Under the Flag of France

BERTRAND DEFENDS THE JESTER

PREFACE

I must plead guilty to having, for the purposes of the story, placed my hero’s castle (which unhappily no longer exists) much nearer to Rennes than it actually was; but the chief events of his life are given here very much as I found them in the old French chronicles.

CHAPTER I The Broken Bough

“What place is there for me on the earth? I would I were dead!”

Startling words, in truth, to hear from any one’s lips; and doubly so from those of a boy of fourteen, with his whole life before him.

It was a clear, bright evening in the spring of 1334, and the setting sun was pouring a flood of golden glory over the wooded ridges, and dark moors, and wide green meadows, and quaint little villages of Bretagne, or Brittany, then a semi-independent principality ruled by its own duke, and little foreseeing that, barely two centuries later, it was to be united to France once for all.

Over earth and sky brooded a deep, dreamy stillness of perfect repose, broken only by the lowing of cattle from the distant pastures, and the soft, sweet chime of the vesper-bell from the unseen church tower, hidden by the still uncleared wood, through one solitary gap in which were seen the massive grey battlements of Motte-Brun Castle, the residence of the local “seigneur,” or lord of the manor. A rabbit sat upright in its burrow to clean its furry face. A squirrel, halfway up the pillar-like stem of a tall tree, paused a moment to look down with its small, bright, restless eye; and a tiny bird, perched on a bough above, broke forth in a blithe carol.

But the soothing influence of this universal peace brought no calm to the excited lad who was striding up and down a small open space in the heart of the wood, stamping fiercely ever and anon, and muttering, half aloud, words that seemed less like any connected utterance than like the almost unconscious bursting forth of thoughts too torturing to be controlled.

“Is it my blame that I was born thus ill-favoured? Yet mine own father and mother gloom upon me and shrink away from me as from one under ban of holy Church, or taken red-handed in mortal sin. What have I done that mine own kith and kin should deal with me as with a leper?”

In calling himself ill-favoured, the poor boy had only spoken the truth; for the features lighted up by the sinking sun, as he turned his face toward it, were hideous enough for one of the demons with which these woods were still peopled by native superstition.

His head was unnaturally large, and covered with coarse, black, bristly hair, which, worn long according to the custom of all men of good birth in that age, tossed loosely over his huge round shoulders like a bison’s mane. His light-green eyes, small and fierce as those of a snake, looked out from beneath a low, slanting forehead garnished with bushy black eyebrows, which were bent just then in a frown as dark as a thunder-cloud. His nose was so flat that it almost seemed to turn inward, and its wide nostrils gaped like the yawning gargoyles of a cathedral. His large, coarse mouth, the heavy jaw of which was worthy of a bulldog, was filled with strong, sharp teeth, which, as he gnashed them in a burst of rage, sent a sudden flash of white across his swarthy face like lightning in a moonless sky.

His figure was quite as strange as his face. Low of stature and clumsily built, his vast and almost unnatural breadth of shoulder and depth of chest gave him the squat, dwarfish form assigned by popular belief to the deformed “Dwergar” (earth-dwarfs) who then figured prominently in the legends of all Western Europe. His length of arm was so great that his hands reached below his knees, while his lower limbs seemed as much too short as his arms were too long. In a word, had a half-grown black bear been set on its hind legs, and arrayed in the rich dress of a fourteenth-century noble, it would have looked just like this strange boy.

All at once the excited lad stopped short in his restless pacing, and, as if feeling the need of venting in some violent bodily exertion the frenzy that boiled within him, snatched from its sheath his only weapon (a broad-bladed hunting-knife, half cutlass and half dirk), and with one slash cut half through the thickest part of a large bough just over his head.

His arm was raised to repeat the blow and sever the branch entirely, when a new thought struck him, and, flinging down his weapon, he seized the bough with both hands, and threw his whole strength into a tug that seemed capable of dislodging not merely the branch, but the tree itself.

The tough wood quivered, cracked, and gave way, and a second effort—which hung the boy-athlete’s low, broad forehead with beads of moisture, and made the veins of his strong hands stand out like cords—wrenched the bough away altogether.

