Part 18
“Bear this away,” he shouted, “bear this away to the Lord Guiseppo, and tell him that his father is on his way to the gibbet.”
“Man of blood and crime,” exclaimed Sir Geoffrey o’ th’ Longsword, as he advanced to the side of Aldarin, “thy life has been full of dark and fearful mystery; hast thou no dying words of repentance to speak, ere the cord tightens round thy neck? It is not well to dare the presence of God, with so much blood upon thy soul.”
Aldarin bowed his head low on his breast, and the bystanders whispered one to the other that the dreaded old man was wrapt in thought.
“A confession I have to make--dying words of repentance I have to speak,” exclaimed Aldarin, as he gazed upon the crowded castle yard.
“Thou dost remember, Sir Geoffrey, that twenty years ago we saw each others faces in the wilds of Palestine?”
“I do, I do!” exclaimed the knight, as a mingled expression of bitter memory and deep feeling passed over his wrinkled visage. “Twenty years agone, we saw each other’s faces within the walls of Jerusalem.”
The sound of a hurried and uneven footstep broke upon the air, then a wild shout echoed from the castle hall, and in an instant, the Lord Guiseppo rushed from the hall door and confronted the Scholar Aldarin, his face pale as death, his eyes rolling madly to and fro, while his trembling right hand shook the parchment scroll above his head.
“This scroll, my father: what means its words of omen? Yon blackning crowd--their looks of vengeance--what means it all, my father?”
Aldarin advanced, and flung his arms around the form of his son, gathering him to his heart in the embrace of a father.
And as he gathered him to his heart, he whispered a few brief words in the ear of the Lord Guiseppo, those words thrilled the youth to the very soul; for his eye flashed brighter than ever, and his cheek grew more deathly pale.
“Thy oath--thy oath!” hissed the hollow whisper of Aldarin.
Guiseppo turned suddenly round, he flung himself at the feet of Sir Geoffrey, and looked up into his face with a voice of anguish, as he shrieked.
“Spare my father--spare, oh! spare the weak old man!”
“Though the angels of God plead for his life, still must he die!”
“Then die, wronger and betrayer! Then die, midnight assassin and ravisher! The spirit of my mother nerves my arm and points the steel!”
And as the words fell from his lips, ere an arm could be raised, or a word of horror spoken, Guiseppo sprang to the very throat of the knight, grasping his long gray hair with one hand, while with the other he inserted the glittering dagger between the armor plates of his victim, and drove the steel down from the left shoulder to the very heart.
It was the work of a moment; the lightning flash might not be swifter, nor the thunderbolt more sudden.
One instant the spectators beheld the kneeling youth, and the warrior waving his hand with stern determination, as he turned from the prayer of mercy; the next moment their eyes were startled by the upraised dagger, and the blow of vengeance.
The knight tottered heavily to and fro, looked vacantly around, and then sank into the arms of Robin the Rough, with the haft of the dagger protruding from the armor plates of his left shoulder.
“Father!” shrieked Guiseppo, shaking wildly above his head, the right hand, the hand that winged the dagger. “Father, my mother is avenged; behold the doom of the ravisher!”
“Thou hast done well!” spoke Aldarin, in a quiet, yet trembling tone, while his lips wore an even smile. “Boy, thou hast done well! Now, Guiseppo, read, read the pacquet--the pacquet in thy bosom.”
And while the horror-stricken spectators--Robin the Rough, the figures in sable robes, the peasant-vassals, and the men-at-arms--remained awed into a fearful silence by the scene,--the silence that ever precedes the march of death,--Guiseppo thrust his hand within his bosom, drew the pacquet from its resting place, and with his trembling fingers broke the seal.
“Man of guilt and bloodshed,” exclaimed the dying knight, as he convulsively placed his hands on the wound near his heart. “I am dying--my heart grows cold, and mine eyes are dim--thy vengeance is gratified; now, now, tell me--”
“Hadst thou ever a child, Sir Geoffrey,” interrupted Aldarin, advancing to the side of the knight: “a fair-haired and soft-voiced boy, whose smile was thy joy, whose presence was thy sunshine?”
“Speak, speak--what knowest thou of my boy?” gasped the dying knight, as a look of agony passed over his face. “‘Tis sixteen years since I beheld his face in the land of his birth, the city of Jerusalem. He was torn from my embrace by an unknown hand.”
