Part 14

At length I reached the castle again, and hid the horse with its precious burden in one of the outlying stables. Then I retired to my chamber and thought over all that I had gone through. My first impulse was to confess all to Father Kussmaul, the chaplain, and seek to expiate by penance the frightful doom I had incurred. But could I sacrifice all hope of happiness in this life for fear of the shadowy penalties in the life to come? Oh, Hildegard! who that had once seen thee would not sooner have braved the deepest depths of hell than have foregone one gentle regard from thee? In pain and terror I watched during the next few days the preparations for the tournament; in pain because I now lived a haunted life, my nights were full of awful dreams, I seemed to be dragged down into deep abysses by the most frightful demons, and would awake in a cold sweat and trembling. In terror I passed my hours lest the promises of Satan should not be fulfilled; and I, inexperienced and weak, should be vanquished by the practised warriors who already filled the castle. Every day, two, three, or half a dozen would arrive, and dreadful were the riots and debauches among them of nights. Each one brought with him a squire and retainers, and every hour there would be measuring of muscle, and deep wagers on the prowess and skill of their several lords, while I looked on as one distraught. The noise and clamour of their tongues, the braying of the minstrels, the quarrels of the masters, the snarling of their hounds, all went through my brain like the whirling of great mill-wheels, and I had almost given up my love and started for Rome when the eventful day arrived. The jousts were to begin at noon, and it was scarcely an hour before that time when I escaped from my duties and stole away to where my horse and armour were concealed in the forest. There I armed myself cap-à-pié, and set forth; nor had I gone a few yards when I heard the clattering of hoofs behind me and the tootooing of a horn. I reined in my steed and looked round, when I saw one in the guise of a squire, so evil a face I had never before seen, who, as soon as he saw me stop, called out: ‘This is no time for delay, my Lord, the joust is begun!’ ‘And you,’ I cried, ‘who are you?’ ‘I am your squire,’ he answered, ‘and come whence your horse and armour came; onward, we are late!’ In despair, I put spurs to my horse, and we arrived just as the last pair were engaged. It was a warm day; the lists were almost hidden in a cloud of dust, which, however, did not rise to the high tribune where Hildegard sat, the Queen of the tournament, among her maidens. No questions were asked me, and I did not raise my vizor, though many gazed curiously at my deviceless shield of maiden whiteness, and whispered among each other: ‘A stranger knight!’ There was a rush of horses, a mighty shock, and one of the combatants lay senseless on the ground. Then my squire rang out an aggressive blast, the knight was carried off, and I and the triumphant conqueror stood face to face in the lists. I could not see his face, for his vizor was down, but I recognised by his shield the knight of Berghausen, a bull-necked stalwart chief who had been the favourite of the wagerers. The air was rent by shouts as he pranced proudly round, which he acknowledged by a slight inclination of his head; and when I advanced, I could see that he looked me over from top to toe, observed my weak arm and slim build, and made sure of an easy victory. Then we wheeled our horses round, and after doing our obeisance to the Queen of Beauty, took up our positions at the further end of the lists and awaited the signal of the herald. After three blasts from his attendant trumpets he cast down his wand, and scarcely had it touched the ground when we put spurs to our steeds and met in the centre of the lists. His spear only touched my armour when it shivered into a thousand fragments; while mine, blunted as it was, would have done him no further injury than to unhorse him had it not broken off at the end, and by some mischance pierced him through the eye, and to my astonishment and horror, stretched him lifeless upon the ground. The ladies shrieked, and there were angry murmurs among the Lord of Berghausen’s men; several of his knights made for their horses and lowered their vizors, but the Count of Schneckenstein signed to a body of his men-at-arms to form up between us, and, frowning fearfully, summoned me as the victor to accompany him before the Queen of Beauty. ‘I cannot accuse you of want of skill, Sir Knight,’ he said, ‘for none but a skilful knight could have withstood the Lord of Berghausen, who was doubtlessly born under an unlucky star; nevertheless, we did not look for such an end.’ At this moment we came up to the throne where Hildegard sat blushing among her attendants; and the Count bade me remove my vizor and kneel down to receive the wreath. ‘_Himmelkreuzdonnerwetter!_’ he ejaculated, starting back a pace or two; ‘why, it is our Wolfram!’ He gasped with rage, the big veins stood out from his forehead, and he cried out to the guards to seize me and instantly clap me in one of the most loathsome cells beneath the donjon keep. But Hildegard rose from her seat, and with a glowing face waved back the men-at-arms who were already advancing. ‘Father,’ she said, ‘is this the way you keep your plighted word? Did you not offer my hand to whomsoever should prove victorious; and because the victor proves to be one of your own household, is he, he who has brought honour to your roof, to be refused?’ I seized her hand and kissed it, while the Count seemed to be irresolute, and finally bade me ‘take off those things’ and return to my duties while he thought the matter over.