For a moment the young champion’s harsh but striking features brightened into a smile of joyful pride, natural enough to one who felt that he possessed surpassing bodily strength in an age when bodily strength and prowess were the most valued of all qualities. But the smile faded instantly, and the sullen gloom settled down on his dark face again, more heavily than before.

“Methinks yon gay cousins of mine,” muttered he, with a grim laugh, “would be hard put to it to do the like, though they call me dwarf and lubbard, and look askance at me as if I were a viper or a toad. I feel, in truth, that though I am not one to wear the dainty trappings of a court-gallant and bask in ladies’ smiles, I have it in me to approve myself a tried man-at-arms on a stricken field, and make my name dreaded by the foes of my country and liege-lord. But what avails it, if I may never find a chance to show what I can do?”

At that very moment, as if in direct answer to the bitter query that the fiery youth had unconsciously spoken aloud, a clear, sweet voice rose from amid the clustering leaves, singing as follows:—

CHAPTER II Facing a Monster

As the song proceeded, the moody lad bent forward to listen with a visibly brightening face, though in an attitude of reverent awe; for his first thought was one that would have occurred to any man of that age in his place—that the voice he heard was that of his patron saint, or of an angel sent down from heaven to comfort him in his distress.

But ere he could utter the devout thanksgiving that rose to his lips, he was checked by the sudden appearance of the singer himself.

From the thickets issued a boy about his own age, with a huge faggot of dead wood on his back. He was barefooted and barelegged, and what little clothing he had was sorely tattered and soiled; but the wholesome brown of his tanned face, and the springy lightness of his step under that heavy burden, told that his rough life agreed with him. It was plain, however, from the wandering look of his eyes, and the bird-like restlessness of all his movements, that he was one of the poor half-witted creatures so numerous then in every part of France, and pretty common even now in some remote parts of it.

At sight of the young noble (whose grim features had certainly nothing reassuring in them at the first glance) the simpleton came to a sudden halt, and looked not a little scared. Nor was this surprising; for so many and so tyrannical were the privileges claimed by the landed gentry in an age when all France was divided into beasts of prey called nobles and beasts of burden called peasants, that (though among the sturdy Bretons there was happily less of the frightful oppression that disgraced France proper) this poor lad could not tell that he might not have committed, by picking up these dry sticks in a wood that virtually belonged to no one, some offence rendering him liable to punishment; and punishment was no trifle in the fourteenth century, whether inflicted by the law or against it.

But ere a word could be spoken on either side, there came a sudden and startling interruption.

Fully occupied with his supposed enemy in front, the wood-boy knew nothing of the far worse peril that menaced him from the rear. He never heard, poor lad, the warning rustle in the thicket behind him, nor saw the hungry gleam of the cruel greenish-yellow eye that glared at him through the tangled boughs; but all at once came a crackle and crash of broken twigs—a fierce yell, a stifled cry, a heavy fall—and the forest-lad lay face downward on the earth, struggling beneath the weight of a huge grey wolf, ravenous from its winter fast!

BERTRAND GRAPPLES WITH THE WOLF

Luckily for the poor boy, the furious beast was hampered for a moment by the projecting sticks of the huge fagot, on which its first rush had fallen. But an instant more would have seen the helpless lad fearfully mangled, if not killed outright, when, just as all seemed over, rescue came.

The moment the young noble caught sight of the springing monster, he looked round for the hunting-knife that he had flung down in the grass and ferns; but not finding it, he whirled up the broken bough like a flail, and dealt a crushing blow at the wolf’s head with all his might and main.

Had that blow fallen as it was meant, the brute would never have moved again; but a quick jerk of the long, gaunt body foiled the stroke, which, missing its head, hit the fore paw and snapped the bone like a reed. With a sharp howl of pain, the savage beast let go its prey and flew at its enemy.

But that sullen, hard-featured lad was one whom no peril, no matter how sudden and terrific, ever found unprepared. Dropping his now useless club, he sprang upon the wolf in turn and fastened both hands on its lean, sinewy throat with a grip like a smith’s vice.

And then began a terrible battle. Over and over rolled boy and beast, amid snapping twigs and flying dust, the boy throwing his whole force into the strangling clutch that he still maintained, while the wolf’s cruel fangs gnashed and snapped close to his throat, and its hot, foul breath came steaming in his face, and the blood-flecked foam from its gaping jaws hung upon his hair or fell in clammy flakes on his cheek.

