Chapter 8

"Why do you shrink from me?" he asked. "I mean you no ill. You shall be queen; I swear you shall be queen. Come with me," and he held out his hand with an air of royal condescension which contrasted ridiculously enough with his grotesque outside. Perpetua turned away from him with a little moan. "Alas, poor wretch," she sighed, her pity for his plight for the moment overpowering her sense of her own peril. Robert did not catch her words, but he saw her trouble and wondered at it.

"What do you fear?" he questioned, tenderly. "I am the King."

Perpetua clasped her hands together in an agony of compassion for the unhappy fool, and for herself, more helpless and alone through his coming.

"Dear Heaven," she prayed, "help me to mend this madness."

"Do you still shun me?" Robert asked, angrily, fretted by the girl's resistance. "Am I young, smooth, strong, comely to so little purpose? Is it a light thing to be a king like me?"

Perpetua listened to his ravings in despair. It seemed so horrible to see the ugly fool stand there mouthing his own praises, his kingship. As she shrank from him, her averted eyes fell on the silver mirror which Lycabetta had left lying upon her couch. A sudden wild hope came into Perpetua's mind. Though the man's brain might be moonstruck, his eyes might still be honest, and a glance might bring him back to sanity. At least the test was worth trying. She sprang to the couch, caught up the mirror, and, turning to Robert as he followed her, thrust, with extended arms, the mirror before his face. Had he been struck by lightning his advance had not stayed more surely.

"God in heaven," he cried, in a dreadful voice, that made the girl shiver to hear. He snatched the mirror from her and stared into the shining field, reading there the hideous lineaments of the fool Diogenes. His wild eyes turned from the mirror to her and back again.

"What damnable trick is this? I am bewitched, for the fool's face leers at me. Some devil reigns in Sicily, who has put this stain upon me."

The tears came into Perpetua's eyes for the blighted wretch who could thus deny his own image. Robert saw the tears and guessed their meaning.

"Woman," he entreated. "Can you not pierce through this glamour? I am, indeed, the King. For holy charity believe me. Though it has pleased Heaven or Hell to change me thus, I am the King."

He held out his hands to her in piteous supplication, and for a moment for very pity's sake there came the temptation into Perpetua's mind to humor the poor ruin. But she thrust the temptation from her, and sadly turned her head. Robert, with a groan, flung himself upon the couch and sat there staring into the mirror, trying to understand the calamity that had come upon him and blotted out his form. In the shining glass the wrinkled, twisted face of Diogenes twitched viciously. Blind rage overswept him, and he shook his fist at the foul reflection, screaming madly:

"I am the King! I am the King!"

Perpetua suffered with him as she would have suffered with some wounded forest beast; even sorrowed more, for if the forest beast were a dumb thing and could not tell its woes, the fool could speak, and his speech was worse than silence. Her compassionate womanhood sent her to his side, and she touched him gently on the shoulder, trying to whisper some words of sympathy, of pity.

But at the touch of her hand, at the sound of her voice, Robert flung the mirror from him, and, springing to his feet, faced the girl with evil in his eyes. Ugly thoughts crowded upon him, wicked impulses pricked his blood. If he was thus deformed, thus degraded, thus stripped of his youth, his beauty, and his power, at least he would not suffer alone; at least he, the outcast, had one at his command. The girl who had denied the King was in the power of the fool.

"Do you sorrow for me," he cried--"for me, the great King, the fair King? Keep sorrow for yourself; for, if my body be blighted, yours is smooth and soft, and at my mercy."

He made a snatch at her, but his wild eyes had warned her, and she eluded his grasp. She felt herself indeed helpless, in such a place and at a madman's mercy, but she prayed and faced him with steadfast eyes. He moved slowly towards her, gloating over his purpose.

"Now you are mine," he said. "Doomed as I am, degraded as I am, you are mine; you cannot escape me. Cling to your bridegroom, bride."

Perpetua slowly drew back from him, and there was that in her steady gaze which, in spite of himself, restrained him.

"God, grant me the key to a madman's pity," she prayed; then to the fool she pleaded: "Sir, in all hearts Heaven has set some spot of gentleness. I am a woman set about by enemies, helpless but not hopeless. If ever any woman's face was sacred in your eyes, if ever any woman's speech was music to your ears, be gentle and befriend me."

