"Alas, my son!" was all Christina could say, for his effort at gaiety formed a ghastly contrast with the gray, livid hue that overspread his fair young face, his bloody armour, and damp disordered hair, and even his stiff unearthly smile.

"Nay, motherling," he added, as she came so near that he could put his arm round her neck, "sorrow not, for Ebbo will need thee much. And, mother," as his face lighted up, "there is joy coming to you. Only I would that I could have brought him. Mother, he died not under the Schlangenwald swords."

"Who? Not Ebbo?" cried the bewildered mother.

"Your own Eberhard, our father," said Friedel, raising her face to him with his hand, and adding, as he met a startled look, "The cruel count owned it with his last breath. He is a Turkish slave, and surely heaven will give him back to comfort you, even though we may not work his freedom! O mother, I had so longed for it, but God be thanked that at least certainty was bought by my life." The last words were uttered almost unconsciously, and he had nearly fallen, as the excitement faded; but, as they were lifting him down, he bent once more and kissed the glossy neck of his horse. "Ah! poor fellow, thou too wilt be lonely. May Ebbo yet ride thee!"

The mother had no time for grief. Alas! She might have full time for that by and by! The one wish of the twins was to be together, and presently both were laid on the great bed in the upper chamber, Ebbo in a swoon from the pain of the transport, and Friedel lying so as to meet the first look of recovery. And, after Ebbo's eyes had re-opened, they watched one another in silence for a short space, till Ebbo said: "Is that the hue of death on thy face, brother?"

"I well believe so," said Friedel.

"Ever together," said Ebbo, holding his hand. "But alas! My mother! Would I had never sent thee to the traitor."

"Ah! So comes her comfort," said Friedel. "Heard you not? He owned that my father was among the Turks."

"And I," cried Ebbo. "I have withheld thee! O Friedel, had I listened to thee, thou hadst not been in this fatal broil!"

"Nay, ever together," repeated Friedel. "Through Ulm merchants will my mother be able to ransom him. I know she will, so oft have I dreamt of his return. Then, mother, you will give him our duteous greetings;" and he smiled again.

Like one in a dream Christina returned his smile, because she saw he wished it, just as the moment before she had been trying to staunch his wound.

It was plain that the injuries, except Ebbo's sword-cut, were far beyond her skill, and she could only endeavour to check the bleeding till better aid could be obtained from Ulm. Thither Moritz Schleiermacher had already sent, and he assured her that he was far from despairing of the elder baron, but she derived little hope from his words, for gunshot wounds were then so ill understood as generally to prove fatal.

Moreover, there was an undefined impression that the two lives must end in the same hour, even as they had begun. Indeed, Ebbo was suffering so terribly, and was so much spent with pain and loss of blood, that he seemed sinking much faster than Friedel, whose wound bled less freely, and who only seemed benumbed and torpid, except when he roused himself to speak, or was distressed by the writhings and moans which, however, for his sake, Ebbo restrained as much as he could.

To be together seemed an all-sufficient consolation, and, when the chaplain came sorrowfully to give them the last rites of the Church, Ebbo implored him to pray that he might not be left behind long in purgatory.

"Friedel," he said, clasping his brother's hand, "is even like the holy Sebastian or Maurice; but I—I was never such as he. O father, will it be my penance to be left alone when he is in paradise?"

"What is that?" said Friedel, partially roused by the sound of his name, and the involuntary pressure of his hand. "Nay, Ebbo; one repentance, one cross, one hope," and he relapsed into a doze, while Ebbo murmured over a broken, brief confession—exhausting by its vehemence of self-accusation for his proud spirit, his wilful neglect of his lost father, his hot contempt of prudent counsel.

Then, when the priest came round to Friedel's side, and the boy was wakened to make his shrift, the words were contrite and humble, but calm and full of trust. They were like two of their own mountain streams, the waters almost equally undefiled by external stain—yet one struggling, agitated, whirling giddily round; the other still, transparent, and the light of heaven smiling in its clearness.

The farewell greetings of the Church on earth breathed soft and sweet in their loftiness, and Friedel, though lying motionless, and with closed eyes, never failed in the murmured response, whether fully conscious or not, while his brother only attended by fits and starts, and was evidently often in too much pain to know what was passing.