Aldarin looked around over the sea of faces, and smiled as he beheld a peasant whetting his knife on the very stone on which he stood.
That smile of incarnate scorn seemed to break the spell of horror that bound the multitude.
“To the gibbet, to the gibbet with the fratricide!” again rose the fierce yell of vengeance, and the men-at-arms came crowding up the steps, while a score of upraised daggers were about to drink the blood of the doomed murderer, when Robin the Rough threw himself before the object of their vengeance.
“Stain not your steel,” he shouted; “stain not your steel with traitor’s blood; away to the castle gate with him! Let the dog die a dog’s death!”
And at the word, the Esquires Halbert and his gallant brother Damian advanced from the crowd, and seizing Aldarin by the arms, they dragged him down the steps of stone, while the multitude gave way on either side, shrinking from the touch of a murderer, as one would shrink from the garments of the plague-smitten.
“There is fire in my heart, there is hell in my brain!” arose a tremulous voice, that was heard far along the castle yard, thrilling the bystanders to the very soul. “God of mercy, it is, it is not true! The parchment is a lie--a falsehood written by the very fiend of hell! I did not--no, no, I did not--wing the _blow_ to _his_ heart! God of heaven witness me, I raised not the steel for _his_ blood!”
And as the multitude, bearing Aldarin to his doom, heard that shrieking voice, they looked back, and beheld the Lord Guiseppo standing over the prostrate form of his victim, his face pale and colorless, his lip livid as with the touch of death, while his eyes rolled their ghastly glance over the faces of the crowd, and his arms hung palsied by his side, with the fatal parchment quivering in the grasp of his trembling hand.
“FATHER, FATHER!” his shriek again arose on the air, as he knelt by the side of his victim; “FATHER, THE MURDERER IS THY SON.”
The old man raised himself on one hand, grasped the hand of the maddened boy, as he gazed silently into his face, while his very soul seemed absorbed into some unreal dream of horror.
“My son,” he whispered with a mournful smile, “_and the dagger in my heart_--”
“Thy son!--ha, ha?--I could laugh till the very heavens echoed my voice!” and as he spoke, Aldarin, the Scholar, looked backward toward the castle steps, where the boy knelt beside the dying knight. “Thy son--ha, ha, ha!--and the dagger in thy heart! Yes, yes, it thy son? Sir Geoffrey, a parting word: dost thou remember a blow--aye, a blow from the mailed hand of a warrior, a blow which struck the Scholar to the floor while the princess of Christendom stood laughing round the scene? Dost thou remember the insult, the contumely, the scorn. Then look upon the face of thy boy, whom I stole and reared to be thy murderer, look upon his youthful face, peruse each feature, and--a smile stole over his face--_think of the vengeance of Aldarin, the Scholar_.”
With cries of execration, with yells of vengeance, the men-at-arms gathered around the fratricide, and as their brandished swords shone in the light, they bore him towards the castle gate, leaving the slab of stone before the pillars of the castle door to the solitary companionship of the father and son.
It was true--darkly and fearfully true--Guiseppo was the son of Sir Geoffrey o’ th’ Longsword.
Guiseppo was kneeling upon the stone; his arms were gathered around the form of his father, and his eyes were fixed in one long gaze upon the face of the dying man.
He marked the hue of that venerable countenance as it grew paler every moment: the lip white and colorless, the eyes wild and wavering in their glance, the livid circles gathering like the taint of corruption beneath each eye; he beheld the signs and heralds of coming death; he heard the quick gasping struggle for breath, and yet he spoke no word, he uttered no sound of agony.
“I see her face in thine,” murmured the old man, as he gazed upwards upon the countenance of his son. “It is no dream,--and--and--thy dagger is resting in my heart!”
Guiseppo was silent.
“Boy, look not upon me with such fearful agony--thou art forgiven!” gasped the old man. “Raise the hilt of my sword to my lips; I would kiss the cross ere I die. And now thy hand is firm, seize the haft of the dagger, and draw the blade from my heart.”
Guiseppo gazed upon the face of his father with a vacant look, yet still he uttered no word.
“Draw the dagger from my heart!” gasped the dying man.
Guiseppo seized the haft of the dagger, and slowly drew the blade from the heart of the murdered man.
CHAPTER THE FOURTEENTH.
THE FATE OF THE FRATRICIDE.
