Part 12

Around, all dark and time-worn, the walls of the castle--each casement blazing with torches--looked down upon various groups of the peasantry and servitors of Albarone, some engaged in light and gleesome gossip, while others were hurrying hither and thither, on errands pertaining to the feast which was to grace the castle hall on the morrow.

In front of the arching roof of the kitchen door stood the gray haired sharp featured, and sharp voiced Steward of the castle, engaged in superintending the operations of a number of hinds, who were severing the limbs of various fat bucks, and cutting up certain lusty beeves, and preparing various kinds of game, for the vast fire that blazed on the kitchen hearth.

Farther on, a minstrel was entertaining a circle of peasants, with the song of love, or the tale of knightly valor; at a short distance, the privileged fool, with his cap and bells, and fantastic dress, was uttering his merry quips and far-fetched jests, which ever and anon he varied by a nimble summersault, while the gaping crowd held their sides as their boisterous laughter broke upon the ear, with all its jovial discord and dissonance.

“Who’ll buy! who’ll buy!” shouted the Jew, “here’s broaches for ye damsels fair--broaches and gauds, rings for your fingers, and crosses of ebony for your bosoms. Look ye how this heart of gold would sink and swell on a maiden’s snow white breast! Here’s plumes for the warriors’ helmet; daggers for his belt, and trappings for his steed. Who’ll buy! who’ll buy!--Here’s ornaments of gold and silver for the doublet of the page, essences for his flowing hair, and chains for his neck.--Who’ll buy--who’ll buy.--Broaches, gauds, rings, gems, plumes, belts, trappings, perfumes, chains, laces of gold! Who’ll buy! Who’ll buy! Gentles, list ye all! Chains, laces of gold, perfumes, trappings, belts, plumes, gems, rings, gauds, broaches. Who’ll buy! who’ll buy!”

“The Virgin save us all!” exclaimed Guiseppo who stood among the crowd that gathered round the Israelite, “the Virgin save us all, but _there’s_ a tongue for you, my good folks.”

This was said with an attitude of mock astonishment, and corresponding grimace of the features.

“An’ my tongue suits ye so well, gentle sir, may-hap you’ll try some of my wares?”

“What have you, Sir Gripe-fist, that it would become _me_ to buy?”

“Everything to suit a gallant page, everything. Except three wares with which the great merchant--_Nature_--must provide him, or else he’ll make but a sorry page.”

“And those wares--how do you style them?” asked the page.

“The first,” replied the Jew with a demure look, “the first ware is somewhat dull and heavy, it is labelled--_Impudence_--may it please thee fair Page.”

“Thou heathen hound, thou!” exclaimed Guiseppo, half amused and half angered. “How name you the second ware? Eh! Leatherface?”

“The second ware,” the Jew replied meekly, “the second ware is light and feathery. It bears the name--_Self-conceit_. As for the third--”

“Aye the third,” interrupted the page. “Go on my black bearded friend--go on--I’ll borrow a good oaken towel to rub you down, when you have done.”

“As for the third, it is the stuff of which the two others are made. It is heavier and duller than _Impudence_, and lighter and more feathery than _Self-conceit_, they style it _Ignorance_. And these three wares are the sole contents of the cob-web-hung storehouse of Sir Page’s brain. An’ it likes thee, fair sir?”

The Israelite bowed low as he spoke.

“Ha--ha--ha! fairly hit! Ho--ho--ho! The Jew turns Scholar, and preaches like a monk.--He--he--he! The trim Page is hit--fairly hit.” Such were the exclamations that went around the laughing crowd.

“Now receive thy pay, thou son of Sathanas!” exclaimed Guiseppo, brandishing an oaken staff; “here’s at thee!”

“Nay, nay!” exclaimed one of the spectators, “thou art fairly hit, sir Guiseppo.”

“Aye, aye, fairly hit,” cried another; and “The Jew has paid thee in thine own coin,” a third shouted, throwing himself in the path of the page.

“Nay, nay, let him come!” cried the Jew, with a sneer. “Let him come. I’ll tame his pageship.”

“Dost thou mock me, thou dog!” As he spoke, the page raised his oaken staff, and whirling it around his head, he aimed with all his strength at the sconce of the Jew, who coolly turned aside the blow with his upraised arm, and in an instant he had Guiseppo by the throat.

He whispered a word in the ear of the page, and then, unloosing his hold, he began to gather up his wares.

The eyebrows of the page elevated with astonishment, and his lips parted. The bystanders gathered around Guiseppo with various expressions of their surprise at the sudden change that had passed over him.

“Why stare you so?” exclaimed a peasant maid.

“Art mad?” asked one of the yeoman of the guard.

“Perhaps moon-struck?” suggested another.

Guiseppo made no reply, but walked slowly away, while the Jew remained standing in the centre of the group, with his servitor waiting silently by his side.

“Look ye, son of Moses,” cried one of the yeomen, advancing toward the Jew, “why stands this man of thine so silent and still? He moves not, nor does he speak; but his wild eye is glancing hither and thither like a fire-coal. Why does he stand thus mute and speechless?”

A grim smile passed over the bearded features of the Jew.

“Ask a post why it does not speak, or ask a war-horse to troll ye a merry song! You are a keen yeoman and a shrewd, yet did it ne’er strike ye that my servitor might be incapable of speech? A poor Arab boy, gentle sirs and damsels, whose dying father gave him to my care, when perishing on the field of battle, in the wilds of Palestine, some twenty years agone.”

“A son of the paynim Mahound,” muttered the yeoman, with a look of scorn.

“Nay he is of the faith of Christ,” interrupted the Jew. “Behold, he wears the cross of Rome!”

“A sweet youth, and gentle-faced, though somewhat sad in look,” murmured a peasant matron, gazing with a look of pity upon the tawny face of the Arab mute.

And while the group of peasant men and women clustered around the Jew and his Arab boy, a cry ran through the castle yard, echoed from lip to lip, and repeated by the crowd thronging the place, until the air seemed alive with the shout: “She comes, she comes! The fair Ladye Annabel is passing to the chapel of St. George! Make way for the betrothed! Make way for the Ladye Annabel! _Make way for the Duchess of Florence!_”

In a moment the court-yard was occupied by two files of men-at-arms, who extended from the great steps, ascending to the massive door of the castle hall, along the level space, making a lane for the passage of the Ladye Annabel and her train. The crowd came thronging to the backs of the warriors, gathering around the staircase, and blackening on every side, eager to behold the betrothed of his grace the Duke of Florence.

Foremost among the throng at the bottom of the stairway, his pack lashed to his back, and a small casket in his hands, the black-bearded Jew appeared to take great interest in the scene progressing before his eyes.

The Arab mute stood at his back, half concealed from view, and unseen or unnoticed by the survitors and vassals of Albarone.

In after times, some of the vassals remembered well that they observed the wild eyes of the Arabian glaring fiercely over the shoulder of the Jew, while his right hand was thrust within the folds of his coarse gaberdine, and his entire appearance denoted a mind agitated by some fierce resolve.

A low, solemn peal of music broke on the air, and a ruddy blaze of light was thrown from the recesses of the massive hall doors. In a moment a band of cavaliers, attired in all the glitter of spangled cloak and waving plume, came from the hall, and took their position on either side of the staircase, each gay cavalier holding a torch on high, while the gleaming light revealed each handsome face, wearing the polished smile, and the costumes varied with strange fancies of embroidery, and fashioned after every manner of device, were disclosed in all their luxuriance and splendor.

A murmur ran through the crowd, and the gaily-attired form of his grace of Florence issued from the hall door, followed by the slight figure of the Count Aldarin.

As they took their positions on either side of the hall door, the crowd below had time to notice the strange contrast between the Lord of Albarone and the Duke of Florence.

Aldarin, pale in face, slender in form, attired in his robes of solemn black, the cap of dark fur on his forehead, with the blaze of a single gem relieving its midnight darkness, standing silent and motionless on one side of the hall door, his keen gray eyes half hidden by his brows, as though he was absent with thoughts of more than mortal interest.

The Duke, the gallant Duke, all show, and glitter, and costume, a doublet of white satin encircling his well-proportioned form, a cloak of the most delicate crimson depending from his left shoulder, the hilt of his jeweled sword glittering in the light; while his dainty cap of pink velvet, with the snow-white plume thrown aside from its front, surmounted his vacant face, marked by the neatly circled hair, the carefully trimmed moustache and beard. His eyes glared vacantly to and fro, and it might easily be seen that his grace of Florence was on a mental excursion after his looking glass.

