Saying this the monk moved towards the wooden staircase that led to the upper rooms, and said to Eidiol"s wife: "Martha, let us go upstairs with your daughter, I want to speak to you both on holy matters."
"Fultrade," said the old skipper, who, no less than his son, seemed to dislike the sight of the monk in his house, "I had justice on my side in this dispute with the count; nevertheless, I thank you for your good intentions. But, my good wife, before turning your thoughts to holy matters, you will be kind enough to let my son and myself have a pot of beer and a piece of bread and bacon for immediate consumption. Then I wish you to prepare some provisions for us, because within an hour we have to sail down to the lower Seine, where we shall remain until to-morrow evening."
While he was making the announcement of his speedy departure, Eidiol observed, without however taking any particular notice of the circ.u.mstance, that the monk, otherwise impa.s.sible, seemed slightly to thrill with joy. The old man"s attention was immediately drawn away from Fultrade by his daughter"s caresses.
"What, father!" exclaimed Anne the Sweet, with a sad look and throwing her arms around her father"s neck, "Are you to leave us so soon, and with my brother, too? Do you really expect to remain a whole day out of the house?"
"We have a cargo to take to the little port of St. Audoin," answered Eidiol. "Do not feel alarmed, my dear child, we shall surely be back to-morrow." And again addressing his wife, "Come, Martha, let us have something to eat, fetch us a pot of beer and get the provisions ready.
We have not much time left."
"Could you not wait a little while, my friend--good Father Fultrade wishes to speak to me and Anne upon some sacred matters?"
"Well, then, let my daughter stay with me," answered the old skipper with some impatience. "She will be able to attend to us."
The monk made a sign to Martha to accept her husband"s proposition, and she followed the holy man into the upper chamber where the two remained alone.
"Martha," the monk hastened to say the instant the two were seated, "I have but a few minutes to spend here. The fervent piety of yourself and your daughter deserves a reward. The treasures of the Abbey of St. Denis have just received from our holy father in Rome a relic of inestimable value--a lock from the hair of our Lord Jesus Christ, cut by a lad at the wedding feast of Cana."
"Good G.o.d! What a divine treasure!"
"Doubly divine! The faithful, lucky enough to be able to touch this matchless relic, will not be only temporarily relieved of their ailments, they will be forever healed of all sorts of fevers."
"Healed forever!" exclaimed Martha, clasping her hands in ecstatic wonderment. "Healed forever of all sorts of dangerous fevers!"
"Besides, thanks to the doubly miraculous virtue of the relic, even those who have always enjoyed health, are preserved from all future sicknesses."
"Oh, good father! What an immense concourse of people will not immediately crowd to your abbey, in order to profit by such miraculous blessings."
"It is for that reason that, in reward to your piety, I wish that you and your daughter be the first to approach the treasure. The seigneurs and the grandees will come only after you. I have reserved the first admission for you two."
"For the like of us, poor women!"
""The last shall be the first, and the first shall be the last"--so hath our Redeemer said. A magnificent case is being prepared for the relic.
It is not to be offered to the adoration of the faithful until the goldsmith"s work is ready. But I mean to introduce you two secretly, you and your daughter, this very evening, into the oratory of the Abbot of St. Denis, where the relic has been temporarily deposited."
"Oh! How bounden I shall be to you! I shall be forever healed of my fevers, and my daughter will never be ill! And do you think that this miraculous relic, this lock of hair, may be powerful enough to enable me to find again my little daughter, my little girl, who, when still a child, disappeared from this place, about thirty years ago?"
"Nothing is impossible to faith. But in order to enjoy the blessings of the relic, you will have to make haste. I accompanied our abbot to St.
Germain-d"Auxerre. He will remain there only until to-morrow. It will, accordingly, be imperative for you and your daughter to come with me to St. Denis this very evening. Towards nightfall I shall wait for you near the tower of the Little Bridge. You will both ride at the crupper of my horse; we shall depart for the abbey; I shall introduce you two into the oratory of the abbot, where you will make your devotions, and then, after you have spent the night in the house of one of our female serfs you can both return to Paris in the morning."
"Oh, holy father in Christ! How impenetrable are the designs of Providence! My husband, who has not the faith in relics that we have, would surely have opposed our pious pilgrimage. But this very night he will be absent!"
"Martha, neither your husband nor your son are on the road to their salvation. You must redouble your own piety to the end that you may be more surely able to intercede for them with the Lord. I forbid you to mention our pilgrimage either to Eidiol or your son."
"I shall obey you, good father. Is it not to the end of living longer at their side that I wish to go and adore that incomparable relic?"
"It is then agreed. Towards nightfall, you and your daughter will wait for me on the other side of the Little Bridge. Understood?"
"Myself and Anne will wait for you, holy father, well m.u.f.fled in our capes."
