Part 7 (2/2)
The fugitives who crowded the court-yard of the abbey dropped upon their knees at the pa.s.sage of the nuns. The latter, led by one of the monks, marched to the parvis of the basilica, followed by the crowd who sang in chorus the prayer that for fully a century had been repeated in all the abbeys and all the castles of Gaul:
”Lord, have mercy upon us! Lord, deliver us from the Northmans! Lord, exterminate the accursed pagans!”
The funeral cortege arrived at the entrance of the basilica and was received by one of the deacons. The prelate had hastily donned his sacerdotal robes. Priests bearing the cross aloft and carrying candles stood behind the officiating prelate. They looked down-cast and pale, and trembled. They repeated the funeral psalms with precipitation and absent-mindedly. The evidence before them of the pirates' being nigh, made them shudder. The first prayers being finished, the body, still carried by the nuns upon the improvised stretcher of branches, was taken to the choir and deposited upon the flagstones, not far from the chanters' desk.
An indescribable disorder reigned in the interior of the vast church.
Monks, a.s.sisted by serfs, were in hot haste finis.h.i.+ng the removal of the precious ornaments of the splendid basilica. Ranged in the transepts, or aisles, that extended to either side of the nave, were a number of crypts, subterranean grooves, above which rose numerous mausoleums erected to the memory of kings and queens of the stock of Clovis and of Charles Martel. The frightened faces of the monks of St. Denis, the lamentations that they uttered while at work removing the sacred ornaments from the altars, the funeral chants that were sung in m.u.f.fled voices for the repose of the soul of the mother-superior, whose body had just been carried into the church by the nuns, the moans of the n.o.ble Franks and their families, who had taken refuge in the holy place--all these lugubrious notes added fuel to the general feeling of dread.
Attracted, probably, more by curiosity than piety, the larger number of the soldiers, who were sent by the Count of Paris for the defense of the abbey, had followed the funeral procession into the church. These men of war, savage, coa.r.s.e and as impious as either the Northmans or the Arabs, brusquely pushed their way forward as far as the choir where the body of the mother-abbess lay surrounded by her nuns. Little affected by the religious character of the ceremony or by the solemnity of the sacred place, these soldiers fastened their licentious glances upon the daughters of the Lord, whose faces they sought to discover across the transparency of their lowered veils. On his knees beside one of these, who, likewise on her knees and her forehead bowed down, seemed steeped in prayer, Sigefred, a captain of the soldiers, made bold to touch the elbow of the holy maid. The latter was for an instant startled, but controlled herself, and remained silent. Encouraged by his success, Sigefred quietly raised the veil which fell from the head of the nun down to her waist, and carried his audacity to the point of sliding a profane hand up to the collar of the maid's robe. No sooner had he committed the indignity than he quickly withdrew his hand as if it had touched a piece of burning coal.
”By the navel of the Pope!” growled Sigefred in an undertone, ”This nun has a skin of iron!”
The venturesome ruffian had no time for another word. He dropped dead, stabbed with a dagger by the nun of the skin of iron. For an instant the other soldiers remained dumb with stupefaction, seeking to explain how the long and large sleeves of the saintly maid could conceal an arm and hand whose epidermis seemed of metal.
”A miracle!” cried some of the witnesses of Sigefred's attempt. ”A miracle! The Lord protects the chast.i.ty of his virgins by covering them with a tissue of steel mail!”
”Treason!” cried the less credulous warriors, drawing their swords.
”These nuns are soldiers dressed like women! Treason! To arms! To arms!
Revenge Sigefred! To the devil with miracles and maids!”
”_Skoldmoe!_” suddenly shouted with resonant voice the mother-abbess whose funeral was being celebrated, and rising to her full length, freeing herself from her long veil and dropping her black robe to her feet, s.h.i.+gne the Buckler Maiden stood there in her battle armor, with her bold face framed in a hair-net of iron mail that replaced her usual casque. ”_Skoldmoe!_” she shouted again, repeating her war-cry. ”Up, my virgins! Mercy for the women! Exterminate the men! Kill them all, to the last one!” and brandis.h.i.+ng a double-edged axe, she bounded forward like a panther and struck down one of the Frankish warriors who rushed upon her.
”_Skoldmoe!_” cried back the other Buckler Maidens, likewise disengaging themselves of their veils and their monastic robes, and like s.h.i.+gne, they forthwith charged upon the soldiers with their axes and swords.
The faithful, only a minute before absorbed in prayer, fled in dismay towards the doors of the basilica; the monks hid themselves behind the mausoleums over the royal crypts or embraced the altars--their last refuge. The vault of the church resounded with cries of terror, with hysterical moans, and with invocations to the Supreme Being, while above the confused noise rose the din of the Northman virgins' battle-cry, the thud of their heavy blows, the shrieks of the soldiers whom they smote.
Sister Agnes, who had introduced the pirate women into the abbey, was a poor victim of sacerdotal authority. She had been compelled to enter the convent of St. Placida. The previous night the Northman warrior maids forced open the doors of the monastery. She saw her opportunity to regain her freedom, and aided the Buckler Maidens in carrying out the strategem which s.h.i.+gne devised in order to capture the abbey of St.
Denis.
More numerous than the pirate women, the soldiers in the abbey strove to break a pa.s.sage through the frightened ma.s.s at the door and join their comrades in the interior of the church in order to overpower their a.s.sailants. But the prodigy of a combat with woman warriors, some of whom were of surpa.s.sing beauty, struck the younger of the men with amazement. Their arms were involuntarily stayed in the act of striking the beautiful maids. These, on the contrary, fired by the example of s.h.i.+gne, who was making havoc among the soldiers with her battle-axe, fought with matchless heroism. The older soldiers, being less susceptible to the emotions of some of their younger companions at the thought of a struggle to the death with young women, fell upon these with fury. Several of s.h.i.+gne's virgins were killed, others were wounded.
But the latter did not seem to feel their wounds, and only fought with increased ardor.
The melee was still at its height when Fultrade arrived back at the abbey from the mission that the Count of Paris had charged him with. The noise of the battle in the church drew him thither. When he entered he saw s.h.i.+gne with her back against the mausoleum of Clovis battling with intrepidity against two Frankish soldiers. The heroine whirled her weapon with such agility and dexterity that every time her battle-axe struck the swords of her two adversaries the sparks were made to fly by the shock of the iron against the steel. During this struggle the sword of one of the soldiers was broken. At the moment when s.h.i.+gne was about to let her axe descend upon his head and kill her disarmed adversary, Fultrade, who had glided silently behind the mausoleum, seized her by the legs. Thus taken by surprise, s.h.i.+gne fell to the ground and dropped her axe. The two Frankish soldiers threw themselves upon her and made desperate efforts to keep her under their knees.
”_Skoldmoe!_--To me, my sisters!”
But the voice of the Buckler Maiden was drowned in the general clash of arms and in the furious roars of the soldiers, mingled with the war-cry of the other virgins who still continued the fray under the fretted vaults of the basilica. In vain the heroine called to her companions.
Fultrade, who had knelt down beside her in order to a.s.sist the two soldiers in keeping her on the floor, placed both his hands upon her mouth, and yielding to his licentious instinct, whispered to the two men at arms:
”Comrades, this witch is young and beautiful; let us drag her into the crypt of this mausoleum; she shall be ours!”
The two Franks broke into a savage laugh of approval, and aided by Fultrade dragged the Buckler Maiden, despite the superhuman resistance that she offered, into a cavity that was dug under the mausoleum--an underground nook perpetually lighted by a sepulchre lamp.
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