Not finding Friedel there, he was, however, some way up towards the tarn, when he met his brother wearing the beamy yet awestruck look that he often brought from the mountain height, yet with a steadfast expression of resolute purpose on his face.
"Ah, dreamer!" said Ebbo, "I knew where to seek thee! Ever in the clouds!"
"Yes, I have been to the tarn," said Friedel, throwing his arm round his brother"s neck in their boyish fashion. "It has been very dear to me, and I longed to see its gray depths once more."
"Once! Yea manifold times shalt thou see them," said Ebbo. "Schleiermacher tells me that these are no Janissaries, but a mere miscreant horde, even by whom glory can scarce be gained, and no peril at all."
"I know not," said Friedel, "but it is to me as if I were taking my leave of all these purple hollows and heaven-lighted peaks cleaving the sky. All the more, Ebbo, since I have made up my mind to a resolution."
"Nay, none of the old monkish fancies," cried Ebbo, "against them thou art sworn, so long as I am true knight."
"No, it is not the monkish fancy, but I am convinced that it is my duty to strive to ascertain my father"s fate. Hold, I say not that it is thine. Thou hast thy charge here-"
"Looking for a dead man," growled Ebbo; "a proper quest!"
"Not so," returned Friedel. "At the camp it will surely be possible to learn, through either Schlangenwald or his men, how it went with my father. Men say that his surviving son, the Teutonic knight, is of very different mould. He might bring something to light. Were it proved to be as the Schneiderlein avers, then would our conscience be at rest; but, if he were in Schlangenwald"s dungeon-"
"Folly! Impossible!"
"Yet men have pined eighteen years in dark vaults," said Friedel; "and, when I think that so may he have wasted for the whole of our lives that have been so free and joyous on his own mountain, it irks me to bound on the heather or gaze at the stars."
"If the serpent hath dared," cried Ebbo, "though it is mere folly to think of it, we would summon the League and have his castle about his ears! Not that I believe it."
"Scarce do I," said Friedel; "but there haunts me evermore the description of the kindly German chained between the decks of the Corsair"s galley. Once and again have I dreamt thereof. And, Ebbo, recollect the prediction that so fretted thee. Might not yon dark- cheeked woman have had some knowledge of the East and its captives?"
Ebbo started, but resumed his former tone. "So thou wouldst begin thine errantry like Sir Hildebert and Sir Hildebrand in the "Rose garden"? Have a care. Such quests end in mortal conflict between the unknown father and son."
"I should know him," said Friedel, enthusiastically, "or, at least, he would know my mother"s son in me; and, could I no otherwise ransom him, I would ply the oar in his stead."
"A fine exchange for my mother and me," gloomily laughed Ebbo, "to lose thee, my sublimated self, for a rude, savage lord, who would straightway undo all our work, and rate and misuse our sweet mother for being more civilized than himself."
"Shame, Ebbo!" cried Friedel, "or art thou but in jest?"
"So far in jest that thou wilt never go, puissant Sir Hildebert," returned Ebbo, drawing him closer. "Thou wilt learn-as I also trust to do-in what nameless hole the serpent hid his remains. Then shall they be duly coffined and blazoned. All the monks in the cloisters for twenty miles round shall sing requiems, and thou and I will walk bareheaded, with candles in our hands, by the bier, till we rest him in the Blessed Friedmund"s chapel; and there Lucas Handlein shall carve his tomb, and thou shalt sit for the likeness."
"So may it end," said Friedel, "but either I will know him dead, or endeavour somewhat in his behalf. And that the need is real, as well as the purpose blessed, I have become the more certain, for, Ebbo, as I rose to descend the hill, I saw on the cloud our patron"s very form-I saw myself kneel before him and receive his blessing."
Ebbo burst out laughing. "Now know I that it is indeed as saith Schleiermacher," he said, "and that these phantoms of the Blessed Friedmund are but shadows cast by the sun on the vapours of the ravine. See, Friedel, I had gone to seek thee at the chapel, and meeting Father Norbert, I bent my knee, that I might take his farewell blessing. I had the substance, thou the shadow, thou dreamer!"
Friedel was as much mortified for the moment as his gentle nature could be. Then he resumed his sweet smile, saying, "Be it so! I have oft read that men are too p.r.o.ne to take visions and special providences to themselves, and now I have proved the truth of the saying."
"And," said Ebbo, "thou seest thy purpose is as baseless as thy vision?"
"No, Ebbo. It grieves me to differ from thee, but my resolve is older than the fancy, and may not be shaken because I was vain enough to believe that the Blessed Friedmund could stoop to bless me."
"Ha!" shouted Ebbo, glad to see an object on which to vent his secret annoyance. "Who goes there, skulking round the rocks? Here, rogue, what art after here?"
"No harm," sullenly replied a half-clad boy.
"Whence art thou? From Schlangenwald, to spy what more we can be robbed of? The lash-"
"Hold," interposed Friedel. "Perchance the poor lad had no evil purposes. Didst lose thy way?"
"No, sir, my mother sent me."
"I thought so," cried Ebbo. "This comes of sparing the nest of thankless adders!"
"Nay," said Friedel, "mayhap it is because they are not thankless that the poor fellow is here."
"Sir," said the boy, coming nearer, "I will tell YOU-YOU I will tell-not him who threatens. Mother said you spared our huts, and the lady gave us bread when we came to the castle gate in winter, and she would not see the reiters lay waste your folk"s doings down there without warning you."