Help was nearer than had been hoped. The summons despatched the night before had been responded to by the vintners and mercers; their train bands had set forth, and their captain, a cautious man, never rode into the way of blows without his surgeon at hand. And so it came to pass that, before the sun was low on that long and grievous day, Doctor Johannes Butteman was led into the upper chamber, where the mother looked up to him with a kind of hopeless gratitude on her face, which was nearly as white as those of her sons. The doctor soon saw that Friedel was past human aid; but, when he declared that there was fair hope for the other youth, Friedel, whose torpor had been dispelled by the examination, looked up with his beaming smile, saying, "There, motherling."

The doctor then declared that he could not deal with the Baron's wound unless he were the sole occupant of the bed, and this sentence brought the first cloud of grief or dread to Friedel's brow, but only for a moment. He looked at his brother, who had again fainted at the first touch of his wounded limb, and said, "It is well. Tell the dear Ebbo that I cannot help it if after all I go to the praying, and leave him the fighting. Dear, dear Ebbo! One day together again and for ever! I leave thee for thine own sake." With much effort he signed the cross again on his brother's brow, and kissed it long and fervently. Then, as all stood round, reluctant to effect this severance, or disturb one on whom death was visibly fast approaching, he struggled up on his elbow, and held out the other hand, saying, "Take me now, Heinz, ere Ebbo revive to be grieved. The last sacrifice," he further whispered, whilst almost giving himself to Heinz and Moritz to be carried to his own bed in the turret chamber.

There, even as they laid him down, began what seemed to be the mortal agony, and, though he was scarcely sensible, his mother felt that her prime call was to him, while his brother was in other hands. Perhaps it was well for her. Surgical practice was rough, and wounds made by fire-arms were thought to have imbibed a poison that made treatment be supposed efficacious in proportion to the pain inflicted. When Ebbo was recalled by the torture to see no white reflection of his own face on the pillow beside him, and to feel in vain for the grasp of the cold damp hand, a delirious frenzy seized him, and his struggles were frustrating the doctor's attempts, when a low soft sweet song stole through the open door.

"Friedel!" he murmured, and held his breath to listen. All through the declining day did the gentle sound continue; now of grand chants or hymns caught from the cathedral choir, now of songs of chivalry or saintly legend so often sung over the evening fire; the one flowing into the other in the wandering of failing powers, but never failing in the tender sweetness that had distinguished Friedel through life. And, whenever that voice was heard, let them do to him what they would, Ebbo was still absorbed in intense listening so as not to lose a note, and lulled almost out of sense of suffering by that swan-like music. If his attendants made such noise as to break in on it, or if it ceased for a moment, the anguish returned, but was charmed away by the weakest, faintest resumption of the song. Probably Friedel knew not, with any earthly sense, what he was doing, but to the very last he was serving his twin brother as none other could have aided him in his need.

The September sun had set, twilight was coming on, the doctor had worked his stern will, and Ebbo, quivering in every fibre, lay spent on his pillow, when his mother glided in, and took her seat near him, though where she hoped he would not notice her presence. But he raised his eyelids, and said, "He is not singing now."

"Singing indeed, but where we cannot hear him," she answered. "'Whiter than the snow, clearer than the ice-cave, more solemn than the choir. They will come at last.' That was what he said, even as he entered there." And the low dove-like tone and tender calm face continued upon Ebbo the spell that the chant had left. He dozed as though still lulled by its echo.



CHAPTER XX: THE WOUNDED EAGLE



The star and the spark in the stubble! Often did the presage of her dream occur to Christina, and assist in sustaining her hopes during the days that Ebbo's life hung in the balance, and he himself had hardly consciousness to realize either his brother's death or his own state, save as much as was shown by the words, "Let him not be taken away, mother; let him wait for me."

Friedmund did wait, in his coffin before the altar in the castle chapel, covered with a pall of blue velvet, and great white cross, mournfully sent by Hausfrau Johanna; his sword, shield, helmet, and spurs laid on it, and wax tapers burning at the head and feet. And, when Christina could leave the one son on his couch of suffering, it was to kneel beside the other son on his narrow bed of rest, and recall, like a breath of solace, the heavenly loveliness and peace that rested on his features when she had taken her last long look at them.