Robert laughed a malign laugh. He seemed to revenge his own ruin in triumphing over the child.

"My heart is a harp in a tree, and it sings to women's voices," he said. "But you must whisper me love-words if you think to win me."

Perpetua answered him bravely, hoping for Heaven's help in the words she might choose to soothe the madman.

"I will not kneel to you, for my knees bend only to Heaven. But I will speak you fair. If you were shapely, strong, and beautiful, with the white fire of knighthood glowing in your soul, you would laugh at death to pluck the meanest woman in the world from such a snare as mine is."

Her speech stabbed Robert with a fresh fury at the thought of his transformation, and he answered her, grinning like a snarling beast:

"If I were shapely, strong, and beautiful, I would do as I will do. The powers that torture me have flung a jewel at my feet, and I will wear it till I weary of it. You are in my power, saintliness! Discrowned, deformed, dishonored, over you I can still be king."

Perpetua shook her head proudly.

"Do not cheat yourself. I am not in your power."

Robert laughed again.

"Am I deceived? I thought you were a prisoner here. I thought your jailers flung you to me for my pleasure. I thought just now you were my suppliant. Will these walls vanish at your wish? Will those hearts melt at your pleadings? Will I deny myself delight? You are in my power."

Perpetua watched him as calmly as a martyr of old days watched the advance of the doomsman.

"I am not in your power. I am young, and I love life, and would be glad to grow old in the world's way. But I would rather die than live with any stain of shame."

Robert retorted swiftly, mocking her, yet conscious, against his will, of unfamiliar admiration of opposition to his will.

"You foolish ermine, Death's angel does not come at a girl's call."

"She who finds life hateful will find the means to end it," Perpetua said, proudly.

"Is this your virtue?" Robert jeered. "May meekness do self-murder?"

Perpetua lifted her tearless eyes towards the painted roof, fretted with pagan emblems.

"When I appear before the court of Heaven," she answered, quietly, "I think I will find pardon for that sin."

All manner of strange thoughts were contending for the supremacy of Robert's reason. Was that an aureole, strangely luminous, about her head, or only the wealth of her red hair? Was she, indeed, as brave as her brave phrases?

"I take you at your word," he said, more mildly. "Here is that which can set you free from all of us."

He drew the fool's dagger from his girdle and held it to her by its blade.

"Have you the heart to drive this home?" he asked.

Perpetua seized the hilt eagerly.

"Ay, with all my heart, into my heart," she cried, with a confidence that he could not question. "You are the gentlest tyrant in the world, and I will pray for you in paradise." She pressed the weapon with both hands to her breast and bowed her head.

Robert felt certain that she would keep her word, yet the evil in him drove him to taunt her. "You do not strike," he said.

Perpetua lifted her bright eyes, and he read in them the joy of a white soul escaping shame. On his ears her words came like saintly music. "I do but commend my spirit to its Maker. When it is done, of your clemency say a prayer by me. Farewell!"

She raised the weapon in the air, and Robert's troubled soul assured him that she meant to strike, that she meant to die. Awful influences seemed to struggle around him, darkness striving with light. He caught at the light. Voices were calling in his ears, urging evil, urging good. He caught at the good.

"Stop!" he called. "I think your hand has driven a devil from my heart. You are a saint; you have a soldier's courage; you have conquered me. I am your servant."

Perpetua hid the knife in her bosom and came close to Robert. "Will you truly help me? Let me see your eyes. Yes, I believe you. How may we escape?"

Robert drew his withered body proudly up. "I will command them to set you free."

"Alas! poor soul, they will not obey you," Perpetua said, sadly.

Robert fell from his high estate in a second. "Oh, God, I had forgotten," he groaned. He clasped his hands; his lips murmured a prayer for strength to bear his cross, for strength to serve this woman. For the second time in his sinful life he was thinking of another than himself, and that other was Perpetua. He turned to her with what he meant to be a smile. "Then we are weak things, you and I, a fool and a woman, and we must fight force with craft. Do you trust me?"

"I trust you," Perpetua said, simply.

Robert came close to her and whispered in her ear. "Seem to consent to this cruel jest of theirs. I will say I have cast a spell upon you, and that you can refuse me nothing. When I command you to follow me, say that you obey. Once you are outside these gates, you will be safe. Do you understand?"

