The Dove in the Eagle's Nest

CHAPTER XX: THE WOUNDED EAGLE

The star and the spark in the stubble! Often did the presage of her dream occur to Christina, and assist in sustaining her hopes during the days that Ebbo's life hung in the balance, and he himself had hardly consciousness to realize either his brother's death or his own state, save as much as was shown by the words, "Let him not be taken away, mother; let him wait for me."

Friedmund did wait, in his coffin before the altar in the castle chapel, covered with a pall of blue velvet, and great white cross, mournfully sent by Hausfrau Johanna; his sword, shield, helmet, and spurs laid on it, and wax tapers burning at the head and feet. And, when Christina could leave the one son on his couch of suffering, it was to kneel beside the other son on his narrow bed of rest, and recall, like a breath of solace, the heavenly loveliness and peace that rested on his features when she had taken her last long look at them.

Moritz Schleiermacher assisted at Sir Friedmund's first solemn requiem, and then made a journey to Ulm, whence he returned to find the Baron's danger so much abated that he ventured on begging for an interview with the lady, in which he explained his purpose of repairing at once to the imperial camp, taking with him a letter from the guilds concerned in the bridge, and using his personal influence with Maximilian to obtain not only pardon for the combat, but authoritative sanction to the erection. Dankwart of Schlangenwald, the Teutonic knight, and only heir of old Wolfgang, was supposed to be with the Emperor, and it might be possible to come to terms with him, since his breeding in the Prussian commanderies had kept him aloof from the feuds of his father and brother. This mournful fight had to a certain extent equalized the injuries on either side, since the man whom Friedel had cut down was Hierom, one of the few remaining scions of Schlangenwald, and there was thus no dishonour in trying to close the deadly feud, and coming to an amicable arrangement about the Debateable Strand, the cause of so much bloodshed. What was now wanted was Freiherr Eberhard's signature to the letter to the Emperor, and his authority for making terms with the new count; and haste was needed, lest the Markgraf of Wurtemburg should represent the affray in the light of an outrage against a member of the League.

Christina saw the necessity, and undertook if possible to obtain her son's signature, but, at the first mention of Master Moritz and the bridge, Ebbo turned away his head, groaned, and begged to hear no more of either. He thought of his bold declaration that the bridge must be built, even at the cost of blood! Little did he then guess of whose blood! And in his bitterness of spirit he felt a jealousy of that influence of Schleiermacher, which had of late come between him and his brother. He hated the very name, he said, and hid his face with a shudder. He hoped the torrent would sweep away every fragment of the bridge.

"Nay, Ebbo mine, wherefore wish ill to a good work that our blessed one loved? Listen, and let me tell you my dream for making yonder strand a peaceful memorial of our peaceful boy."

"To honour Friedel?" and he gazed on her with something like interest in his eyes.

"Yes, Ebbo, and as he would best brook honour. Let us seek for ever to end the rival claims to yon piece of meadow by praying this knight of a religious order, the new count, to unite with us in building there--or as near as may be safe--a church of holy peace, and a cell for a priest, who may watch over the bridge ward, and offer the holy sacrifice for the departed of either house. There will we place our gentle Friedel to be the first to guard the peace of the ford, and there will we sleep ourselves when our time shall come, and so may the cruel feud of many generations be slaked for ever."

"In his blood!" sighed Ebbo. "Ah! would that it had been mine, mother. It is well, as well as anything can be again. So shall the spot where he fell be made sacred, and fenced from rude feet, and we shall see his fair effigy keeping his armed watch there."

And Christina was thankful to see his look of gratification, sad though it was. She sat down near his bed, and began to write a letter in their joint names to Graf Dankwart von Schlangenwald, proposing that thus, after the even balance of the wrongs of the two houses, their mutual hostility might be laid to rest for ever by the consecration of the cause of their long contention. It was a stiff and formal letter, full of the set pious formularies of the age, scarcely revealing the deep heart-feeling within; but it was to the purpose, and Ebbo, after hearing it read, heartily approved, and consented to sign both it and those that Schleiermacher had brought. Christina held the scroll, and placed the pen in the fingers that had lately so easily wielded the heavy sword, but now felt it a far greater effort to guide the slender quill.

Moritz Schleiermacher went his way in search of the King of the Romans, far off in Carinthia. A full reply could not be expected till the campaign was over, and all that was known for some time was through a messenger sent back to Ulm by Schleiermacher with the intelligence that Maximilian would examine into the matter after his return, and that Count Dankwart would reply when he should come to perform his father's obsequies after the army was dispersed. There was also a letter of kind though courtly condolence from Kasimir of Wildschloss, much grieving for gallant young Sir Friedmund, proffering all the advocacy he could give the cause of Adlerstein, and covertly proffering the protection that she and her remaining son might now be more disposed to accept. Christina suppressed this letter, knowing it would only pain and irritate Ebbo, and that she had her answer ready. Indeed, in her grief for one son, and her anxiety for the other, perhaps it was this letter that first made her fully realize the drift of those earnest words of Friedel's respecting his father.

Meantime the mother and son were alone together, with much of suffering and of sorrow, yet with a certain tender comfort in the being all in all to one another, with none to intermeddle with their mutual love and grief. It was to Christina as if something of Friedel's sweetness had passed to his brother in his patient helplessness, and that, while thus fully engrossed with him, she had both her sons in one. Nay, in spite of all the pain, grief, and weariness, these were times when both dreaded any change, and the full recovery, when not only would the loss of Friedel be every moment freshly brought home to his brother, but when Ebbo would go in quest of his father.

For on this the young Baron had fixed his mind as a sacred duty, from the moment he had seen that life was to be his lot. He looked on his neglect of indications of the possibility of his father's life in the light of a sin that had led to all his disasters, and not only regarded the intended search as a token of repentance, but as a charge bequeathed to him by his less selfish brother. He seldom spoke of his intention, but his mother was perfectly aware of it, and never thought of it without such an agony of foreboding dread as eclipsed all the hope that lay beyond. She could only turn away her mind from the thought, and be thankful for what was still her own from day to day.

"Art weary, my son?" asked Christina one October afternoon, as Ebbo lay on his bed, languidly turning the pages of a noble folio of the Legends of the Saints that Master Gottfried had sent for his amusement. It was such a book as fixed the ardour a few years later of the wounded Navarrese knight, Inigo de Loyola, but Ebbo handled it as if each page were lead.

"Only thinking how Friedel would have glowed towards these as his own kinsmen," said Ebbo. "Then should I have cared to read of them!" and he gave a long sigh.

"Let me take away the book," she said. "Thou hast read long, and it is dark."

"So dark that there must surely be a snow-cloud."

"Snow is falling in the large flakes that our Friedel used to call winter-butterflies."

"Butterflies that will swarm and shut us in from the weary world," said Ebbo. "And alack! when they go, what a turmoil it will be! Councils in the Rathhaus, appeals to the League, wranglings with the Markgraf, wise saws, overweening speeches, all alike dull and dead."

"It will scarce be so when strength and spirit have returned, mine Ebbo."

"Never can life be more to me than the way to him," said the lonely boy; "and I--never like him--shall miss the road without him."

While he thus spoke in the listless dejection of sorrow and weakness, Hatto's aged step was on the stair. "Gracious lady," he said, "here is a huntsman bewildered in the hills, who has been asking shelter from the storm that is drifting up."

"See to his entertainment, then, Hatto," said the lady.

"My lady--Sir Baron," added Hatto, "I had not come up but that this guest seems scarce gear for us below. He is none of the foresters of our tract. His hair is perfumed, his shirt is fine holland, his buff suit is of softest skin, his baldric has a jewelled clasp, and his arblast! It would do my lord baron's heart good only to cast eyes on the perfect make of that arblast! He has a lordly tread, and a stately presence, and, though he has a free tongue, and made friends with us as he dried his garments, he asked after my lord like his equal."

"O mother, must you play the chatelaine?" asked Ebbo. "Who can the fellow be? Why did none ever so come when they would have been more welcome?"

"Welcomed must he be," said Christina, rising, "and thy state shall be my excuse for not tarrying longer with him than may be needful."

Yet, though shrinking from a stranger's face, she was not without hope that the variety might wholesomely rouse her son from his depression, and in effect Ebbo, when left with Hatto, minutely questioned him on the appearance of the stranger, and watched, with much curiosity, for his mother's return.

"Ebbo mine," she said, entering, after a long interval, "the knight asks to see thee either after supper, or to-morrow morn."

"Then a knight he is?"

"Yea, truly, a knight truly in every look and gesture, bearing his head like the leading stag of the herd, and yet right gracious."

"Gracious to you, mother, in your own hall?" cried Ebbo, almost fiercely.

"Ah! jealous champion, thou couldst not take offence! It was the manner of one free and courteous to every one, and yet with an inherent loftiness that pervades all."

"Gives he no name?" said Ebbo.

"He calls himself Ritter Theurdank, of the suite of the late Kaisar, but I should deem him wont rather to lead than to follow."

"Theurdank," repeated Eberhard, "I know no such name! So, motherling, are you going to sup? I shall not sleep till I have seen him!"