Moritz Schleiermacher assisted at Sir Friedmund's first solemn requiem, and then made a journey to Ulm, whence he returned to find the Baron's danger so much abated that he ventured on begging for an interview with the lady, in which he explained his purpose of repairing at once to the imperial camp, taking with him a letter from the guilds concerned in the bridge, and using his personal influence with Maximilian to obtain not only pardon for the combat, but authoritative sanction to the erection. Dankwart of Schlangenwald, the Teutonic knight, and only heir of old Wolfgang, was supposed to be with the Emperor, and it might be possible to come to terms with him, since his breeding in the Prussian commanderies had kept him aloof from the feuds of his father and brother. This mournful fight had to a certain extent equalized the injuries on either side, since the man whom Friedel had cut down was Hierom, one of the few remaining scions of Schlangenwald, and there was thus no dishonour in trying to close the deadly feud, and coming to an amicable arrangement about the Debateable Strand, the cause of so much bloodshed. What was now wanted was Freiherr Eberhard's signature to the letter to the Emperor, and his authority for making terms with the new count; and haste was needed, lest the Markgraf of Wurtemburg should represent the affray in the light of an outrage against a member of the League.

Christina saw the necessity, and undertook if possible to obtain her son's signature, but, at the first mention of Master Moritz and the bridge, Ebbo turned away his head, groaned, and begged to hear no more of either. He thought of his bold declaration that the bridge must be built, even at the cost of blood! Little did he then guess of whose blood! And in his bitterness of spirit he felt a jealousy of that influence of Schleiermacher, which had of late come between him and his brother. He hated the very name, he said, and hid his face with a shudder. He hoped the torrent would sweep away every fragment of the bridge.

"Nay, Ebbo mine, wherefore wish ill to a good work that our blessed one loved? Listen, and let me tell you my dream for making yonder strand a peaceful memorial of our peaceful boy."

"To honour Friedel?" and he gazed on her with something like interest in his eyes.

"Yes, Ebbo, and as he would best brook honour. Let us seek for ever to end the rival claims to yon piece of meadow by praying this knight of a religious order, the new count, to unite with us in building there—or as near as may be safe—a church of holy peace, and a cell for a priest, who may watch over the bridge ward, and offer the holy sacrifice for the departed of either house. There will we place our gentle Friedel to be the first to guard the peace of the ford, and there will we sleep ourselves when our time shall come, and so may the cruel feud of many generations be slaked for ever."

"In his blood!" sighed Ebbo. "Ah! would that it had been mine, mother. It is well, as well as anything can be again. So shall the spot where he fell be made sacred, and fenced from rude feet, and we shall see his fair effigy keeping his armed watch there."

And Christina was thankful to see his look of gratification, sad though it was. She sat down near his bed, and began to write a letter in their joint names to Graf Dankwart von Schlangenwald, proposing that thus, after the even balance of the wrongs of the two houses, their mutual hostility might be laid to rest for ever by the consecration of the cause of their long contention. It was a stiff and formal letter, full of the set pious formularies of the age, scarcely revealing the deep heart-feeling within; but it was to the purpose, and Ebbo, after hearing it read, heartily approved, and consented to sign both it and those that Schleiermacher had brought. Christina held the scroll, and placed the pen in the fingers that had lately so easily wielded the heavy sword, but now felt it a far greater effort to guide the slender quill.

Moritz Schleiermacher went his way in search of the King of the Romans, far off in Carinthia. A full reply could not be expected till the campaign was over, and all that was known for some time was through a messenger sent back to Ulm by Schleiermacher with the intelligence that Maximilian would examine into the matter after his return, and that Count Dankwart would reply when he should come to perform his father's obsequies after the army was dispersed. There was also a letter of kind though courtly condolence from Kasimir of Wildschloss, much grieving for gallant young Sir Friedmund, proffering all the advocacy he could give the cause of Adlerstein, and covertly proffering the protection that she and her remaining son might now be more disposed to accept. Christina suppressed this letter, knowing it would only pain and irritate Ebbo, and that she had her answer ready. Indeed, in her grief for one son, and her anxiety for the other, perhaps it was this letter that first made her fully realize the drift of those earnest words of Friedel's respecting his father.

