CHAPTER XVIII
A Phantom Warrior
All turned round with a start, and saw the helmeted head of a knight infull armour leaning out of the window just above them.
This knight had been, ever since he entered the little inn an hourbefore, an object of much curiosity and some fear to its wholehousehold. He was sheathed in black armour from head to foot; he kepthis visor closed, and through its bars the few words that he spokesounded strangely hollow and grim; and there was about the whole mansomething so weird and gloomy and overawing that the host was moved toremark to his equally impressed wife that, had not the stranger crossedhimself and murmured a prayer as he entered, and paid his reckoning inadvance, he would certainly have taken him for the dreaded "PhantomKnight" himself!
Ere any of the astounded peasants could reply, the stranger went on--
"Hark ye, good fellows; which of ye will guide me to yon haunted spot?Rich shall be his reward."
The stupefied silence that followed was at last broken by old Pierre,who spoke the unanimous verdict of the whole party.
"Fair sir, all the gold in the king's treasury could not bribe any manof these parts to venture yonder after nightfall; and if your worshipwill heed a plain man's counsel, you will not venture it either. Think!what avails the bravest man on earth against a demon?"
"Were he the worst demon ever seen on earth," said the knight,undauntedly, "he can do nought beyond what God permits him to do; andone man who puts his trust in God is a match for all the spirits ofevil. It is not meet that the Wicked One should play his pranks in thisChristian land, and hinder honest folk from their lawful goings; and ifnone else can be found to drive him hence, I, with the aid of Heaven,will do it myself!"
So nobly confident, yet so devoutly humble, were the speaker's tone andbearing that a murmur of applause broke from his hearers, and evencrabbed old Pierre eyed him admiringly, though still muttering--
"Would to Heaven it might be so! But bethink you, noble sir, a demon'sarm is mighty to smite."
"So, perchance, is mine," said the unknown, quietly; and, snatching upa battle-axe so heavy that few men could have even lifted it, he hewed,at one blow, from a tree by the window a huge limb as easily as if hewere slicing a peach.
A cry of amazement broke from the lookers-on, and Paul said eagerly--
"But one man in this realm could deal such a blow! Is your worship,then, our Bertrand du Guesclin?"
"I am," said the hero, to whose large human heart this tribute ofsimple affection from the down-trodden peasantry whom he had alwayspitied and defended was dearer than all the triumphs of his gloriouslife.
Instantly all were pressing around him, kissing his gauntleted hands,or begging to be allowed only to touch the famous weapon that hadfought so well for the oppressed. Some would even have knelt at hisfeet; but the brave man drew back, and said simply--
"Kneel to God, friends, not to a poor sinner like me, and pray to Himto be with me this night when I go forth to fight with the powers ofevil. And now," added he, in a lighter tone, "tell me my road, that Imay go quickly to this haunted spot, and see if I can meet thereanything uglier than myself; for I trow this demon (if he be one) hathas good cause to be scared at my face as I at his."
The peasants laughed at the great captain's rough jest on his ownugliness; and he, stamping on his memory the directions given him byold Pierre, rode off toward the dreaded spot, watched by the group asif he were entering a lion's den.
On fair ground, six miles would have been a trifle to such a horse andrider; but the high-roads of that age were on a par with the dirtiestcountry lane of our time, and the byways far worse, and Bertrand knewbetter than to tire his steed on the eve of such a combat by putting itto speed over bad ground. So perplexing, too, were the paths hefollowed, that, in spite of the directions given him, he was forced tohalt and look about at every turn, so that, though the sun was stillhigh when he started, it was growing dark when he at last neared theHaunted Circle.
Whether from the deepening gloom or the ghastly associations of thisevil spot, or both combined, it seemed to the bold intruder that he hadnever seen so ghostly a place. The broken path, barely wide enough forone man, wound steeply up through a tangled mass of black, shadowythickets, the over-arching boughs of which took weird and spectralforms in the dim twilight. Here a monstrous snake reared up to enfoldhim; there a demon's clawed hand clutched at him as he passed; and,farther on, the gaping jaws of a wolf menaced him, or the thick, clumsyhead of a huge black bear. The night wind moaned drearily through thedark tree-tops above, the hoarse rush of the unseen river came sullenlythrough the tomb-like silence from below, and the boding shriek of araven from the deeper shadows seemed to claim as its prey the rashmortal who had dared to brave a power that was not of earth.