"Hold, dear son." She leant over him and spoke low. "See him thou must, but let me first station Heinz and Koppel at the door with halberts, not within earshot, but thou art so entirely defenceless."

She had the pleasure of seeing him laugh. "Less defenceless than when the kinsman of Wildschloss here visited us, mother? I see for whom thou takest him, but let it be so; a spiritual knight would scarce wreak his vengeance on a wounded man in his bed. I will not have him insulted with precautions. If he has freely risked himself in my hands, I will as freely risk myself in his. Moreover, I thought he had won thy heart."

"Reigned over it, rather," said Christina. "It is but the disguise that I suspect and mistrust. Bid me not leave thee alone with him, my son."

"Nay, dear mother," said Ebbo, "the matters on which he is like to speak will brook no presence save our own, and even that will be hard enough to bear. So prop me more upright! So! And comb out these locks somewhat smoother. Thanks, mother. Now can he see whether he will choose Eberhard of Adlerstein for friend or foe."

By the time supper was ended, the only light in the upper room came from the flickering flames of the fire of pine knots on the hearth. It glanced on the pale features and dark sad eyes of the young Baron, sad in spite of the eager look of scrutiny that he turned on the figure that entered at the door, and approached so quickly that the partial light only served to show the gloss of long fair hair, the glint of a jewelled belt, and the outline of a tall, well-knit, agile frame.

"Welcome, Herr Ritter," he said; "I am sorry we have been unable to give you a fitter reception."

"No host could be more fully excused than you," said the stranger, and Ebbo started at his voice. "I fear you have suffered much, and still have much to suffer."

"My sword wound is healing fast," said Ebbo; "it is the shot in my broken thigh that is so tedious and painful."

"And I dare be sworn the leeches made it worse. I have hated all leeches ever since they kept me three days a prisoner in a 'pothecary's shop stinking with drugs. Why, I have cured myself with one pitcher of water of a raging fever, in their very despite! How did they serve thee, my poor boy?"

"They poured hot oil into the wound to remove the venom of the lead," said Ebbo.

"Had it been my case the lead should have been in their own brains first, though that were scarce needed, the heavy-witted Hans Sausages. Why should there be more poison in lead than in steel? I have asked all my surgeons that question, nor ever had a reasonable answer. Greater havoc of warriors do they make than ever with the arquebus--ay, even when every lanzknecht bears one."

"Alack!" Ebbo could not help exclaiming, "where will be room for chivalry?"

"Talk not old world nonsense," said Theurdank; "chivalry is in the heart, not in the weapon. A youth beforehand enough with the world to be building bridges should know that, when all our troops are provided with such an arm, then will their platoons in serried ranks be as a solid wall breathing fire, and as impregnable as the lines of English archers with long bows, or the phalanx of Macedon. And, when each man bears a pistol instead of the misericorde, his life will be far more his own."

Ebbo's face was in full light, and his visitor marked his contracted brow and trembling lip. "Ah!" he said, "thou hast had foul experience of these weapons."

"Not mine own hurt," said Ebbo; "that was but fair chance of war."

"I understand," said the knight; "it was the shot that severed the goodly bond that was so fair to see. Young man, none has grieved more truly than King Max."

"And well he may," said Ebbo. "He has not lost merely one of his best servants, but all the better half of another."

"There is still stuff enough left to make that ONE well worth having," said Theurdank, kindly grasping his hand, "though I would it were more substantial! How didst get old Wolfgang down, boy? He must have been a tough morsel for slight bones like these, even when better covered than now. Come, tell me all. I promised the Markgraf of Wurtemburg to look into the matter when I came to be guest at St. Ruprecht's cloister, and I have some small interest too with King Max."

His kindliness and sympathy were more effectual with Ebbo than the desire to represent his case favourably, for he was still too wretched to care for policy; but he answered Theurdank's questions readily, and explained how the idea of the bridge had originated in the vigil beside the broken waggons.

"I hope," said Theurdank, "the merchants made up thy share? These overthrown goods are a seignorial right of one or other of you lords of the bank."

"True, Herr Ritter; but we deemed it unknightly to snatch at what travellers lost by misfortune."

"Freiherr Eberhard, take my word for it, while thou thus holdest, all the arquebuses yet to be cut out of the Black Forest will not mar thy chivalry. Where didst get these ways of thinking?"

"My brother was a very St. Sebastian! My mother--"

"Ah! her sweet wise face would have shown it, even had not poor Kasimir of Adlerstein raved of her. Ah! lad, thou hast crossed a case of true love there! Canst not brook even such a gallant stepfather?"