This flashing of torches, this gallant array, heralded the approach of the Ladye Annabel, who presently emerged from the hall door, followed by a long line of the bower maidens, arrayed, like their mistress, in flowing robes, white as the mountain snow untouched by the summer sun.

The face of the Ladye Annabel was pale as the attire that enveloped her slender form, and she leaned for support on the arm of her black-eyed cousin, the damsel Rosalind.

Pale and beautiful, the victim of the sacrifice of the morrow, neither returned the deep inclination of the head with which the Duke of Florence greeted her appearance, nor glanced upon the countenance of her father; but slowly moved down the steps of stone, her eyes downcast, and her face calm as the sculptured marble.

“She is pale,” murmured Aldarin, “pale as death! She walks with the measured step of the victim walking to the living tomb!”

“I’ faith, she is beautiful!” muttered the Duke. “My bride will hang like a pleasant costume on this royal arm!”

The black-bearded Hebrew gazed upon the Ladye Annabel with a keen and searching eye, while the Arab mute, standing at his back, bowed his head low on his breast, and veiled his face with one hand, as the other was thrust within the folds of his coarse doublet.

Slowly the procession ascended the steps of stone, one foot of the betrothed was upon the pavement of the castle yard, when a rushing sound was heard, a hurried footstep, and the Jew rushed through the men-at-arms--flinging himself at the maiden’s feet, he threw open the casket which he held in his hand.

“Fair ladye,” he cried, in a deep-toned voice, “It is the lace--the lace of price, which two days since I promised to procure thee. ’Tis worth its weight in gold--aye, an hundred times over! Look, ladye--’tis the best that gold or favor might procure.”

The Ladye Annabel started at the uncouth appearance and bearded face of the Jew, while the bystanders seemed struck dumb with his audacity.

In an instant cries of execration arose on all sides. The Count Aldarin advanced hastily to his daughter’s side, while the Duke of Florence muttered an involuntary oath, as two of the men-at-arms raised their swords to hew the Israelite to the earth.

It was a fearful moment, and the Jew seemed to feel that his fate was wavering like the sunbeam on the point of a brightened dagger.

He made a quick gesture to the Arab mute, he seized the wrist of the fair Rosalind, and looking her earnestly in the face, whispered a hurried word in the maiden’s ear, deep and piercing in its import, yet inaudible to the group clustered around.

Rosalind turned pale, started quickly aside, but in a moment seemed chiding herself for this folly, as with a smile on her lip she spoke to the Ladye Annabel in a low and murmured tone. Annabel started, with the quick convulsive start that follows an overwhelming surprise.

She started, but in a moment recovering herself, she exclaimed with a firm voice, and extended arms--

“Touch him not--do the Jew no harm! It is by my command that he is here. Sir Merchant,” she continued, with a smile of kindly meaning, “you will wait for me, in the hall of the castle--there will I look at your wares when the evening mass is done.”

“This is wondrous strange,” murmured Aldarin. “Some changing woman’s fancy, I trow--”

“Certes, the lace must be rare in texture, and quaint in device!” half muttered the Duke. “Yet I never knew that there was magic in the mere mention of such costly gear, before this moment!”

The men-at-arms released the Jew, and the procession passed on towards the more distant precincts of the castle, where the light of many torches presently streamed from the arching windows of the chapel of St. George of Albarone, showing in full and beautiful relief the snow-white forms of the maidens, passing through the sacred door of the church followed by the Count Aldarin and the Duke, environed by a glittering throng of cavaliers.

Meanwhile, alone and in the darkness, deserted by the crowd, near the hall door, stood the Hebrew and his Mute Servitor, gazing ardently upon the receding procession, until the last cavalier disappeared within the walls of the chapel.

Then it was that a grim smile passed over the bearded face of the Jew, while the Arab boy started wildly aside clenching his hands with sudden agitation, as the strains of the Holy Mass, floating from the chapel, broke upon his ear.

An hour passed. The holy ceremonies of religion had ceased to echo through the walls of the chapel. The Ladye Annabel attended by her maidens had again passed into the castle hall. Beside one of the pillars of the lofty door, stood the gallant Guiseppo, his arms folded and his eyes fixed upon the heavens above.

Guiseppo was enrapt in the mysteries of a sombre study.