THE ELEMENTS ARISE IN BATTLE, DARKENING THE EARTH WITH THEIR STRIFE, AS THE WIND SHRIEKS THE DEATH-WAIL OF ALDARIN THE SCHOLAR.
Onward toward the castle gate, walking to his death, and _yet receding from the grave at every step_, with the fierce faces of the avengers frowning around him, with cries of execration and deep muttered oaths of vengeance deafening his ear, onward toward the castle gate, with an even step and an erect form, strode the Scholar Aldarin an icy smile on his lip, and a sombre light in his eye.
He knew not why they bore him onward--fearless of death, come in what form it might, he cared not.
The castle gate was reached. A dark-robed monk rushed from the shadow of the massive pillars, and while his white hairs waved in the morning breeze, he raised a cross of iron aloft in the sunbeams--
“Sinner--there is mercy above--even for thee! Behold the symbol of that mercy!”
“Ha--ha--curses on thee and thy symbol of--mercy! thou shaveling! Were not my hands stayed by these cowards I would strike ye down in my very path! I curse ye all!” he shrieked, gazing around the crowd--“I blaspheme your religion, I mock your * * *! Will ye not strike? Aldarin laughs at your steel! Are ye afraid of a weak and trembling old man? Fear ye the Scholar, even in his last hour? Lo! my breast is bare--I defy the blow!”
“Thou wilt have striking enough presently,” cried Robin the Rough--“Throw open the castle gate there. Let the portcullis be raised and the drawbridge lowered.”
The gate was passed, and the drawbridge crossed. Aldarin stood upon the platform of turf surmounting the summit of the hill; beneath him descended the road into the valley; on either side yawned chasms dark and deep; while the rocks upon whose massive piles the castle was founded, threw their fantastic forms from amid clumps of brushwood, and here and there colossal stones rose brightly into the sunshine from the depths of the gloomy void.
Aldarin looked around, and beheld the face of nature clad in the smile of sunshine; waves of foliage rising in the light; the bosom of the Arno calm and beautiful as a silver mirror, seen through the intervals of undulating hills; the Apenines frowning in the far distance, and the calm blue sky, glowing with the first kiss of morn, arching above.
Aldarin looked around upon the face of nature, but another spectacle fixed his attention and excited his wonder.
Not far from where he stood, four dark steeds were rearing and springing on the sod, while their grooms, four swarthy Moors, whose distorted faces scarce resembled the visages of humanity, were forced to exert all their giant-strength in the effort to hold the wild horses of the desert.
Wildly with their hoofs the barbs tore the sod, scattering the loosened earth in the very face of Aldarin; their eyes flashed like coals of flame, their sinews seemed to creep under the smooth and glossy skin, black as midnight; their crests proudly arching, gave their manes, long and dark, to the breeze; while with quivering nostrils and a shrill piercing neigh they seemed panting to break loose from all restraint and dart like lightning down the steep.
“What would ye with me now?” exclaimed Aldarin, as a strange wonder and a darker fear gathered around his heart. “Cowards that ye are, ye still delay your work of murder. I would this merry mysterie were finished--”
“To the gibbet with the brother-murderer!” arose the thunder shout of the multitude. “To the gibbet with the wizard and sorcerer!”
“To the Doom, to the Doom!” shouted the stout yeoman. “_To the Doom_, but not to the gibbet!”
Robin the Rough smiled and waved his hand to the Moors who led the barbs of Arimanes down the steep, while Damian and Halbert followed at their heels, bearing the Fratricide to his doom.--
Meanwhile the multitude thronging from the castle-gate, in one dense crowd, began to darken over the rocks that hedged in the moat, as the men-at-arms followed Aldarin down the hilly road, their upraised swords glittering in the first beams of the morning sun.
At the foot of the hill there lay a piece of level earth, some hundred paces square, sloping toward the east into a green meadow, backed by a wood; on the west it was hedged in by the forest trees, on the north arose the road leading to the castle, while towards the south the highway to Florence wound upwards along the brow of a precipitous hill.
Arrived at this level space--the theatre of the last and most fearful scene in his life--Aldarin beheld the stout yeoman ranging the men-at-arms along the foot of the hill, shoulder to shoulder, presenting one firm compact front, their upraised swords glittering over their sable plumes, their armor of steel shining in the morning sun. At his very side, in the centre of the level space, the wild horses of the desert were rearing and plunging in the hold of their grooms, as their shrill and piercing neigh broke on the air.