Meantime the mother and son were alone together, with much of suffering and of sorrow, yet with a certain tender comfort in the being all in all to one another, with none to intermeddle with their mutual love and grief. It was to Christina as if something of Friedel's sweetness had passed to his brother in his patient helplessness, and that, while thus fully engrossed with him, she had both her sons in one. Nay, in spite of all the pain, grief, and weariness, these were times when both dreaded any change, and the full recovery, when not only would the loss of Friedel be every moment freshly brought home to his brother, but when Ebbo would go in quest of his father.

For on this the young Baron had fixed his mind as a sacred duty, from the moment he had seen that life was to be his lot. He looked on his neglect of indications of the possibility of his father's life in the light of a sin that had led to all his disasters, and not only regarded the intended search as a token of repentance, but as a charge bequeathed to him by his less selfish brother. He seldom spoke of his intention, but his mother was perfectly aware of it, and never thought of it without such an agony of foreboding dread as eclipsed all the hope that lay beyond. She could only turn away her mind from the thought, and be thankful for what was still her own from day to day.

"Art weary, my son?" asked Christina one October afternoon, as Ebbo lay on his bed, languidly turning the pages of a noble folio of the Legends of the Saints that Master Gottfried had sent for his amusement. It was such a book as fixed the ardour a few years later of the wounded Navarrese knight, Inigo de Loyola, but Ebbo handled it as if each page were lead.

"Only thinking how Friedel would have glowed towards these as his own kinsmen," said Ebbo. "Then should I have cared to read of them!" and he gave a long sigh.

"Let me take away the book," she said. "Thou hast read long, and it is dark."

"So dark that there must surely be a snow-cloud."

"Snow is falling in the large flakes that our Friedel used to call winter-butterflies."

"Butterflies that will swarm and shut us in from the weary world," said Ebbo. "And alack! when they go, what a turmoil it will be! Councils in the Rathhaus, appeals to the League, wranglings with the Markgraf, wise saws, overweening speeches, all alike dull and dead."

"It will scarce be so when strength and spirit have returned, mine Ebbo."

"Never can life be more to me than the way to him," said the lonely boy; "and I—never like him—shall miss the road without him."

While he thus spoke in the listless dejection of sorrow and weakness, Hatto's aged step was on the stair. "Gracious lady," he said, "here is a huntsman bewildered in the hills, who has been asking shelter from the storm that is drifting up."

"See to his entertainment, then, Hatto," said the lady.

"My lady—Sir Baron," added Hatto, "I had not come up but that this guest seems scarce gear for us below. He is none of the foresters of our tract. His hair is perfumed, his shirt is fine holland, his buff suit is of softest skin, his baldric has a jewelled clasp, and his arblast! It would do my lord baron's heart good only to cast eyes on the perfect make of that arblast! He has a lordly tread, and a stately presence, and, though he has a free tongue, and made friends with us as he dried his garments, he asked after my lord like his equal."

"O mother, must you play the chatelaine?" asked Ebbo. "Who can the fellow be? Why did none ever so come when they would have been more welcome?"

"Welcomed must he be," said Christina, rising, "and thy state shall be my excuse for not tarrying longer with him than may be needful."

Yet, though shrinking from a stranger's face, she was not without hope that the variety might wholesomely rouse her son from his depression, and in effect Ebbo, when left with Hatto, minutely questioned him on the appearance of the stranger, and watched, with much curiosity, for his mother's return.

"Ebbo mine," she said, entering, after a long interval, "the knight asks to see thee either after supper, or to-morrow morn."

"Then a knight he is?"

"Yea, truly, a knight truly in every look and gesture, bearing his head like the leading stag of the herd, and yet right gracious."

"Gracious to you, mother, in your own hall?" cried Ebbo, almost fiercely.

"Ah! jealous champion, thou couldst not take offence! It was the manner of one free and courteous to every one, and yet with an inherent loftiness that pervades all."

"Gives he no name?" said Ebbo.

"He calls himself Ritter Theurdank, of the suite of the late Kaisar, but I should deem him wont rather to lead than to follow."

"Theurdank," repeated Eberhard, "I know no such name! So, motherling, are you going to sup? I shall not sleep till I have seen him!"

"Hold, dear son." She leant over him and spoke low. "See him thou must, but let me first station Heinz and Koppel at the door with halberts, not within earshot, but thou art so entirely defenceless."

