St. Stephen's Eve

by Warwick Deeping

 

St. Stephen's Eve

BY WARWICK DEEPING

THE sky was a bowl of dusky azure, when Alain the page skipped over the stertorous carcass of Croquart the porter, unlatched the postern in the great gate, and crept across the trestle bridge that spanned the moat. For two nights and a day snow had fallen, spreading a cloak of glittering samite over moor and meadow, ribbing the woods with silver, deepening a winter silence over the world. Now, at St. Stephen's eve, the gray pinions of the snow-clouds had fled. A full moon had reared her silver buckler in the sky, pouring mysterious glory upon the ivory hills. The broad moat, dappled with moonbeams, stretched dim yet brilliant under the lad's feet. Above, the towers of Terabil, with their machicolated shadows, cut the dusky splendor of the sky.

It was St. Stephen's eve, and witchery breathed in the frosty silence of the hour. Alain, dimpling the snow, tucked his fustian cloak over his girdle and turned southwards, with his pert nose sniffing the air, his black eyes glistening in the moonlight. Not far distant the gaunt giants of the forest lifted up their grotesque branches to the sky. A wild arabesque, solemn and mysterious, the woods scrolled the white plain of the snow and the steel-visaged night.

It was St. Stephen's eve, the one eve in the year when Fulk of the Forest, mythical woodsman, was said to cleave the trunk of the Old Oak and come forth to hunt with ten couples of red-eyed hounds. So ran the legend on the lips of the country beldames—a legend that had ruled the ingle-nooks for centuries. On St. Stephen's eve Fulk's horn made the dim woods shudder; the baying of his ghostly pack echoed through the black bowels of the forest. And Alain, sturdy lad, with his poll packed with old wives' tales, had crept out that night from Terabil to see Black Fulk come forth.

He held on across the waste of snow, glancing up now and again from the dark barriers of the woods to the moon swim- ming calmly overhead. He was hugging his boyish errantry under his cloak with a species of ecstatic fear, shivering one moment till his teeth chattered, warm the next with his scamper over the snow. It was not long before he touched the trees, gaunt and solitary sentinels appealing the moon with their multitudinous hands. Their trunks crowded the distance, making strange gloom over the brilliant carpet of winter.

Alain plunged in, knowing the place well, and able to abide by the path despite the snow. Anon, as the black trunks thickened and the feltwork of boughs grew denser overhead, he came towards a broad clearing, white in the light of the moon. In the centre of the place stood a gigantic oak, gnarled, grim, and terrible, a patriarch rent by the sword of centuries, primeval and hoary in its sullen solitude. The stars seemed to hang above its branches like a magic crown.

Alain, big-eyed, alert as a weasel, huddled down behind a pile of fagots on the outskirts of the clearing. An oak log served him as a seat. He turned the hood of his cloak over his head, and sat and stared at the tree. A hundred fantastic fancies danced and nickered in his brain. His ears tingled with the frosty air; his breath rose above him like vapor.

ALAN CREPT OUT TO SEE BLACK FULK COME FORTH

The forest stood soundless and calm under the moon. The silence was supernatural in its utter emptiness. Not a wind stirred; not a cloud moved athwart the sky; the very earth seemed dead, a frozen planet, sunless and without life. The lad crouching by the fagots huddled his cloak about him, and still stared at the tree. The night air was freezing his courage; the sinister significance of the place began to bulk more vividly in his imagination. His eyes darted swift, restless glances into the surrounding gloom. Fear seemed to create sounds from the void of silence. He remembered with a twinge of hunger the red warmth of the guard-room fire, the fumes of roast meat and ale, even drunken Croquart, sleeping behind the half-shut door. Black Fulk of the Forest with his lurid hounds, viewed erstwhile with a mischievous glee, began to bulk with a more terrific realism that was not comforting. Alain stared at the great tree with the fascination of a gradual fear. He could hear his heart cantering, his breath whistling between his teeth. Each moment he expected to behold the black trunk open with a glare of flame and a sound as of thunder, to see the eyes of the hell-hounds burning like live coals over the snow.

Magic or no magic, some sound came to him from the forest, setting his ears tingling, his mouth agape. It was a queer metallic sound, thin and eerie in the vast void of the night. He crouched low behind the fagots like a frightened rabbit, listening, and staring into the gloomy vistas of the woods. A noise as of muffled hoofs waxed gradual in the distance—a sinister under-chant like the galloping of a pack of wolves, save that there was no tonguing, no howling under the moon. Now and again there came a clear, half-musical note as of steel smiting steel.

The boy's heels were itching for flight, and he grew cold with a most brisk and holy terror. None the less there was some comfort in the fagot screen, and he clung to it with a flicker of latent courage. As he crouched, gazing into the wood, the darkness ahead of him under the trees seemed to grow alive with fitful light, transient flashes as of armor moving under the moon. Shadows, huge and ominous, drew out of the black tunnels of the trees. Alain, stiff with wonder, saw armed men pour from the forest and gather round Fulk's Oak.

They gathered round in a great circle, their horses trampling the snow, their harness shining brilliant in the moonlight. A steaming vapor ascended from them into the frosty air. They were spectral enough, in all truth, and yet too real to cheat the boy's fancy. Their utter silence astonished him. Whence came they, and for what end? Fifty spears gathered round the Fairy Oak on St. Stephen's eve at midnight. A strange company, wizard and ghostly, wandering through the woods over the silent snow.

He heard a gruff voice break the quiet. A knight on a black horse, standing under the great oak, was speaking. He seemed to be giving orders in an undertone. Alain, with his eyes fixed on the figure, saw a pennon stream out black against the sky. It was trebly dentate at the "fly," and pierced in the centre by a hollow star. The lad by the fagots caught a sudden quick breath, doubled his knees under him, like a bird crouching for flight.

The pennon of Guiscard of Avray!

The whole scene grew eloquent in the twinkling of a snowflake. The riders of the Red Valley massed about the Fairy Oak one mile from Terabil! The knowledge of a century's bloody feuds streamed athwart the lad's mind. A silent march over the snow, a night attack, Sire Bertrand absent at court, his young wife housed in Terabil, behind the useless swords of a drunken garrison. The postern in the great gate open. Alain saw all this in a flash of fear. He had crept forth to catch Fulk of the Forest at his midnight hunt; he had seen the raiders of Avray gather about the great oak for the surprise and sacking of Terabil in the Mere.

Superstition evaporated on the instant. The lad was all warm flesh and eager sinew; his heart quickened, but grew steady; he tucked his cloak up under his girdle, slipped from his hiding-place, and ran.

Never a glance back did he give as he skimmed silently over the snow. The branches of the trees flew back above his head; the keen air whistled in his ears. Even as he ran he could catch the muffled tramp of horses at the trot. The sound stirred him like a trumpet-cry. Panting, wide-mouthed, he reached the open, and scurried on over the snow.

Terabil, with its silver girdle of water, lay before him in the moonlight; he could see the towers black and saturnine under the sky. The white plain seemed to heave endless under his feet. Once he stumbled over a knot of heather, fell, picked himself up, and ran the harder. He was half-way to the water, when he heard a shout rise from the woods—a keen, angry cry, like the tonguing of a hound that has seen the quarry.

A STRANGE COMPANY, WIZARD AND GHOSTLY, WANDERING OVER THE SNOW

[[file:p 180--St Stephen's Eve--The Lady Maude in Castle}}Terabil.jpg|350px|frameless|center]] {{c|THE LADY MAUDE IN CASTLE TERABIL

Alain reached the bridge, turned for a moment and stared back towards the forest. A dark mass was moving over the snow, grim and serrate, silvered with steel. They of Avray made little sound as they came galloping over the winter-cushioned grass. He footed it fast across the bridge, bent down at the last span and tugged at the boards. The bolts were home, and he could not stir the limbers. He fumbled at the fastenings, found them frozen to his stiff fingers. With a little gulp of despair, he sprang in through the open yawn of the gate, swung it to with a crash, hitched up the chain, and rammed home the bolts.

By the door he stumbled over the carcass of Croquart the porter. He bent down and pulled his beard, screamed into his ear. The man was drunk, torpid as a stone; he only muttered in his sleep inarticulate oaths, and turned his hairy muzzle to the wall.

Alain sprang into the guard-room, shouting as he ran. The fire had burned low under the great chimney, and a single cresset smoked and spluttered on the wall. Two men were dozing on a settle before the red embers of the fire. A score more were sprawling about the table or snoring on the rushes, drunk on this wassail night, helpless as hogsheads. Alain cursed them in a whimpering treble, and shook the men sleeping on the settle by the shoulders. They started up, fiery-faced and voluble. One of them was Hanotin the sergeant—a man with a beard like a black bear's hide, burly as Og of Bashan, strong as an oak. Alain squealed in his face, out of breath, beside himself:

"Arm! arm! Guiscard is at the gate!"

Hanotin stared like a sleepy ogre.

"Quick, you scullions! Fifty spears from Avray are pricking over the snow. I caught them in the forest by Fulk's Oak. They are crossing the bridge. Quick, I say!"

Black Hanotin swore, kicked sundry of his comrades, swore again. There were but two fit men and a boy to hold Terabil. The giant blundered to the arm-rack, slipped on steel cap and hauberk, took an axe from the wall, and went out with his comrade to the gate. Alain saw them squinting through the grill as he made for the court and the state quarters.

Even as Alain crossed the court he heard the thunder of steel upon the gate. The sound echoed through the castle in the hush of the night, mingled with the hoarse clamor of many voices. The lad plunged up a stairway and came into a long gallery, lighted by mullioned windows towards the court. Moonlight streamed in, calling dim colors into the scutcheons on the glass. He passed along the gallery, and beat with his fist upon a door at the end thereof.