Aldarin cast his gaze above.
There crowding along the rocks, that confined the moat, form after form face after face, thronged the vassals of Albarone, gazing with silence and awe, upon the strange scenes passing in the valley below. For the moment every voice was stilled, every cry was silenced; with hushed breath and fixed brows, the men of Albarone, awaited the last scene of this tragedy.
And as Aldarin gazed around, he beheld two soldiers advance, holding thongs in their hands twisted out of the hide of the wild bull, while the tawny Moors, at a sign from Robin the Rough, placed their steeds haunch to haunch, the heads of two of the barbs looking towards the east, while the others were turned towards the west.
Robin the Rough advanced.
He gazed for a moment around the scene, and then approaching the side of Aldarin, spoke in a calm and even tone, as though the dignity of his solemn office, the avenger of the dead, imbued and elevated his soul.
“Thou hast invoked the blow, thou hast defied the steel, blasphemed our religion, and mocked our God.”
“Traitor and Fratricide--turn thee and behold the vengeance of that God.”
“Behold the manner of thy death--Murderer, look at these barbs of the desert; see how they paw the earth, how their quivering nostrils snuff the air--mark those forms of strength, those sinews of iron!”
“Ere an hundred can be told, lashed to the limbs of these horses, thine accursed carcass shall be scattered to the winds of heaven, while thy blood-stained soul, goes trembling to its last account! Thou art a brave man--we would listen to thee, while thou makest a merry mock of death, and of such a death as this!”
Aldarin turned, he looked at the wild horses, placed haunch to haunch; a deformed Moor holding each steed; he marked their forms of strength, their sinews of iron; and a slight tremor, scarce perceptible, passed over his frame.
“I am ready--” he slowly and distinctly spoke, with a calm smile--“I am ready even for this death. Cowards and slaves I defy ye!”
“Thou art a wise man--” again spoke Robin the Rough in his mocking tone--“and yet mere fools have deceived and duped thee! Yesternight, within the confines of the Red-Chamber, thou didst wait the coming of a Brother-wizard who was to journey from the far wilds of the east. Thy brother-wizard twenty-four hours agone, rode from the very walls of Florence, secured by the favor of this tyrant-duke--Ha! dost thou tremble?”
“This--this--is false!” gasped Aldarin--“Ibrahim journeyed not from the wilds of the east.”
“He came from the east attended by a train of twelve Arab knights and a band of Christian warriors, whom the courtesy of the Crusades, gave to the service of the friend of Saladin. He arrived at Florence, he beheld the tyrant duke, and at high noon yesterday rode from the walls of the city, bound for the Castle of Albarone. He was a venerable man and a mighty, this Ibrahim--for his long beard--ha,--ha--trailed down to his very breast! Who was it that made captives of his companie, and confined his own royal person in bonds, while the men of Sir Geoffrey wended to the castle clad in the garments of the Arabian retinue? Old man breathe the question in a murmured voice for it was the work of--THE INVISIBLE.”
Aldarin veiled his face in his hands, and pressed his lips between his teeth, until the blood trickled down to his very chin.
“Off with the murderer’s attire!” shrieked Robin the Rough--“Off with tunic and hose, belt and boots! Strip him to the very skin! Demon, thy magical pranks shall not avail thee, now! We will lead thee to thy death, unarmed with magic casket or wizard phial! Advance comrades and disrobe the murderer!”
Aldarin raised his head as the soldiers with the thongs advanced, while the men-at-arms noted that his face was ghastly white in hue, yet calm as the Summer Morn then dawning in the eastern sky.
“Is there not one man in all this crowd, who will bear a message from a father to his daughter!” he slowly exclaimed--“The Ladye Annabel, she is my child, and--by the fiend ye dare not refuse a father’s request!”
There was a pause, while two figures clad and veiled in sweeping robes of sable, stole silently thro’ the throng of the men-at-arms, and stood beside Robin the Rough.
“Will no man hear the last words of a--father to his child?”
“I--I--will bear the message--” exclaimed one of the sable figures, speaking from the folds of his robe--“I will bear thy dying words to the Ladye Annabel!”
Aldarin trembled. He knew the voice; and strange memories came crowding around him, as he fancied the tones of his murdered brother living again in that husky sound.