Perpetua looked at him with shining eyes. "I understand that I have found a friend."

The words seemed to burn Robert's heart with purifying fire. "A slave who will serve you faithfully," he whispered. "Hush, some one is coming."

XI

GLAMOUR

The hangings behind the image of Venus parted, and Lycabetta surveyed the strange pair. She had grown weary of the garden, grown curious to know how the fool had progressed with his wooing.

"Well," she asked, "are the lovers happy?"

Perpetua folded her arms in silence as Lycabetta descended the steps, but Robert danced up to the Neapolitan antically.

"A marvel, a marvel," he carolled; "I have won the mad maid's heart."

Lycabetta stared at him. "Does Andromeda dote on the monster? Does Beauty love the Beast?"

Robert jigged and skipped in front of her, almost singing his words. If he had the fool's shape, he would play the fool's part to save Perpetua. "Bah, the husk belies the kernel. I am skilled in philtres--I can cast love spells as well as the straightest and the smoothest."

"Love-making has mended your wits," said Lycabetta. "So you no longer think yourself the King."

Robert laughed wildly. "King or no king," he gibbered, "I sway a maid's heart." He was playing his part bravely, for the air seemed full of voices calling, "Save Perpetua!"

"Does the girl accept you?" Lycabetta questioned.

"Accept me?" Robert echoed, gleefully. "I have so overcome her that she will woo me in season and out of season. I shall boast the most loving, patient spouse in Christendom. Mark, now, how my bird flies to a call. Come hither, rusticity."

He beckoned, and Perpetua moved slowly towards him, outwardly calm. "Do you take me for your lord and master?" he asked her.

"Ay," Perpetua answered.

Lycabetta looked at the girl's grave face in amaze. "This is a wonder," she said; "she seems spellbound."

Robert nodded joyously. "Why, I have cast the glamour upon her, and she will listen to me as the fish listened to St. Anthony. Will you swear to obey me, maiden?"

Again Perpetua answered, "Ay."

"Are you in league with the devil?" Lycabetta asked, astonished at the girl's acquiescence.

Robert grinned impishly. "I will not sell my secret. I suppose you do not care how I conquer the maid, so long as I do conquer her."

"So long as you do what the King wishes," Lycabetta answered, contemptuously.

"I swear I will do what the King wishes," Robert retorted. "She shall be humble enough, she shall be wise enough when I am done with her. You are skilled in mischief; but I still could be your school-master. Did you ever hear of Orpheus and his magic lute?"

"What of it?" Lycabetta asked.

"He could pipe so divinely," Robert related, "that all things must needs follow him, not merely men and women, birds and beasts, but silly stocks and stones; and your phlegmatic stay-at-home tree would needs uproot itself and skip to his jingle. Well, you shall see this intractable virgin follow, lamblike, when I pipe, as I lead the way to my hovel."

"If you can do this, I shall be glad to be rid of her," Lycabetta confessed. "I have better use for my hours than the training of country girls."

Robert came nearer to her, confiding: "I know a spell my master mountebank taught me. A Greek fellow made it, a Roman rogue stole it, an Italian rascal gave a new twist to it; here is the pith of it. Oh, it sounds simple enough, but it will win a matron from her allegiance, a nun from her orisons, a maid from her modesty. See, now, how she will trip to my whistle. Mistress Modesty, Mistress Modesty, follow me home, follow me home, follow me home!"

He took up the lute Euphrosyne had laid down, and moved around the room slowly, playing a quaint little country-side air in a minor key, while he chanted his song, and, as he went, Perpetua moved slowly after him, as if compelled by the spell of the music:

"By the music of the morn, When equipped with spear and shield, Oberon, the elfin-born, Winding on his wizard horn, Calls the fairies to the field-- I conjure thee, maiden, yield!

"By the magic of the moon, When Diana from her dome Wakes from slumber, woos from swoon All the folk who fear the noon, Dwarf and kobold, witch and gnome-- I conjure thee, maiden, come!

"By the beauty, by the bliss Of the ancient gods who ride Eros, Phoebus, Artemis, Aphrodite, side by side, Through the purple eventide, On the cloudy steeds of Dis-- I conjure thee, maiden, kiss."

Lycabetta watched, astounded, the submission with which Perpetua followed the incantation of the fool. "This is the black magic," she said; and then asked Perpetua, "Are you content to follow this fool?"

Perpetua paused in her patient following of the singer, and, looking Lycabetta full in the face, she answered, "Ay."

Lycabetta raised protesting hands. "And to go with him where he will?" she persisted.

Again Perpetua answered, "Ay."

Robert interrupted the colloquy with a sweep of the strings that drifted into a new tune with new words:

"Caper, sweeting, while I play; Love and lover, we will stray Over the hills and far away."

He beckoned to the girl and ambled backward towards the entrance, obediently followed by Perpetua.

As he was about to pass luting through the entrance, Lysidice parted the curtains and entered the room. Robert fell back to give her passage. With a reverence to Lycabetta, she said:

"The Lord Hildebrand waits without."

The news brought very different thoughts to the three hearers. Lycabetta, always willing to welcome the King's favorite, gave order gladly enough to admit him. In Robert's mind the name rekindled hopes that had died away. His heart's friend, his brother in arms, the companion of his vices, the flatterer of his follies, he surely would not be deceived by the fantastic transformation. Flinging aside his lute, he shouted, joyously: "Hildebrand! Surely he will know me."

Perpetua's heart grew cold at this proof of renewed madness, and she caught him by the arm. "Do not abandon me," she entreated.

Robert shook her off in his eagerness to greet Hildebrand. "No, no, have no fear--" he promised, hurriedly, pressing forward towards the entrance. The hangings parted and Hildebrand entered, exquisite, debonair, radiant.

"Salutations, sweet lady," he said, gayly, advancing towards her, but his advance was interrupted by Robert, who rushed forward, exclaiming: "Hildebrand! Hildebrand! do you not know me? Do you not know my voice?"

Hildebrand frowned resentfully on the intruder. "Why are you here, fool!" he grumbled. "Your head and your hump are like to part company."

Robert gave a great groan and turned away. His last hope had withered. The spell under which he suffered was too potent for his dearest friend to resist; even the eye of comradeship could not pierce through that fleshly mask; even the ear of affection could not discern a familiar voice. Perpetua stood where she was, full of dread at this untimely interruption. Lycabetta tapped her forehead mockingly as she looked from Diogenes to Hildebrand.

"The crazy zany thinks he is the King," she said.

Hildebrand nodded. "He mimicked the King so pertly yesterday morn that the King doomed him, and fear has so addled his weak wits that he believes himself to be his master."

"Yet he is a cunning rogue," Lycabetta added, "for he has won the heart of the woodchuck."

Hildebrand caught at her words. "I came on that business. Have you obeyed the King?"

"Bravely," Lycabetta replied. "I flung her to this fool for a marriage morsel, knowing him to be as cruel as he is crooked, and, by our Lady of Lesbos, he has bewitched her, and she follows his songs like a lamb to the sacrifice."

At the sound of her words, Robert roused himself from his lethargy. "Ay, ay," he chirped, "you shall see. She will follow where I call. Come, sweetheart, come!"

Again he began to move, and again he was followed by Perpetua. Now, for the first time, Hildebrand caught sight of her and moved forward, captured by her loveliness.

"Is this the King's fancy?" he asked.

Lycabetta answered: "This is the girl the King sent me to tame and shame for him. Could I do it better than by giving her to this limping devil?"

Hildebrand struck his hands loudly together in protest. "Ay, by the gods, much better. She is far too fair for the first sweetness of her youth to be wasted on a clumsy clown. We are ourselves indifferent good at this taming and the rest, and, like a loyal subject, I will gladly serve the King in this." He advanced towards Perpetua, but Robert instantly came between them.

"The girl is mine," he asserted. "You shall not take her from me."

Hildebrand grinned maliciously. "Gently, beast, gently," he purred. "You shall have your turn by-and-by. You must give place to your betters, bowback."

Robert glared at him in hate. "I say you shall not have her!" he repeated.

Lycabetta burst into a fit of laughing. "Have a care, my lord," she warned; "the fool's eyes roll horridly, and his mouth twitches. He will do you hurt if you steal his leman."

"You shall not have her!" Robert insisted, fiercely.