She had the pleasure of seeing him laugh. "Less defenceless than when the kinsman of Wildschloss here visited us, mother? I see for whom thou takest him, but let it be so; a spiritual knight would scarce wreak his vengeance on a wounded man in his bed. I will not have him insulted with precautions. If he has freely risked himself in my hands, I will as freely risk myself in his. Moreover, I thought he had won thy heart."

"Reigned over it, rather," said Christina. "It is but the disguise that I suspect and mistrust. Bid me not leave thee alone with him, my son."

"Nay, dear mother," said Ebbo, "the matters on which he is like to speak will brook no presence save our own, and even that will be hard enough to bear. So prop me more upright! So! And comb out these locks somewhat smoother. Thanks, mother. Now can he see whether he will choose Eberhard of Adlerstein for friend or foe."

By the time supper was ended, the only light in the upper room came from the flickering flames of the fire of pine knots on the hearth. It glanced on the pale features and dark sad eyes of the young Baron, sad in spite of the eager look of scrutiny that he turned on the figure that entered at the door, and approached so quickly that the partial light only served to show the gloss of long fair hair, the glint of a jewelled belt, and the outline of a tall, well-knit, agile frame.

"Welcome, Herr Ritter," he said; "I am sorry we have been unable to give you a fitter reception."

"No host could be more fully excused than you," said the stranger, and Ebbo started at his voice. "I fear you have suffered much, and still have much to suffer."

"My sword wound is healing fast," said Ebbo; "it is the shot in my broken thigh that is so tedious and painful."

"And I dare be sworn the leeches made it worse. I have hated all leeches ever since they kept me three days a prisoner in a 'pothecary's shop stinking with drugs. Why, I have cured myself with one pitcher of water of a raging fever, in their very despite! How did they serve thee, my poor boy?"

"They poured hot oil into the wound to remove the venom of the lead," said Ebbo.

"Had it been my case the lead should have been in their own brains first, though that were scarce needed, the heavy-witted Hans Sausages. Why should there be more poison in lead than in steel? I have asked all my surgeons that question, nor ever had a reasonable answer. Greater havoc of warriors do they make than ever with the arquebus—ay, even when every lanzknecht bears one."

"Alack!" Ebbo could not help exclaiming, "where will be room for chivalry?"

"Talk not old world nonsense," said Theurdank; "chivalry is in the heart, not in the weapon. A youth beforehand enough with the world to be building bridges should know that, when all our troops are provided with such an arm, then will their platoons in serried ranks be as a solid wall breathing fire, and as impregnable as the lines of English archers with long bows, or the phalanx of Macedon. And, when each man bears a pistol instead of the misericorde, his life will be far more his own."

Ebbo's face was in full light, and his visitor marked his contracted brow and trembling lip. "Ah!" he said, "thou hast had foul experience of these weapons."

"Not mine own hurt," said Ebbo; "that was but fair chance of war."

"I understand," said the knight; "it was the shot that severed the goodly bond that was so fair to see. Young man, none has grieved more truly than King Max."

"And well he may," said Ebbo. "He has not lost merely one of his best servants, but all the better half of another."

"There is still stuff enough left to make that ONE well worth having," said Theurdank, kindly grasping his hand, "though I would it were more substantial! How didst get old Wolfgang down, boy? He must have been a tough morsel for slight bones like these, even when better covered than now. Come, tell me all. I promised the Markgraf of Wurtemburg to look into the matter when I came to be guest at St. Ruprecht's cloister, and I have some small interest too with King Max."

His kindliness and sympathy were more effectual with Ebbo than the desire to represent his case favourably, for he was still too wretched to care for policy; but he answered Theurdank's questions readily, and explained how the idea of the bridge had originated in the vigil beside the broken waggons.

"I hope," said Theurdank, "the merchants made up thy share? These overthrown goods are a seignorial right of one or other of you lords of the bank."

"True, Herr Ritter; but we deemed it unknightly to snatch at what travellers lost by misfortune."

"Freiherr Eberhard, take my word for it, while thou thus holdest, all the arquebuses yet to be cut out of the Black Forest will not mar thy chivalry. Where didst get these ways of thinking?"

"My brother was a very St. Sebastian! My mother—"

"Ah! her sweet wise face would have shown it, even had not poor Kasimir of Adlerstein raved of her. Ah! lad, thou hast crossed a case of true love there! Canst not brook even such a gallant stepfather?"