On went the bold Breton, fearless as ever, through the deepeningblackness and the threatening phantoms, till all at once the mattedboughs around him seemed to melt away, and he stood on the edge of abare, open space--the famous Haunted Circle itself.
There it was at last, that spot of fearful memories, revealed in allits terrors by the bursting of the full moon through the gloom that hadveiled it till then.
The minstrel's grim legend had described it truly enough. It was acircular clearing rather more than a hundred yards across, shut in onall sides by tall, dark trees, and in the centre stood a low mound ofcrumbling stones, overgrown with weeds and long grass--the pagan altar,no doubt, of the ballad.
Bold as he was, Bertrand felt his heart beat quicker as he set foot onthe haunted ground; but he rallied his courage, and, stepping into thecircle, was about to smite the ruined altar with his axe, according tothe form prescribed for summoning the haunting spirit, when a fearfulcry, half shriek and half roar, broke from the gloomy thickets, andinto the ring came leaping, with frantic bounds, and gestures morefrantic still, a figure that made even Du Guesclin's brave blood runcold.
It was a tall form in full armour, with closed visor and drawn sword,just as the peasants had described it; but the armour was stained withmould, and red with rust from helm to heel, giving to the spectre, inthe fitful moonlight, an aspect horribly suggestive of being steeped inblood. In place of plumes there clung to the helmet a bunch of weedsclotted with earth, as if he had torn them up by the roots in burstingfrom his grave; and the glistening scales of a dead snake twined abouthis neck made around it a foul and corpse-like rainbow.
"Who and what art thou?" cried Du Guesclin, crossing himself with ahand that trembled in spite of all his courage.
"A demon," replied a hollow voice from the barred helmet, in a tone ofunutterable horror.
Bertrand fully believed the ghastly assertion, but it could not makehim waver for a moment.
"If thou art indeed a demon," said he, firmly, "I, as a Christian man,bid thee defiance; but if thou art spellbound by enchantment, my goodsteel may break the spell and set thee free. Tarry till I alight, forthou art on foot, and it shall never be said that I fought Satanhimself unfairly."
He leaped from his horse, and in a moment his axe and the stranger'ssword were clashing fiercely together and sending showers of sparksinto the encircling gloom.
At the first crash and shock of blows the Breton hero was his owndaring self once more. Demon or no demon, this strange foe could smiteand be smitten; and at the familiar feeling of hand-to-hand combat allthe ghostly terrors that had haunted him vanished like morning mist.
But, strong and brave as he was, he had for once met his match. Thestorm of strokes showered on him were dealt with the savage force ofone who cared not for his own life could he but strike down his foe.Again and again did the great warrior reel back from such a blow as hehad never felt before, and he might be pardoned if the conviction roseanew in his mind that he had to do with no mortal enemy.
How this strange combat might have ended it would be hard to say; butall at once, as the Phantom Knight dealt a tremendous blow right at hisopponent's h
ead, his rusted sword snapped off at the hilt with a sharpcrash, leaving him defenceless.
But this mishap, so far from daunting him, seemed to goad him to fury.With a cry of rage he hurled the broken weapon far away, and, springinglike a tiger on Du Guesclin, seized him in a clutch that made everyjoint of his armour crackle.
But this mode of attack was not likely to take by surprise the bestwrestler in Brittany. Quick as thought Bertrand dropped his axe, and,in turn, seized his foe in a hug worthy of a Polar bear, and thegrapplers swayed to and fro, stamping, struggling, gasping, now one andnow the other seeming to have the mastery.
But with this grapple body to body the last of Bertrand's doubtsvanished. This strange foe, whoever he might be, was plainly flesh andblood like himself, and he now began to suspect that he had to do withneither demon nor ghost, but simply with a madman.
Nerved by this thought, the hero put forth all his strength, and,bringing into play a dexterous trip that he had learned long ago, borehis formidable enemy clear off his feet, and hurled him to the earthwith crushing force, falling right upon him.
As the unknown lay stunned and motionless, Du Guesclin, bending overhim, unbarred his visor, eager to see what features it hid. But whenthe stranger's face lay bare before him, fully revealed in the gloriousmoonlight, the Breton started as if stung, and muttered tremulously--
"Heaven help us! Can this be indeed he?"