"My good lad! What saidst thou?" cried Ebbo, but the boy seemed dumb before him, and Friedel repeated the question ere he answered: "All the lanzknechts and reiters are at the castle, and the Herr Graf has taken all my father"s young sheep for them, a plague upon him. And our folk are warned to be at the muster rock to-morrow morn, each with a bundle of straw and a pine brand; and Black Berend heard the body squire say the Herr Graf had sworn not to go to the wars till every stick at the ford be burnt, every stone drowned, every workman hung."
Ebbo, in a transport of indignation and grat.i.tude, thrust his hand into his pouch, and threw the boy a handful of groschen, while Friedel gave warm thanks, in the utmost haste, ere both brothers sprang with headlong speed down the wild path, to take advantage of the timely intelligence.
The little council of war was speedily a.s.sembled, consisting of the barons, their mother, Master Moritz Schleiermacher, Heinz, and Hatto. To bring up to the castle the workmen, their families, and the more valuable implements, was at once decided; and Christina asked whether there would be anything left worth defending, and whether the Schlangenwalden might not expend their fury on the scaffold, which could be newly supplied from the forest, the huts, which could be quickly restored, and the stones, which could hardly be damaged. The enemy must proceed to the camp in a day or two, and the building would be less a.s.sailable by their return; and, besides, it was scarcely lawful to enter on a private war when the imperial banner was in the field.
"Craving your pardon, gracious lady," said the architect, "that blame rests with him who provokes the war. See, lord baron, there is time to send to Ulm, where the two guilds, our allies, will at once equip their trained bands and despatch them. We meanwhile will hold the knaves in check, and, by the time our burghers come up, the snake brood will have had such a lesson as they will not soon forget. Said I well, Herr Freiherr?"
"Right bravely," said Ebbo. "It consorts not with our honour or rights, with my pledges to Ulm, or the fame of my house, to shut ourselves up and see the rogues work their will scatheless. My own score of men, besides the stouter masons, carpenters, and serfs, will be fully enough to make the old serpent of the wood rue the day, even without the aid of the burghers. Not a word against it, dearest mother. None is so wise as thou in matters of peace, but honour is here concerned."
"My question is," persevered the mother, "whether honour be not better served by obeying the summons of the king against the infidel, with the men thou hast called together at his behest? Let the count do his worst; he gives thee legal ground of complaint to lay before the king and the League, and all may there be more firmly established."
"That were admirable counsel, lady," said Schleiermacher, "well suited to the honour-worthy guildmaster Sorel, and to our justice- loving city; but, in matters of baronial rights and aggressions, king and League are wont to help those that help themselves, and those that are over nice as to law and justice come by the worst."
"Not the worst in the long run," said Friedel.
"Thine unearthly code will not serve us here, Friedel mine," returned his brother. "Did I not defend the work I have begun, I should be branded as a weak fool. Nor will I see the foes of my house insult me without striking a fair stroke. Hap what hap, the Debateable Ford shall be debated! Call in the serfs, Hatto, and arm them. Mother, order a good supper for them. Master Moritz, let us summon thy masons and carpenters, and see who is a good man with his hands among them."
Christina saw that remonstrance was vain. The days of peril and violence were coming back again; and all she could take comfort in was, that, if not wholly right, her son was far from wholly wrong, and that with a free heart she could pray for a blessing on him and on his arms.
CHAPTER XIX: THE FIGHT AT THE FORD
By the early September sunrise the thicket beneath the pa.s.s was sheltering the twenty well-appointed reiters of Adlerstein, each standing, holding his horse by the bridle, ready to mount at the instant. In their rear were the serfs and artisans, some with axes, scythes, or ploughshares, a few with cross-bows, and Jobst and his sons with the long blackened poles used for stirring their charcoal fires. In advance were Master Moritz and the two barons, the former in a stout plain steel helmet, cuira.s.s, and gauntlets, a sword, and those new-fashioned weapons, pistols; the latter in full knightly armour, exactly alike, from the gilt-spurred heel to the eagle- crested helm, and often moving restlessly forward to watch for the enemy, though taking care not to be betrayed by the glitter of their mail. So long did they wait that there was even a doubt whether it might not have been a false alarm; the boy was vituperated, and it was proposed to despatch a spy to see whether anything were doing at Schlangenwald.
At length a rustling and rushing were heard; then a clank of armour. Ebbo vaulted into the saddle, and gave the word to mount; Schleiermacher, who always fought on foot, stepped up to him. "Keep back your men, Herr Freiherr. Let his design be manifest. We must not be said to have fallen on him on his way to the muster."
"It would be but as he served my father!" muttered Ebbo, forced, however, to restrain himself, though with boiling blood, as the tramp of horses shook the ground, and bright armour became visible on the further side of the stream.
For the first time, the brothers beheld the foe of their line. He was seated on a clumsy black horse, and sheathed in full armour, and was apparently a large heavy man, whose powerful proportions were becoming unwieldy as he advanced in life. The dragon on his crest and shield would have made him known to the twins, even without the deadly curse that pa.s.sed the Schneiderlein"s lips at the sight. As the armed troop, out-numbering the Adlersteiners by about a dozen, and followed by a rabble with straw and pine brands, came forth on the meadow, the count halted and appeared to be giving orders.
"The ruffian! He is calling them on! Now-" began Ebbo.
"Nay, there is no sign yet that he is not peacefully on his journey to the camp," responded Moritz; and, chafing with impatient fury, the knight waited while Schlangenwald rode towards the old channel of the Braunwa.s.ser, and there, drawing his rein, and sitting like a statue in his stirrups, he could hear him shout: "The lazy dogs are not astir yet. We will give them a reveille. Forward with your brands!"