Such a struggle, however, was too furious to last. Little by little the fire died out of the fierce yellow eyes—the wolfish yells sank into a low, gasping whine—the monster’s frantic struggles grew fainter and fainter; the victory was all but won.

But the boy-champion, too, was almost spent with the terrific strain of this death-grapple, and his numbed fingers were already beginning to relax the iron grasp which they had so sternly made good till now. One moment more would have let loose the all-but-conquered enemy, and sealed the brave lad’s doom; but just then came a flash of steel before his swimming eyes—a dull thud, like a tap on a padded door—a hoarse, gurgling gasp—and the wolf lay limp and dead on the trampled earth.

The half-witted boy, recovering from the first stun of his fall, had seen his rescuer’s peril, and his keen eye had caught the glitter of the lost knife in the fern. To pounce on it, to snatch it up, to deal one sure thrust into the wolf’s exposed side, was the work of a moment; but, quick as he was, he came only just in time.

“I thank thee, friend,” said the young noble, with a quiet dignity far beyond his years, as he slowly rose to his feet. “St. Yves be my speed, but yon blow of thine was as good a one as ever was stricken; and had it been one whit less swift or less sure, methinks it had gone hard with me. But how fares it with thee? Thou canst scarce have come off scatheless from the clutch of yon felon beast.”

“I am unharmed, messire; praise be to God and the holy saints,” said the other, respectfully. “I trow it is I who ought rather to thank your valiancy, since, but for your aid, my strength had availed nought against such a beast as this.”

“A grim quarry, in good sooth,” cried the boy-conqueror, scanning with admiring looks the slain wolf’s sinewy limbs and mighty jaws; “but, be that as it may, neither man nor beast shall harm a defenceless boy while I can lift hand to stay it!”

“It is well spoken, fair son,” said a grave, mild voice from behind; “and ever mayst thou buckler the weak against the strong, and beat down the ravening wolves that slaughter the flock of God!”

Both boys looked up with a start, and saw with surprise and secret awe that, although they had neither seen nor heard any one approach, they were no longer alone.

Beside them stood a tall, slim figure, clad in the grey frock and cowl of a monk, and protected from the flints and thorns of the rugged path only by a pair of torn and dusty sandals.

The stranger’s arms and limbs, so far as his robe left them visible, seemed wasted almost to a skeleton; and on the hollow face that looked forth from the shadowy cowl might be plainly read the traces of long hardship and bitter suffering, and of mental conflicts more exhausting than either. But on that worn face now rested the sweet and holy calmness of the peace that passeth all understanding. A kindly smile played on his thin, delicate lips, and his large, bright eyes were filled with the loving, pitying tenderness of a guardian angel, though through it pierced ever and anon a flash of keen and terrible discernment.

A child would have nestled trustfully to the owner of that face, even without knowing who he was; a ruffian or a traitor would have slunk away abashed at the first glimpse of it.

The stranger’s soundless approach, his saintly aspect, and his sudden appearance at the very moment when the death-struggle ended in victory, bred in both lads a conviction which the beliefs of that age made quite natural, and which the boy-noble was not slow to utter aloud.

“Holy father,” said he, with a low and almost timid bow, “art thou my patron saint, St. Yves of Bretagne? If so, I pray thee to accept mine unworthy thanks for thy timely aid.”

“Give thy thanks to God, my son, not to the humblest of His servants,” replied the stranger, in a clear, musical voice, “though, could my aid have profited thee, assuredly it should not have been lacking. No saint nor angel am I, but a poor brother of the monastery of Notre Dame de Secours (Our Lady of Help) in the town of Dinan; and men call me Brother Michael.”

Hardly had he spoken, when the forest-boy threw himself at his feet, and kissed his hand, crying joyfully—

“You are he, then, whom they call ‘God’s Pilgrim!’ Give me your blessing, I pray, holy father, for men say that good follows your steps wherever you go.”