Hildebrand's affability vanished. "Out of the way, monkey!" he ordered; then, catching Robert lightly by the collar, he cast him aside as easily as he might have cast a kitten. Robert staggered and fell on his knees. Unheeding him, Hildebrand went towards Perpetua. "You lithe idol of the heights," he asked, smiling, "would you not choose me for your paramour?"

Perpetua looked steadily at her new danger, and her heart was glad to think of the knife that lay hidden in her bosom. "I will go with the fool," she said.

In the corner where he knelt unnoticed Robert was muttering confused, disjointed prayers to Heaven. The passionate desire to save the girl revived within him, and he implored the Heaven that he had wronged for help.

At Perpetua's speech, Lycabetta clapped her hands derisively. "I said he had bewitched her."

"We will exorcise her," Hildebrand laughed back, and advanced towards the girl. Perpetua drew away a little, regarding Hildebrand with a steadiness that puzzled him, resolved to drive the knife into her heart before he could lay hand on her. To Robert, where he lay huddled, the spinning seconds seemed to be beating against his ears like the booming of great bells, and through their clangor came a babble of brisk voices reproaching him, mocking him. "Now for one hour," they seemed to say, "of that royal power which you have used so ill, and now might use so nobly." Again his agony spurred him to supplicate Heaven to send him some thought that might save her, but no thought came; he was weak, helpless, dishonored, and through the darkness of his soul the voices of his enemies stabbed him like many arrows.

Lycabetta, seeing how Hildebrand paused for a moment in his advance upon Perpetua, stung him with a sneer.

"Lord Hildebrand, for a lover of ladies you are at a loss. She clings to her cripple."

Hildebrand, irritated, made a step forward, and again Perpetua moved a step away. Hildebrand frowned, accustomed to conquest.

"You shun me, child," he protested, "as if I had the plague."

The plague!

At those words the booming bells ceased, the babbling voices ceased; Robert's darkness became light; an inspiration told him what to do. He sprang to his feet and advanced towards Hildebrand, barring his way to Perpetua. With outstretched palms, with cringing shoulders, he appealed to Hildebrand, to Lycabetta.

"Sweet lord, sweet lady, I entreat a sweet word with you."

Perpetua, who had lifted her hand to clasp the handle of the knife, let it fall again. Hildebrand, who had forgotten the fool's existence, scowled and snarled at him.

"To heel, sirrah, to heel!"

Lycabetta shook with mirth. "You forget, my lord," she suggested, "that it is the King who addresses you."

"I'll wring his majesty's neck," Hildebrand answered, savagely, "if he vexes me further."

"Nay, if he vexes you, there be others for that task," and Lycabetta struck sharply with a golden hammer upon a golden gong. Immediately the curtains parted and Zal and Rustum entered. At their heels came several of Lycabetta's women, wondering at the summons.

Lycabetta pointed to Robert.

"Cast the fool forth," she commanded.

The black slaves descended the steps. Robert turned a mocking, mouthing face towards Lycabetta.

"Wait, wait," he said; "I have a tale to tell that should divert you much."

Something in the fool's fantastic manner, in his grotesque attitude, in his promise of diversion, took Lycabetta's fitful fancy. She held up a hand and the slaves halted. Robert, who had edged a little nearer to where Perpetua stood, wondering what strange purpose urged the fool, was making singular gestures with his hands, as one inviting, even commanding attention.

"Listen," he said, and his voice had a strange sound in it of defiance, of dominion, of frightful triumph, that jarred horridly on his hearers. "It was cold on the hills to-night and the wind chilled me. By the road-side near the city's gate I found one who slept or seemed to sleep. Wait, wait, my tale is wonderful and worth your patience. The sleeper was wrapped in a great mantle. Why should he lie snug while I shivered? I would have killed him sleeping to steal his cloak, but I was spared the pains, for as I twitched at a corner of it the fellow rolled in a lump before me and lay there dead. Wait, wait, your patience shall not be strained to breaking, and my adventure is good hearing. My man lay on his back in the moonlight, staring stupidly, and I who looked saw that his face was drawn and twisted, as if he had died in great pain; his teeth were dropping from their livid gums and his skin was stained and mottled and discolored, blue and black and green, and he seemed to rot as I watched him. But I was cold and I fear nothing, being a fool, so I went my ways, warm in his mantle. What do I care for the plague?"

The plague!