There was some trouble about the death of the Knight of Berghausen. His followers wished to have me delivered up to them for punishment, and swore that it was a foul stroke: but the Count would not listen to them. ‘I will bury your Lord with pleasure in the most honourable way,’ he said to them; ‘but Wolfram is of gentle birth and there is no dishonour in dying by his hand. ’Tis all fortune and chance: had the knight killed Wolfram, though he be of my own house, I should have borne him no malice. _Potztousand_, why all this fuss?’ And I verily believe that their grumbling did my case good; for the Count was thereby forced to take my side, and so came to think better of me. Nevertheless, he would not listen to my suit; and once when I ventured humbly to recall to him the labours I had undertaken for the promised guerdon, he only answered: ‘Away, and be thankful that so far you have escaped my resentment, nor let me cast eyes upon you if you love your skin.’

I therefore kept beyond his view; for, indeed, his nature was hot: but I ventured, whenever I got the chance, to throw myself in the way of Hildegard, and from exchanging a few words, we came, little by little, to meeting often as ’twere by chance; and thence to talk, to confidences, and so to mutual love. But I was constantly in fear lest her confessor should get wind of the affair and reveal our secret to the Count, and so either get me banished, or get her married to one of her many suitors, or, perchance both. I therefore in one of our conversations urged my fears, to which she replied that, indeed, they were well founded, and that she dare not dispute her father’s will. Then I urged her to fly with me beyond the power of her father, but this she feared to do: ‘Nay,’ says she, ‘that would be evil.’ Again I urged the certainty of our separation, that it was her father who had done evil in breaking his parole: for had he not pledged her hand to the victor in the tournament? Could she bring herself to be the wife of another? At this she wept and bemoaned her hard fate, compelling her either to disobey her father or to lose her lover; and shortly afterwards we were forced to part; but I had reason to hope that another attack would bring her to yield, and therefore went to consult my squire, him of the evil countenance, who since the tournament had joined the body of the Count’s men-at-arms, but who was really only my valet. I ordained him to have a couple of horses waiting at the postern gate so soon as it became dark, and, when the time arrived I took my mandoline and sang these verses beneath her bower:

Listen, fair maid, to a lover’s prayer! Wilt thou not hear me, my own sweetheart? Bid me, oh, bid me not despair! Then say me not nay, my true love, I pray, Oh, list to me, darling, my life, my soul, Oh, list to me, darling, my own sweetheart!

I only live now thy love to gain; Wilt thou not love me a little, sweetheart? Let me not think I love in vain; Then say me not nay, my true love, I pray, Oh, say thou dost love me, my life, my soul, Oh, say thou dost love me, my own sweetheart

Tell me, my love, thou wilt be mine: Wilt thou not say it, my own sweetheart? I’ve given my love, then give me thine; Oh, say me not nay, my true love, I pray, Wilt thou not say it, my life, my soul, Wilt thou not say it, my own sweetheart!

And if thou dost thy love deny (Thou’lt ne’er be so cruel, my own sweetheart!) Then I must lay me down and die! Oh, say me not nay, my true love, I pray, Thou’lt ne’er be so cruel, my life, my soul, Thou’lt ne’er be so cruel, my own sweetheart!