“God grant the like may be said of us all!” said the monk, earnestly, as his pale, worn face lighted up with so bright and happy a smile that it fairly transfigured him for the moment. Then, laying his thin hand gently on the boy’s bowed head, he blessed him fervently.

As the overjoyed simpleton shambled to his feet again, Brother Michael turned to the boy-noble, who was eyeing him with undisguised admiration; for he too had heard the fame of “God’s Pilgrim,” who went from place to place doing good, and fearing neither pestilence, war, famine, robbers, nor any other peril, if there was even a chance of helping and comforting his fellow-men.

“Son,” said he, kindly, “I have told thee my name; wilt thou tell me thine?”

“Bertrand du Guesclin,” replied the boy, in a tone of sullen dejection, which showed that he, at least, had no guess how soon the unknown name that he uttered so despondingly was to echo like a roll of thunder through the length and breadth of Europe, and to be the symbol of all that was chivalrous and noble alike with friend and foe.

The monk started slightly, and stood silent for a moment or two, with knitted brow and compressed lips, as if trying hard to recall some half-forgotten association connected with the name that he had just heard.

“Give me thy hand,” said he at last, in a strangely altered voice.

The future hero extended his broad, sinewy hand to the clasp of Michael’s long, slender fingers; and the monk’s deep, earnest eyes rested with a penetrating glance on those of young Du Guesclin, which, as they met his, remained fixed as if unable to turn away.

So the two stood gazing at each other without a word for some moments, while the young forester looked wonderingly on.

“Give glory to God, my son, for He hath destined thee to great honour,” said the monk at last, with a solemn earnestness, which showed how deeply he felt the importance of the strange message that he was delivering. “The grace of Heaven hath vouchsafed to mine unworthy self the gift of reading in each face that I see the destiny of him who bears it; and I read in thine that God hath chosen thee to be the champion of this distressed land, and to save it from all its foes!”

To any man of that age, the voice of a Churchman was as that of God; and Bertrand no more thought of doubting the monk’s words than if they had come down to him from heaven. His heart bounded at the thought that he, the ill-favoured, the mocked, the despised—he, on whom his own parents looked down as a shame to them—should be chosen by Heaven itself for so glorious a task; and it was no disbelief, but sheer astonishment, that fettered his tongue when he tried to answer.

“I the champion of France?” said he at last, with a look and tone of joyful amazement.

“Thou and no other,” said the monk, firmly. “Why look’st thou thus amazed? Is it not told in Holy Writ how the greatest king of God’s chosen people was at the first but an unknown shepherd-lad, and how he too was despised by his own kin?”

“Ha! how know’st thou that, holy father?” cried Du Guesclin, starting.

“By the revelation of God,” said Michael, solemnly. “Fare thee well, my son; be thou strong to do thine appointed work, and to curb thine own rebellious spirit; for he that humbleth himself shall be exalted. As for thee, my child,” added he to the half-witted lad, who had watched this strange scene with ever-growing wonder, “come with me; I have somewhat to say to thee.”

The wood-boy obeyed like a child; and the next moment boy and monk vanished amid the trees, while Bertrand remained standing like a statue on the spot where they had left him, deep in thought.

CHAPTER III A Mysterious Message

The sunset of that memorable evening, as it faded from the scene of the wolf-fight, sent its last rays streaming through the small, narrow, loophole-like window of a plainly furnished upper room in Motte-Brun Castle (which stood two miles away on the edge of the wood), lighting up the face and figure of a tall, stately, grey-bearded man of middle age—whose plumed cap and rich dress showed him to be a noble—as he paced restlessly to and fro.

He was still strong and active for his years, and so markedly handsome that no one could guess him to have the unenviable renown of being father to the ugliest lad in Brittany. Yet such was the case, for this man was the Seigneur Du Guesclin himself, the lord of Motte-Brun.

The temper of a feudal lord of that age was usually anything but sweet; and Messire Yvon du Guesclin thought nothing of flinging a knife at his son or wife in the middle of dinner, or knocking out the teeth of some unlucky vassal with his sword-hilt. But, on this particular evening, his bent brows, his short, fierce step, and the very strong language that came growling through his set teeth, told that he was in an even worse temper than usual, or (as an observant man-at-arms of his poetically said) “as ill at ease as a fat friar in Lent.”