Part 6 (2/2)
”Oh!” repeated Rothbert, pointing proudly at Eidiol, ”at the head of such men, we shall be invincible!”
”And yet,” replied the aged skipper, ”only this forenoon, you were ordering your knights to break their lances upon our backs!”
Rothbert bit his lips, puckered his brow, and answered with embarra.s.sment:
”You must excuse an accidental outburst of excitement.”
”Your present glorifications contrast singularly with the insolent words that you bestowed upon me this forenoon.”
”Fortunat,” rejoined the count, turning to the abbot and with difficulty suppressing his anger: ”This good fellow loves to banter. I think, however, he should choose his time better. We must run to arms, not joke, when these accursed Northmans threaten our peace.”
”Well! well! They are not so deserving of curses, after all,” remarked Eidiol, smiling with nonchalance. ”Thanks to these very Northmans, you are now treating me with civility and courting my friends.h.i.+p. The n.o.ble is flattering the villein!”
”Quit your raillery, old man!” commanded Rothbert, relapsing, despite himself, into his wonted haughty and violent temper.
”Seigneur count, I am speaking to the point because I am in a hurry to embrace my wife and daughter. It is now about twenty-seven years ago, in the year 885, when the Northmans, under the lead of Hastain, to-day master and Seigneur of the country of Chartres, invaded the country and laid siege to Paris for the fifth or sixth time.”
”On that occasion, at least, and it was the only time, the plebs of Paris, under the command of Eudes, my brother, offered a brave resistance, since when the pirates have no longer ravaged the city. It will be so again now. I swear it to G.o.d, will ye, nill ye, villeins, you shall be marched to the ramparts to give battle!”
”Until that year of which you speak, Paris had never offered any resistance to the pirates. The reason was simple. The people, the guilds and the artisans did not care to undertake the defence--”
”Yes, yes!” broke in Rothbert with concentrated rage ”That plebs allowed the churches, the abbeys and the castles to be pillaged and set on fire!”
”The Northmans only plunder the rich. They surely do not care to load their barks with our rags, our rough furniture and our sand-stone pots when they can load them to overflowing with vases of gold and silver and all manner of costly things with which the castles, the churches and the abbeys are gorged. They attack the seigneurs. Let the seigneurs defend themselves!”
”By the death of Christ! This old man has gone crazy!” cried Rothbert beyond himself with rage and yet not daring fully to give a loose to his pent-up anger. ”How could we defend ourselves without the aid of the people! Could I repel thirty thousand Northmans with the two thousand soldiers that I keep in my duchy of France?”
”Oh, I know it! You can do nothing without the people. Your brother, Count Eudes, knew it also. At the approach of the pirates he sought to propitiate the people, and convoked the deans of the guilds at his little castle of Paris. My father, the then dean of the skippers, said to your brother: 'You, kings, seigneurs and clergymen, need us to protect your goods from the pillage of the Northmans. Well, then, let us strike a bargain. Lighten our taxes, render our lives less hard, and we shall defend your riches.' 'Agreed!' answered Count Eudes, and certain franchises and other measures of relief for the plebs of the city were agreed on. On the morrow that good plebs rushed to the ramparts and fought with intrepidity. Many of them were killed, many more were wounded. My father and myself were among the latter. The Northmans were repelled. But the danger being over, the King, the seigneurs and the dignitaries of the Church forgot their promise.”
While Eidiol spoke the Count of Paris controlled his indignation with difficulty; finally he broke forth pale with rage: ”Do you mean that your plebs will refuse to defend the city?”
”I think so. We, the skippers, will take on board our vessels our own families and those of our friends who are willing to follow us. We shall sail out of the waters of Paris on one side while the Northmans enter by the other, and we shall calmly ascend the Seine towards the Marne, leaving you, seigneurs and abbots, to arrange matters with the Northmans the best way you may know how.”
”Listen to him! The infamous poltroon! Is your vile slave's heart moved neither with anger nor shame at the bare idea of the disgrace of seeing the foreigners, the Northmans, in Paris!”
At these insulting words a slight flush suffused Eidiol's face, a spark of lightning glistened in his eyes. But the self-possessed old man controlled himself and answered:
”Count, my grandfather read in the old parchments of our family that a small colony of men of my race, now more than three centuries ago, lived free and happy in a corner of Burgundy when the Arabs invaded and ravaged Gaul[3]--”
”And that colony of cravens,” broke in the count, ”trembling before the Arabs, like you now before the Northmans, of course left the pagans to ravage, pillage and burn down the country!”
”Count,” proceeded the old skipper proudly, ”the people of that colony were killed to the last man because they fought in defence of their rights, their families, their soil and their liberty. But, seeing that that handful of brave men were, with the single exception of the indomitable Bretons, the only free men in all Gaul, the Arabs were able to ravage the other provinces and to settle down in Languedoc. In this century the same thing will happen with the Northmans. The population--a horde of slaves on the field, a ma.s.s of wretched beings in the towns--is indifferent to the ills that smite you--you rich seigneurs and prelates.
And now, adieu. I am in a hurry to return to Paris and embrace my wife and daughter.”
While Eidiol was uttering these last sentences, the count issued some orders in a low voice to one of his officers, who thereupon hurriedly left the apartment. The old man moved towards the door, but Rothbert, motioning his men to bar the pa.s.sage, cried in a menacing tone:
”You shall not go to introduce disturbance and revolt in my city of Paris!” And addressing the abbot: ”Have you a prison in the place?”
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