He was just wondering what the stars could be made of, whether they were veritable balls of fire, unstable meteors, or angel’s eyes--how it chanced that they were lighted up so regularly every night, stormy ones of course excepted--where they went in day-time--and then he fell to thinking of angels, fairies, and other beings made all out of air--and from angels it was quite natural that his thoughts should pass to woman; and with the thought of woman came dim, floating visions of ancles well turned, black eyes beaming like living things, ruby lips wreathing in a smile, while they wooed the kiss of love. There is no knowing how far his musings might have gone, had he not been disturbed by the sound of a footstep breaking the silence of the castle yard. He looked in the direction from whence the sound proceeded, and beheld a strange figure, clad in solemn black, approaching from the gloom of the court-yard. It drew nearer and nearer, and Guiseppo beheld the form of the Scholar Aldarin.

He came slowly onward, toward the light burning over the hall door, and the Page remembered in after life that his face was most ghastly to behold, most fearful to look upon.

His head drooped upon his breast over his folded arms, his eyes dilated to their utmost, glaring vacantly on the earth, while his lips moved in broken murmurs, the Scholar ascended the steps of stone, as the Page observed him from the shadow of a massive pillar.

“It hastens, it hastens to perfection--THE MIGHTY SPELL! The marriage--ha, ha, Duchess of Florence!--HE shall live again--ha, ha! the world shall not say Aldarin toiled in vain! The secret--a few more days--ALDARIN LIVES FOREVER!”

And as the murmurs broke wildly from his lips, the Scholar disappeared within the shadow of the hall door, leaving the careless Guiseppo to the memory of that fearful face. It was an appalling memory. Guiseppo’s cheek grew pale, and his whole frame trembled with an indefinable fear.

How long he remained in this state he knew not, but after a long lapse of dreamy reverie, he was startled by a slight tap on his shoulder.

Looking around, he beheld the beaming eyes of the fair Rosalind fixed upon him with a glance which for the moment banished the face of Aldarin from his mind, and made his heart knock sadly against his breast.

“What wouldst have, Rosalind?” _The maiden whispered in his ear._

It was curious to see the change that came over the countenance of the page; the pallor vanished from his visage, which swelled out on either side as though he had an orange in each cheek, his lips were curiously pursed, while his eyes rolled about in his head after a strange fashion.

“Eh? Rosalind?” he cried, as if he had not understood her aright.

Again did the maiden whisper in his ear.

“By our Lady!” exclaimed Guiseppo, “but this does exceed everything that I ever did hear. Art not crazed, sweetheart?”

“Say, Guiseppo, wilt do it for my sake!”

The bewitching smile with which this was said, appeared to complete the conquest of the page.

“I’ll obey thee,” he cried, “but surely ’tis a strange request.”

“_Strange?_ nonsense! Never call the whim of woman--_strange_! Hie thee away and do ’t immediately. I will tell thee more concerning this matter in the evening. Away! away!”

And as the lovely damsel tripped lightly down the steps and wended her way toward the castle gate, on an errand whose import may possibly be revealed in future pages of this history, the page Guiseppo entered the hall of the castle, while his frame shook with a pleasant fit of inward laughter.

CHAPTER THE FIFTH.

THE BRIDAL MORN.

THE WEDDING GUESTS CIRCLE ROUND THE HOLY ALTAR, WHILE THE SCHOLAR ALDARIN STRIKES HIS DAGGER AT THE INTANGIBLE AIR.

The first flash of the morn that was to gild the fair brow of the Ladye Annabel with a ducal coronet, glowed faintly in the eastern sky, and the black-bearded Jew stood in the court-yard, casting his eyes earnestly about him, as if waiting the approach of one with whom he had made an appointment.

Not long did he wait, for presently emerging from a small door inserted in a wing of the castle, near the chapel of St. George, the page Guiseppo approached, with his form muffled up in his cloak of blue velvet and gold embroidery; while his slouching hat, drooping over his face, concealed his features entirely from the view.

By his side, at a respectful distance, walked the Arab mute, his head bowed low, and his face half concealed by his jet-black locks, while he tottered under the weight of his heavy burden.

As Guiseppo gained the side of the Jew, a sentinel was passing.

“Ho, sir page!” exclaimed the Hebrew, “thou seem’st fearful of the morning breeze. Hurry along--hurry along--or beshrew me, thou wilt not get the rare lace for the Ladye Annabel--the rare lace worth its weight in gold a hundred times told. Haste thee--haste thee!”