“Bear the parchment scroll to the Ladye Annabel. Tell her--tell her--it came from the hands of _one_ who loved her thro’ life, and gave his lost thoughts to _her_, in the hour of a fearful death. And look ye man--” he continued in quick and gasping tones--“ye need not tell her, how her father died--ye need not speak of his doom--say to her, that Aldarin died in his bed.”
“I will--I will--as God lives I will!”
“Tell her that Aldarin with his last words, blessed her with the blessing of the God in whom she believes!”
“It shall be done!” exclaimed the voice, and the hand of the veiled Figure grasped the parchment scroll--“It shall be done!”
Robin turned from the scene, and gazed above. “How say ye men of Albarone--” he shouted pointing to the Barbs of Arimanes--“shall the Wild Horses, rend the body of the murderer into atoms? Is our sentence just?”
There arose from rock, from hill, from valley one shout--“It is the judgment of Heaven--the judgment of Heaven!”
Slowly and silently the soldiers disrobed the Scholar, and at last he stood disclosed in the light, with the folds of his under tunic floating around his slender form.
“Lead him to his doom?” shouted Robin the Rough.
“Ye shall not lead the old man to this fearful death!” arose the shriek of the Figure who had received the parchment from the hands of the Scholar--“I forbid this work of doom!”
The robe fell from the form of the stranger, and Adrian Di Albarone confronted the stout yeoman, his hands upraised, and his blue eye gleaming with a wild light, as he shrieked forth the words, “I forbid this work of doom!”
“Adrian Di Albarone,” exclaimed the deep-toned voice of Robin the Rough, as he seemed inspired with an awful feeling of the duty which he owed the dead; “to-morrow, these gallant men, the vassals clustering round yon heights, and thy poor servitor, who stands before thee, will joy to call thee--Lord!--This day is sacred to another master, to another Lord--this day is sacred to the God of vengeance. This day we own no earthly rule, we stand apart from all human things; we have sworn not to eat, nor drink, nor sleep until we have fulfilled the work of doom!”
“Thou will not scorn my prayer for mercy;--Adrian Di Albarone asks the old man’s life of thee! He is stained with my father’s blood, but I would not have him die this fearful death--spare the old man’s life!”
“I am the avenger of Lord Julian of Albarone! Ask the God above to spare the fratricide--for I cannot, cannot stay HIS judgment!”
Adrian turned away, for the stern faces of the men-at-arms told him that his pleadings were all in vain. And as he glided from the place of death, the robes were thrust aside from the face of the other figure, and every eye beheld the visage of Albertine the monk.
“Old man,” exclaimed the voice of Albertine, from the shrouded folds of his robe, “hast thou no prayer to offer, no words of penitence to speak ere thou art led to thy doom?”
“I am ready for my death;” exclaimed Aldarin, extending his arms--
“I scorn your whining prayers, and as for words of penitence--look ye--is there aught of repentance written on this cheek or brow?”
“To whom dost thou resign thy soul!”
“To the AWFUL SOUL OF THE UNIVERSE!”
Thus exclaimed the fated man, as his slender form rose proudly erect while his extended hands were raised in the act of solemn appeal.
“Ye may tear this body into fragments, ye may rend this carcass into atoms, doom me to the death of fire, or consign this form to the decay of the charnel-house, _yet ye cannot destroy Aldarin_! His soul will live and live forever! It may float on the unseen winds, it may glare in the lightning’s flash, or strike in the thunderbolt; it may come back to the earth, in the storm, the horror and the doom: or it may wander far, far in the solitudes of the VAST UNKNOWN, where eternal fires lash the shores of desolated worlds--still will it live and live forever! A beam of the AWFUL SOUL can never die!”
Albertine gazed upon the erect form and flashing eye of the Scholar and saw that his labour was in vain. With a look which mingled bitter and contrasted feelings, he turned away from the scene, gathering the folds of his robe over his face as he disappeared.
“Lead me to the death,” cried Aldarin in a tone of bitter scorn. “Or are ye afraid of a weak and withered old man? Ha--ha! ye are brave men!”
“Lead him to his death!” echoed Robin the Rough.
Attired in his under tunic, Aldarin was led forward. Damian seized him by the shoulders and Halbert his feet. They raised him upon the haunches of the steeds, with his head to the east.