I had hardly finished, when her adorable figure appeared on the terrace. She flew into my arms, and weeping, said: ‘No, Wolfram, I am not cruel, I have given thee my love as thou hast given me thine.’ We exchanged some love passages, and then I told her of my preparations; how the horses were now in readiness, and I drew a picture of herself in the arms of some lord chosen for her by her father and myself pining in banishment; then, falling on my knees, I besought her to prove her love for me and to fly upon the instant. She wept an abundance of tears, but, nevertheless, at that moment she could deny me nothing, and, to my inexpressible joy, she yielded, though beside herself for fear. Yet so great was her confidence in me, and so great her horror of our separation, that she allowed me to lead her out, and we were soon mounted and on our way.

My squire had informed me that a castle was provided for us, and thither we urged our steeds: but I hope my bride saw not what I saw on the way, hideous shadowy forms, that seemed to wring their hands and wail, while others seemed to urge us on in fierce diabolic delight. We rode along, hand in hand, neither of us seeming to have any heart for talk, as lovers should have, for we were both of us too much absorbed with our own thoughts: Hildegard with the step she had taken in running away from her father and I with terrible fears of the danger into which I had led the confiding girl. At length our guide pointed out a black spot crowning a rocky height, which, as he informed me, was to be our home. To reach it, we had to descend into a deep and dark ravine, in the depths of which we could hear, though not see, a rushing torrent. We scrambled down to it with some difficulty and danger owing to the darkness, but would not have ventured to cross had not a blue flame suddenly shot up from the bank at the opposite side just where the ford was, and showed us where we might safely pass. So frighted was Hildegard that she clung as close to me as our horses would permit, nor would anything have persuaded her to go forward had not her fear of returning equalled her present fear. From the depths of the ravine we toiled up a rocky narrow path until we came to the outworks of the castle, whence continuing between embattled walls we arrived at a frowning and gloomy portal. I had never seen the place before, nor, indeed, knew that such a castle existed in the neighbourhood. It is true that I had heard that in the direction which we had taken there was a haunted wood in which no hunter would dare to allow the shades of night to overtake him, and many were the tales I had heard of the awful things that had been seen there; and belike for this reason my lord of Schneckenstein never cared to turn his footsteps that way,--certainly, I had followed our guide the more readily because I considered that we were in less danger of pursuit in this direction than had we taken another, but the horrors of our ride and the eerie aspect of the castle, I think, had begun to shake my nerves, and had I not had to comfort and reassure Hildegard I do not think that I should have had courage to go on. Though the night was dark, and our way had only been illumined by some fitful moonbeams that stole out between the scudding clouds, yet every stone of the old crumbling walls was visible to us clothed in a sort of phosphorescent light of their own, but the casements were mere black cavities, excepting a row of great windows in the distance belonging as I guessed to the banqueting hall, which were all lit up with a ruddy glow which waned and again waxed as if from the flames of a furnace. Yet all was deathly silent, though we were near enough to have heard sounds of revelry had there been any, as the lights indicated. When we halted at the edge of the moat, the vapours from the stagnant waters of which smote our nostrils like the poisonous steams of the plague, we could see no watchman or warder, nor indeed, was there any sign of life visible. Then my squire sounded a discordant blast on his horn that seemed to freeze the very marrow in our bones, upon which the drawbridge slowly descended with many creaks and groans, and we passed into the courtyard. Here, however, we still saw no one, but he of the evil countenance seemed to reck of none of these things, and merely motioned us to a crumbling archway which stood in the corner beyond a ruined fountain. We entered, and found ourselves on a dark but broad stone staircase, that led into a hall or banqueting chamber, spacious enough, but merely lit at the further end by a few ill-burning sconces sufficient to show that the table was spread. We were hungry after our ride and all the fears we had gone through and took our seats at the daïs at the head of the table; whereupon a trumpet sounded and in trooped men-at-arms and varlets, at least so they seemed to be, but they were all clad in some sort of grey stuff that gave them a sort of shadowy look, and all wore their hoods drawn over their heads so that their visages were hidden. One only saw here and there an eye which shone with a strange lambent flame such as I had never before seen in human countenance. They made their obeisance, and there they sat as silent as death, and had we not noted now and again a turn of the head or seen them raise their hands to their mouths, we should have thought indeed that we were in the company of the dead. Even as it was, Hildegard was in an agony of terror, and whispered, asking me whither I had brought her. Amidst such chill surroundings it was some comfort to see the meats smoking on the board, but when I had helped my Hildegard and myself, we found them icy cold, insomuch that some fear began to enter even into my heart, small as the matter was; but, taken with all that had gone before, I think I had some cause for fear. Poor Hildegard could not touch a morsel, but sat looking at me, afraid to show how fearful she was, and indeed, I had much ado to put on a cheerful countenance, for it was not a cheerful feast. The hall, as I have said, was only dimly lighted, and such vagrant moonbeams as managed to struggle through the heavily mullioned windows seemed but to make more spectral the grey and silent guests. The roof was in utter darkness, and here and there it seemed to be gone, disclosing through a tangle of rafters a few dim and distant stars. Outside, the wind moaned drearily, and ever and anon a gust shook the mouldy tapestry that still festooned the walls, causing them to wave to and fro so that the faded figures worked into them seemed to be endued with life, and looked all the more weird in the flickering of the torches. Now and again, too, an owl or a bat, attracted by the light, would brush past, almost touching the table, so that neither of us could do more than sit still and look, for we were deprived of all appetite for food. After the feast had proceeded for some space, one of the figures, who appeared by his habit to be the seneschal, rose up in his place, and in a hollow voice spoke words of welcome for the bride and bridegroom; then he bade his fellows fill their cups and drink to us--to our +ETERNAL DAMNATION+! They all arose in their places, and as they did so, their hoods fell from their heads and each one was revealed to us as a skeleton; as they waved their cups in their bony hands, blue flames shot up from them which they poured down their cavernous jaws; but we saw no more, for Hildegard had swooned in my arms, while I, in a frenzy of fear and horror, had seized her up, and rushed with her into the ruined chapel which opened into the hall behind our seat.