They crossed the court-yard, and presently stood before the pillars of the castle gate, which was guarded by four sentinels, attired in the livery of his grace of Florence.

“Fair sir,” exclaimed the Jew, addressing one of the men-at-arms, “I would pass through the castle gate. I am bound for the village hard by the castle. Albarone, I think you call it?”

“Wherefore abroad so early?” asked the sentinel; “and why goes Guiseppo with you?”

“Yesternight, when I journeyed toward the castle, some of my most precious wares I left behind me at the hostel of the village below. The Ladye Annabel wishes to purchase some rare and costly laces. My business calls me and this poor dumb youth away to the north, and therefore is the page sent with me; he is sent to receive the wares purchased by the Ladye Annabel. Hast any thing further to ask, sir sentinel?”

And as he asked the question, the page Guiseppo and the Arabian drew nearer to the Jew, awaiting the answer with evident interest.

It was observable that the right hand of the mute was thrust within the folds of his doublet, while his blue eye, so strangely contrasting with his dark brows and darker hair, glared fiercely into the faces of the sentinels.

“I have nothing more to ask of thee, _now_,” exclaimed another sentinel, advancing. “But had not the Duke sent me this pass for thee, thy servitor, and the page Guiseppo, the foul fiend take me, but I would have seen thy heathen carcass at the devil, ere a bolt should be drawn for thee to pass forth at this unseasonable hour. Thy way lies before thee, Jew!”

As he spoke, he applied a key to a small door which was cut into the massive timbers of the castle gate. The door flew open, and through the opened space the drawbridge was seen descending. One foot of the Jew was passed through the narrow entrance, when the sentinel who held the pass of the Duke, exclaimed:

“Why, Guiseppo, what aileth thee? Wherefore art muffled up in this fashion? Where are thy merry jests? Where is that magpie tongue of thine? Hast forgotten all thy mischievous pranks--eh, sir page?”

A low, moaning noise came from the mouth of the mute, as he seemed impatient of the delay.

“I have no time to trifle in idle converse,” exclaimed the Jew. “Come on, fair sir, the morning breaks, and I must be on my way.”

He took the page by the shoulder, and gently pulled him through the doorway, leaving the sentinels to their surprise at the strange silence of the mirthful Guiseppo, while the unfortunate mute slowly followed in the footsteps of the Jew, his right hand trembling with a scarce perceptible motion, as he buried it within the folds of his doublet.

With a hurried step, the Jew and his companion passed over the drawbridge, and in a moment standing upon the summit of the hill upon whose rocks and caverns the castle was founded, they viewed the winding road beneath.

The page turned his head--still concealed by his slouched hat--he turned his head for a moment toward the castle, and a slight tremor pervaded his frame.

Then his hand was extended, grasping the hand of the Arab mute, who returned the grasp with a firm pressure upon the white fingers of the dainty page.

“Let us onward! Let us onward!” whispered the Jew. “A long journey have we before us. Onward, I pray ye!”

They hurriedly wended down the hill, and ere an hundred could be told, their forms were lost to sight in the shades of the forest.

All bright and glorious came on the rising day, lighting up the cloudless azure with its kindly beams, shimmering over the waves of the broad, deep river, filling the wild-wood glade with glimpses of golden light; while the far-off mountains towered into the heavens, the white clouds crowning their rugged peaks, radiant with the changing hues of the morning sun.

And while the day wore slowly on, the paths leading through the valley toward the castle, the winding ways that passed through the recesses of the wild wood, and the great highway sweeping on toward Florence the Fair, were all alive with crowds of peasants, in their holiday attire, wrinkled age and red-lipped youth, mature manhood and careless boyhood, all hastening onward toward the castle of Albarone, anxious to behold the marriage of the Duke and the Ladye Annabel.

The day wore on, and the court-yard was thronged by strange and contrasted bands; the peasant in his gay costume, the vassal in his rich livery, side by side with the man-at-arms clad in glittering mail, while the servitors of the house ran hurriedly to and fro, passing with hasty steps from hall to hall, from gallery to gallery, as the confused sounds of preparation for the bridal feast awoke the echoes of the arching corridor or pillared hall.

The first quarter of the day had passed, and the shadow of the dial plate in the castle yard, was gliding over the path of high noon.