"I may not," said Ebbo, with spirit; "for with his last breath Schlangenwald owned that my own father died not at the hostel, but may now be alive as a Turkish slave."

"The devil!" burst out Theurdank. "Well! that might have been a pretty mess! A Turkish slave, saidst thou! What year chanced all this matter—thy grandfather's murder and all the rest?"

"The year before my birth," said Ebbo. "It was in the September of 1475."

"Ha!" muttered Theurdank, musing to himself; "that was the year the dotard Schenk got his overthrow at the fight of Rain on Sare from the Moslem. Some composition was made by them, and old Wolfgang was not unlikely to have been the go-between. So! Say on, young knight," he added, "let us to the matter in hand. How rose the strife that kept back two troops from our—from the banner of the empire?"

Ebbo proceeded with the narration, and concluded it just as the bell now belonging to the chapel began to toll for compline, and Theurdank prepared to obey its summons, first, however, asking if he should send any one to the patient. Ebbo thanked him, but said he needed no one till his mother should come after prayers.

"Nay, I told thee I had some leechcraft. Thou art weary, and must rest more entirely;"—and, giving him little choice, Theurdank supported him with one arm while removing the pillows that propped him, then laid him tenderly down, saying, "Good night, and the saints bless thee, brave young knight. Sleep well, and recover in spite of the leeches. I cannot afford to lose both of you."

Ebbo strove to follow mentally the services that were being performed in the chapel, and whose "Amens" and louder notes pealed up to him, devoid of the clear young tones that had sung their last here below, but swelled by grand bass notes that as much distracted Ebbo's attention as the memory of his guest's conversation; and he impatiently awaited his mother's arrival.

At length, lamp in hand, she appeared with tears shining in her eyes, and bending over him said,

"He hath done honour to our blessed one, my Ebbo; he knelt by him, and crossed him with holy water, and when he led me from the chapel he told me any mother in Germany might envy me my two sons even now. Thou must love him now, Ebbo."

"Love him as one loves one's loftiest model," said Ebbo—"value the old castle the more for sheltering him."

"Hath he made himself known to thee?"

"Not openly, but there is only one that he can be."

Christina smiled, thankful that the work of pardon and reconciliation had been thus softened by the personal qualities of the enemy, whose conduct in the chapel had deeply moved her.

"Then all will be well, blessedly well," she said.

"So I trust," said Ebbo, "but the bell broke our converse, and he laid me down as tenderly as—O mother, if a father's kindness be like his, I have truly somewhat to regain."

"Knew he aught of the fell bargain?" whispered Christina.

"Not he, of course, save that it was a year of Turkish inroads. He will speak more perchance to-morrow. Mother, not a word to any one, nor let us betray our recognition unless it be his pleasure to make himself known."

"Certainly not," said Christina, remembering the danger that the household might revenge Friedel's death if they knew the foe to be in their power. Knowing as she did that Ebbo's admiration was apt to be enthusiastic, and might now be rendered the more fervent by fever and solitude, she was still at a loss to understand his dazzled, fascinated state.

When Heinz entered, bringing the castle key, which was always laid under the Baron's pillow, Ebbo made a movement with his hand that surprised them both, as if to send it elsewhere—then muttered, "No, no, not till he reveals himself," and asked, "Where sleeps the guest?"

"In the grandmother's room, which we fitted for a guest-chamber, little thinking who our first would be," said his mother.

"Never fear, lady; we will have a care to him," said Heinz, somewhat grimly.

"Yes, have a care," said Ebbo, wearily; "and take care all due honour is shown to him! Good night, Heinz."

"Gracious lady," said Heinz, when by a sign he had intimated to her his desire of speaking with her unobserved by the Baron, "never fear; I know who the fellow is as well as you do. I shall be at the foot of the stairs, and woe to whoever tries to step up them past me."

"There is no reason to apprehend treason, Heinz, yet to be on our guard can do no harm."

"Nay, lady, I could look to the gear for the oubliette if you would speak the word."

"For heaven's sake, no, Heinz. This man has come hither trusting to our honour, and you could not do your lord a greater wrong, nor one that he could less pardon, than by any attempt on our guest."

"Would that he had never eaten our bread!" muttered Heinz. "Vipers be they all, and who knows what may come next?"