Here all was quiet. The pale moonbeams struggling with the rising dawn shone coldly through the broken windows upon the many sculptured monuments of priests, and lords and ladies who once had lived here, but now were mouldering into dust. With warm kisses upon her icy forehead I restored my darling back to life, and she had hardly come to, when, seeing where she was, she threw herself before the altar and clasping my hand in hers, commended our souls to God. Shouts, and howls, and blasphemies, together with the rattling of bones, resounded from the hall without, while, as if awakened by these cries, horror upon horror! the graves gave up their dead, and the chapel began to fill with filmy gibbering ghosts in numbers that continued to wax until the chapel became so full that they seemed to stand within each other, and crowded, pressing threateningly around us. With a mind full of anguish I looked at Hildegard, fearing that she would go mad with horror and fright, and would, if I had dared, have cursed my folly for my impatient dallying with the Evil One; but the brave girl seemed to gather more courage as the need for it became the greater, and, throwing her arms about my neck, prayed earnestly and without ceasing. Still the ghosts thronged nearer, with everincreasing threatenings, and forms of demons seemed to arise out of them that pressed into the front rank and made as though they would seize us. Nearer they came, and I felt redhot claws searing into my flesh, but Hildegard still remained untouched as though some heavenly power were guarding her. Me, however, they seized, and they were dragging me away, though she clung to me with tears and prayer, when a sudden inspiration came to her; she tore off the crucifix she had been wearing and threw it round about my neck. With a howl the demons started back, but only for a moment, and then one among them pierced her with a dart, and she fell cold and dead into my arms. What happened after that I know not. I seemed to fall into an ecstasy, and see a troop of angels come down, whose very sight put all the ghostly forms to flight. They seemed to lift my Hildegard up and bear her away to Paradise, while the ground rose up, the walls of the castle fell, and I found myself lying on the bare rocks in a desert place as the morning sun began to gild the clouds. Only the crucifix which my sainted love had placed about my neck remained to show that what we had suffered was aught but an awful dream. I staggered to my feet, and guiding myself by the sun, set forth to expiate my sins at Rome, if it were possible to save my sinful soul; and so, wandering on, I presently found myself at Marseilles, where I took ship, and the next day in a calm was captured by these heathens. This is my story. If I die now, I shall die damned, and never meet my Hildegard again.

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