Fultrade left the room, descended the staircase with meek gravity, and before leaving the house said to the old skipper, while affecting not to look at Anne the Sweet:
"May the Lord prosper your voyage, Eidiol."
"Thanks for the good wish, Fultrade," answered Eidiol, "but my voyage could not choose but be favorable. We are to descend the Seine; the current carries us; my vessel has been freshly sc.r.a.ped; my ash-tree oars are new, my sailors are young and vigorous, and I am an old pilot myself."
"All that is nothing without the will of the Lord," answered the monk with a look of severity, while following with l.u.s.tful side glances the movements of Anne, who was ascending the stairs to fetch from the upper chambers the great coats which her father and brother wished to take along for use during the night on the water. "No!" continued Fultrade, "without the will of the Lord, no voyage can be favorable; G.o.d wills all things."
"By the wine of Argenteuil, which you sold to us at such dear prices in the church of Notre Dame, when we used to go there and play dice, Father Fultrade, how like a sage you are now talking!" cried Rustic the Gay, whose name well fitted his looks. The worthy lad, having learned at the Port of St. Landry about the arrest of the dean of the Skippers" or Mariners" Guild of Paris, had hastened to the spot, greatly alarmed about Martha and her daughter, to whom he came to offer his services.
"Oh, Father Fultrade!" the young and merry fellow went on to say, "what good broiled steaks, what delicate sausages did you not use to sell us in the rear of the little chapel of St. Gratien where you kept your tap-room! How often have I not seen monks, vagabonds and soldiers wa.s.sailing there with the gay la.s.sies of Four-Ba.n.a.l street! What giddy whirls did they not use to dance in front of your hermitage!"
"Thanks be to G.o.d, Father Fultrade needs no longer to sell wine and broiled steaks!" put in Martha with marked impatience at the jests of Rustic the Gay, and annoyed at seeing the young skipper endeavor to humiliate the holy man with the recollection of the former traffic in wine and victuals in which he had indulged as was the habit with the priests of lower rank. "Father Fultrade is now the leader of the choir of St. Denis and one of the high dignitaries of the Church. Hold your tongue, brainless boy!"
"Martha, let the fool talk!" replied the monk disdainfully, walking to the door. "The true Christian preaches humility. I am not ashamed of having kept a tap-room. The end justifies the means. All that is done in the temple of the Lord is sanctified."
"What, Father Fultrade!" exclaimed Rustic the Gay, "Is everything sanctified?--even debauchery?"
The monk left the house shrugging his shoulders and without uttering a word. But Martha, angered at the lad"s language, addressed him with bitterness in her tone:
"Rustic, if all you come here for is to humiliate our good Father Fultrade, you may dispense with putting your feet over our threshold.
Shame upon speakers of evil!"
"Come, come, dear wife," said Eidiol, "calm yourself. After all, the lad has only said the truth. Is it not a fact that the lower clergy traffic in wine and food, even in pretty girls?"
"Thanks be to the Lord!" answered Martha. "At least what is drunk and what is eaten on the premises of holy places is sanctified, as the venerable Father Fultrade has just said. Is it not better to go and drink there than in the taverns where Satan spreads his nets?"
"Adieu, good wife! I do not care to discuss such subjects. Nevertheless it does seem strange to me, despite the general custom, to see the house of the Lord turned into a tavern."
"Oh, my G.o.d! My poor husband!" exclaimed Martha, sighing and painfully affected by the obduracy of her husband. "Is the custom not general? In all the chapels there is feasting done."
"It is the custom; I admit it; I said so before, dear wife. Let us not quarrel over it. But where is Anne? She has not returned from above;"
and stepping towards the staircase, the old man twice called out his daughter"s name.
"Here I am, father," answered the blonde girl with her sweet voice, and she descended with her father"s and brother"s great coats on her arm.
The preparations for departure were soon ended by Eidiol, his son, and Rustic the Gay, all the quicker and more cheerful for the hand that Anne took in them. A large hamper was filled with provisions and the men took leave of the women folks.
"Adieu, dear wife; adieu, dear daughter, till to-morrow. Forget not to lock the street door well to-night. Penitent marauders are dangerous fellows. There is no worse breed of thieves."
"The Lord will watch over us," answered Martha, dropping her eyes before her husband.
"Adieu, good mother," said Guyrion, in turn. "I regret to have caused you the fright of this forenoon. My father was right. I was too quick with my hook against the lances of the Franks."
"Thanks to G.o.d, my son," replied Martha with unction, "our good Father Fultrade happened along, like an angel sent by G.o.d to save you. Blessed be he for his intervention!"
"If the angels look like him, what a devil of a face must not the demons have!" murmured Rustic the Gay, taking charge of the hamper, while Guyrion threw two spare oars and his redoubtable hook over his shoulder.
At the moment when, following last upon the steps of Eidiol and his son, Rustic the Gay was leaving the house, Anne the Sweet approached the young man and said to him in a low voice: