced me first came over and jerked me roughly to my feet. Then, as though I were a log, shoved me back until I fell into the chair.

“Where did you get that dagger?” he demanded. He had picked the weapon from the floor and had thrown it on the table.

“I took it from a man on the road,” said I.

“Was it a short fellow—a churchman—dressed like an Abbot?” he asked further.

I was loath to give these rascals more information than was good for them so my answer was as short as I could make it.

“I don’t know whether he was an Abbot or not,” I said. “I couldn’t tell.”

They looked at each other in alarm.

“If he’s in the neighborhood,” said the first, “we’d better get out.”

The other came forward into the light of the fire. His hand was bandaged with a strip of an old shirt and the blood was caked where it had oozed through and hardened.

“Do you know me?” he asked.

“You tried to kill me in the woods,” I said, without lifting my eyes.

“Do you see this?” he went on.

I looked at his hand.

“It’s cut to the bone,” he said, threateningly. “It’ll take weeks for it to heal.” He narrowed his eyes till they were mere slits and studied me. “You’re going to pay for this, do you hear?”

I said nothing, but looked helplessly around.

The first fellow had his gaze upon the floor. He was worried, that I plainly saw. Then, after a little, he touched this fellow on the shoulder.

“Let’s put him out of the way,” he said, glancing towards me. “If we’re caught here, we’ll be in a trap ourselves.”

They were both willing, but still some doubt held them in leash.

“If we do,” was the answer, “what will De Marsac say? You know he wants him” (meaning me) “for a purpose.”

The word De Marsac struck strangely on my ears.

“Oh!” I exclaimed. “De Marsac had better look out for himself. There is some one on his heels.”

They turned to me together like a flash.

“What!” they exclaimed. “Who?”

“The Black Prince!” I called boldly. “He will——”

They laughed in my face.

“The Black Prince is on his way to the west to join the starving remnants of his army,” I was told. “We thought you meant the Abbot of Chalonnes.”

My mouth fell agape. I searched their faces and they searched mine. The fellow who had grappled with me first made a signal to the other, and turned towards the table to pick up the dagger. The man with the wounded hand slouched over towards me. He had his good fist curled in a knot, no doubt to crash it against my skull.

I felt that it was my end. I took a firm hold on the arms of the chair to dodge or fight them to the last of my strength.

The door suddenly flew back on its hinges and banged against the wall. Both men jumped and in my tenseness I jumped with them. They stood with frightened faces looking towards the entrance.

A form appeared—the form of a little man clad in rags, smeared with ink and dirt so that his face was hardly to be seen. His beard was clotted with mire where he had been sleeping in the open. His quills and ink-horn and roll of parchment were gone but he still wore the same curious grin that I had noticed earlier in the day.

With one skip he was in the middle of the room. He clapped the fellow with the injured hand roundly on the back and cried in a voice of glee.

“Well, I see you have him at last!”