"I may not," said Ebbo, with spirit; "for with his last breath Schlangenwald owned that my own father died not at the hostel, but may now be alive as a Turkish slave."

"The devil!" burst out Theurdank. "Well! that might have been a pretty mess! A Turkish slave, saidst thou! What year chanced all this matter--thy grandfather's murder and all the rest?"

"The year before my birth," said Ebbo. "It was in the September of 1475."

"Ha!" muttered Theurdank, musing to himself; "that was the year the dotard Schenk got his overthrow at the fight of Rain on Sare from the Moslem. Some composition was made by them, and old Wolfgang was not unlikely to have been the go-between. So! Say on, young knight," he added, "let us to the matter in hand. How rose the strife that kept back two troops from our--from the banner of the empire?"

Ebbo proceeded with the narration, and concluded it just as the bell now belonging to the chapel began to toll for compline, and Theurdank prepared to obey its summons, first, however, asking if he should send any one to the patient. Ebbo thanked him, but said he needed no one till his mother should come after prayers.

"Nay, I told thee I had some leechcraft. Thou art weary, and must rest more entirely;"--and, giving him little choice, Theurdank supported him with one arm while removing the pillows that propped him, then laid him tenderly down, saying, "Good night, and the saints bless thee, brave young knight. Sleep well, and recover in spite of the leeches. I cannot afford to lose both of you."

Ebbo strove to follow mentally the services that were being performed in the chapel, and whose "Amens" and louder notes pealed up to him, devoid of the clear young tones that had sung their last here below, but swelled by grand bass notes that as much distracted Ebbo's attention as the memory of his guest's conversation; and he impatiently awaited his mother's arrival.

At length, lamp in hand, she appeared with tears shining in her eyes, and bending over him said,

"He hath done honour to our blessed one, my Ebbo; he knelt by him, and crossed him with holy water, and when he led me from the chapel he told me any mother in Germany might envy me my two sons even now. Thou must love him now, Ebbo."

"Love him as one loves one's loftiest model," said Ebbo--"value the old castle the more for sheltering him."

"Hath he made himself known to thee?"

"Not openly, but there is only one that he can be."

Christina smiled, thankful that the work of pardon and reconciliation had been thus softened by the personal qualities of the enemy, whose conduct in the chapel had deeply moved her.

"Then all will be well, blessedly well," she said.

"So I trust," said Ebbo, "but the bell broke our converse, and he laid me down as tenderly as--O mother, if a father's kindness be like his, I have truly somewhat to regain."

"Knew he aught of the fell bargain?" whispered Christina.

"Not he, of course, save that it was a year of Turkish inroads. He will speak more perchance to-morrow. Mother, not a word to any one, nor let us betray our recognition unless it be his pleasure to make himself known."

"Certainly not," said Christina, remembering the danger that the household might revenge Friedel's death if they knew the foe to be in their power. Knowing as she did that Ebbo's admiration was apt to be enthusiastic, and might now be rendered the more fervent by fever and solitude, she was still at a loss to understand his dazzled, fascinated state.

When Heinz entered, bringing the castle key, which was always laid under the Baron's pillow, Ebbo made a movement with his hand that surprised them both, as if to send it elsewhere--then muttered, "No, no, not till he reveals himself," and asked, "Where sleeps the guest?"

"In the grandmother's room, which we fitted for a guest-chamber, little thinking who our first would be," said his mother.

"Never fear, lady; we will have a care to him," said Heinz, somewhat grimly.

"Yes, have a care," said Ebbo, wearily; "and take care all due honour is shown to him! Good night, Heinz."

"Gracious lady," said Heinz, when by a sign he had intimated to her his desire of speaking with her unobserved by the Baron, "never fear; I know who the fellow is as well as you do. I shall be at the foot of the stairs, and woe to whoever tries to step up them past me."

"There is no reason to apprehend treason, Heinz, yet to be on our guard can do no harm."

"Nay, lady, I could look to the gear for the oubliette if you would speak the word."

"For heaven's sake, no, Heinz. This man has come hither trusting to our honour, and you could not do your lord a greater wrong, nor one that he could less pardon, than by any attempt on our guest."

"Would that he had never eaten our bread!" muttered Heinz. "Vipers be they all, and who knows what may come next?"

"Watch, watch, Heinz; that is all," implored Christina, "and, above all, not a word to any one else."

And Christina dismissed the man-at-arms gruff and sullen, and herself retired ill at ease between fears of, and for, the unwelcome guest whose strange powers of fascination had rendered her, in his absence, doubly distrustful.