Anon the latch slipped, the door opened a very little, giving view of a woman, whose white face peered from a fleece of dishevelled hair. She had a cloak cast over her shoulders as though she had but that moment risen from her bed.

"Dame Jake!" cried the boy.

The thunder against the gate echoed through the night-darkened place. The woman heard it, came out into the gallery, shivering, and staring into Alain's eyes.

"What is it—tell me?"

"Guiscard and his men are breaking in. The guards are drunk, save Hanotin and the Gascon. They of Avray will take the castle. The Lady Maude, what of her?"

The woman tossed her hair from her shoulders with a gesture of despair. Her mouth showed a circle of jet in the half-gloom; her eyes dilated. She stood holding her throat, listening like one dazed to the din beneath. Alain, rigid and white of face, was staring at the distorted visage of the moon, his jaw thrust forward, his fingers twisting the buttons of his tunic.

"I have it," he said.

"What?"

"Take me in quickly—"

"Where?"

"We must hide Sire Bertrand's wife. See, my hair is long; I will put on woman's gear and play the lady. Quick; it is the last hope."

The woman gripped his shoulder, kissed him suddenly on the lips. They passed in together, bolting the door after them. Groping in the dark through an anteroom, overturning an embroidery-frame, they came into an inner chamber, where a single taper burned—the bed-chamber of Sire Bertrand's young wife.

There was a great bed in one corner, carven richly, and garnished with gold and painted escutcheons. Its pillars were gilt-work, its tester purple silk. On the bed was seated a young girl, with jet-black hair falling about her face, streaking her white night-gear even to her knees. Her eyes were dark, wonderful to look upon, yet full of fear. She had thrust her little feet into a pair of embroidered slippers. Her face was pale as apple-blossom, and she shivered like an aspen as she sat.

Alain knelt to her and touched her hand. Her tirewoman took a cloak of blue and spread it over her lady's shoulders. Together, in hurried words, they told her of her peril and their plan for baffling it that night. The girl heard them with a torpid stare of fear. Even as they spoke to her a din of steel shivered through the silence. Guiscard and his men had broken in, and had come hand to hand with Hanotin and the Gascon at the gate.

In the bedchamber there was a great cupboard, full of samites, robes of silk, fine linen, and rich girdles. A stout latch closed the door. Dame Jake, taking her lady by the shoulders, thrust her in straightway, smothered her behind the clothes, and latched the door. Turning, she flung night-gear and a cloak at Alain's feet, and going out, stood listening in the outer chamber.

The clash of steel had ceased at the gate. In its stead came the tramp of mailed feet in the court, a babel of hoarse voices resounding from wall to wall. A cresset waved across the gloom, casting a weird light on armor and on casement. Sinister sounds arose from the guard-room—a grim, whimpering cry, for the Avray men were putting the drunkards to the sword.

Soon stairway and gallery resounded to the clangor of Guiscard's soldiery. Blows were dealt against the door. One burly ruffian, setting his shoulders to the panelling, burst the bolts like willow withes; the whole rout streamed in.

On the bed sat Alain, with his black curls upon his shoulders, his boy's figure wrapped in a green mantle, closely bound by a girdle of silver. Dame Jake, with her head hid in the mock lady's bosom, knelt on the floor, clasping Alain's knees. The single taper cast a thin radiance over the scene, showing the mailed men crowding the threshold, the crouching woman, the stiff, white-faced figure on the bed.

Guiscard, black of beard and black of eye, came into the room with sword sheathed, a foppish smirk upon his face.

"Madame, your pardon for a Christmas greeting. The night is fair, though frosty. I must bid you make ready to ride with us to Avray."

"Ah!"

"Sire Bertrand will be our debtor."

"For vengeance, the saints see to it."

They took the woman Jake, two of them together, dragged her aside, and cast her headlong into a corner. Alain, whimpering and covering his eyes with his sleeve, was seized by Guiscard and carried bodily from the room. He made brave outcry enough, while Dame Jake's screams followed him down the gallery.

Guiscard of Avray bore his burden into the court, smiling into his black beard, and licking his long, red lips. By the gate, Alain had a grim vision of black Hanotin, lying dead against the wall, with his skull cleft, his axe splintered in his hand. Over the Mere they passed, the moonlight pointing their shadows in the water. Guiscard's men trailed after him, hot and lusty, their breath steaming to the heavens, their armor twinkling in the gloom.

So they took horse again and cantered away over the snow, singing a rough wassail song to match the clangor of their arms. The woods received them, and the mild moon stared down on the snow, scarred and trampled under the boughs.

By dawn that morning, Dame Jake and her lady had taken horse and fled for Domvrault over the moors. By evening, when the torches were red in the west, they were safely housed within honest walls. But Alain lay dead in the castle ditch at Avray, with a poniard wound over his heart.