Late that night the host of the one small inn at St. Barnabe wasstartled by a succession of thundering strokes on his barred door, andan imperious summons, in a loud, harsh voice, to open at once. Nor washe much reassured, when he did at last open the door (which seemedlikely to be beaten down about his ears if he did not), to see an armedman on foot leading a horse on which lay another man seemingly dead orsorely wounded.
But the name given by the new-comer was a passport to the heart ofevery Frenchman, and a handful of silver set at rest any lingeringdoubts of the worthy host, who declared himself ready to "do aught thatmight pleasure the worshipful Messire Bertrand du Guesclin."
The senseless man was carefully undressed and laid in a small upperroom, where Bertrand watched by his side all that night, stilluncertain if the crazed, haggard, ghastly sufferer before him couldreally be the same man whom he had last seen in the pride of youth andvigour and beauty, with all the fairest gifts of life within his reach.
Toward morning the sick man began to mutter uneasily, and then pouredforth a flood of wild and rambling talk, amid which came words that,broken and confused as they were, thrilled Bertrand's bold heart withhorror.
But as he listened, stronger and stronger grew the conviction that hiswild guess was right, and that this distracted sufferer was really theman he thought; and when at last the rising sun streamed into thesick-room, lighting up the helpless man's sunken face--that face,ravaged and ruined as it was, retained enough of its former self tochange his suspicions into certainty.
"Alured de Claremont!" cried he. "Is it thus that we meet again?"
"Who speaks my name?" asked a hollow voice, as the sick man startedhalf erect, with a visible gleam of reviving reason in his haggardeyes. "I was called thus while I lived; but now I am a dead man, andgiven over, body and soul, to the powers of evil."
The simple, downright intellects of the fourteenth century knew nothingof "immutable laws of being," "workings of nature," "fortuitousconjunction of atoms," and the other neat little phrases with whichGod's creatures are now doing their best to blot Him out of His ownworld. To them, God was God, and Satan Satan; and whatever befell them,good or ill, was directly traceable to one or the other.
Hence Bertrand never doubted for a moment that the wretched man'sfearful words were literally true; nor would he have been surprised hadthe Evil One started up in bodily form to claim his prey. But this onlymade the devout warrior all the more determined to wrest from Satan asoul that belonged to God.
"Not so!" cried he, sturdily. "There can be no true compact with onethat is a liar from the beginning, and Satan hath nought to do with asoul that our Lord hath redeemed. I tell thee, if the Wicked One wereto rise before us this moment, and claim thee for his, he should nothave thee! In a cause that is good and holy, I fear neither man norfoul fiend!"
"And who art thou who speak'st so boldly?" asked Alured, gazingadmiringly at the glow of manly enthusiasm which, for the moment,fairly transfigured the other's harsh features.
"I am a poor knight of Brittany, named Bertrand du Guesclin."
"Du Guesclin?" echoed Alured, with the first sign of returning energythat he had yet shown. "Art thou indeed he?"
"I am; and thou and I are acquainted of old. Thou wert a guest longsince in my father's castle of Motte-Brun, and I met thee afterwards atRennes and Dinan. Tell me thy tale, I pray; and whatever aid I can givethee shall be given right gladly."
"No help can avail me now," replied the other, relapsing into hisformer gloom. "Hast thou the courage to hear what I have done?"
"I have," said the hero, simply. "When a man hath done amiss, whatbetter can he do than confess and repent? And Heaven forbid that I, asinful man, should be harsh to thee when God hath been merciful to usall. Tell thy tale, and when it is told we will take counsel what todo."
Not till two hours later did Du Guesclin at last come down from thesick-room, and, then putting several gold pieces into the hand of thebowing host, he bade him go quickly and find a stout horse for the hurtknight.
Spurred alike by the hope of pleasing "Messire Bertrand," and theinspiring prospect of making at least twenty-five per cent. profit onthe job, the worthy host was so active that ere Alured--who now lookedand spoke quite like a rational man--was fully equipped for thejourney, his horse stood ready at the inn door.
"I owe thee more than I can ever repay, noble Sir Bertrand," said he;"and I vow to God, Our Lady, and Monseigneur St. George of England,that never will I cleanse this armour from rust, till I have done somedeed by which I may know that I can hope to be forgiven."