"Watch, watch, Heinz; that is all," implored Christina, "and, above all, not a word to any one else."

And Christina dismissed the man-at-arms gruff and sullen, and herself retired ill at ease between fears of, and for, the unwelcome guest whose strange powers of fascination had rendered her, in his absence, doubly distrustful.



CHAPTER XXI: RITTER THEURDANK



The snow fell all night without ceasing, and was still falling on the morrow, when the guest explained his desire of paying a short visit to the young Baron, and then taking his departure. Christina would gladly have been quit of him, but she felt bound to remonstrate, for their mountain was absolutely impassable during a fall of snow, above all when accompanied by wind, since the drifts concealed fearful abysses, and the shifting masses insured destruction to the unwary wayfarer; nay, natives themselves had perished between the hamlet and the castle.

"Not the hardiest cragsman, not my son himself," she said, "could venture on such a morning to guide you to—"

"Whither, gracious dame?" asked Theurdank, half smiling.

"Nay, sir, I would not utter what you would not make known."

"You know me then?"

"Surely, sir, for our noble foe, whose generous trust in our honour must win my son's heart."

"So!" he said, with a peculiar smile, "Theurdank—Dankwart—I see! May I ask if your son likewise smelt out the Schlangenwald?"

"Verily, Sir Count, my Ebbo is not easily deceived. He said our guest could be but one man in all the empire."

Theurdank smiled again, saying, "Then, lady, you shudder not at a man whose kin and yours have shed so much of one another's blood?"

"Nay, ghostly knight, I regard you as no more stained therewith than are my sons by the deeds of their grandfather."

"If there were more like you, lady," returned Theurdank, "deadly feuds would soon be starved out. May I to your son? I have more to say to him, and I would fain hear his views of the storm."

Christina could not be quite at ease with Theurdank in her son's room, but she had no choice, and she knew that Heinz was watching on the turret stair, out of hearing indeed, but as ready to spring as a cat who sees her young ones in the hand of a child that she only half trusts.

Ebbo lay eagerly watching for his visitor, who greeted him with the same almost paternal kindness he had evinced the night before, but consulted him upon the way from the castle. Ebbo confirmed his mother's opinion that the path was impracticable so long as the snow fell, and the wind tossed it in wild drifts.

"We have been caught in snow," he said, "and hard work have we had to get home! Once indeed, after a bear hunt, we fully thought the castle stood before us, and lo! it was all a cruel snow mist in that mocking shape. I was even about to climb our last Eagle's Step, as I thought, when behold, it proved to be the very brink of the abyss."

"Ah! these ravines are well-nigh as bad as those of the Inn. I've known what it was to be caught on the ledge of a precipice by a sharp wind, changing its course, mark'st thou, so swiftly that it verily tore my hold from the rock, and had well-nigh swept me into a chasm of mighty depth. There was nothing for it but to make the best spring I might towards the crag on the other side, and grip for my life at my alpenstock, which by Our Lady's grace was firmly planted, and I held on till I got breath again, and felt for my footing on the ice-glazed rock."

"Ah!" said Eberhard with a long breath, after having listened with a hunter's keen interest to this hair's-breadth escape, "it sounds like a gust of my mountain air thus let in on me."

"Truly it is dismal work for a lusty hunter to lie here," said Theurdank, "but soon shalt thou take thy crags again in full vigour, I hope. How call'st thou the deep gray lonely pool under a steep frowning crag sharpened well-nigh to a spear point, that I passed yester afternoon?"

"The Ptarmigan's Mere, the Red Eyrie," murmured Ebbo, scarcely able to utter the words as he thought of Friedel's delight in the pool, his exploit at the eyrie, and the gay bargain made in the streets of Ulm, that he should show the scaler of the Dom steeple the way to the eagle's nest.

"I remember," said his guest gravely, coming to his side. "Ah, boy! thy brother's flight has been higher yet. Weep freely; fear me not. Do I not know what it is, when those who were over-good for earth have found their eagle's wings, and left us here?"

Ebbo gazed up through his tears into the noble, mournful face that was bent kindly over him. "I will not seek to comfort thee by counselling thee to forget," said Theurdank. "I was scarce thine elder when my life was thus rent asunder, and to hoar hairs, nay, to the grave itself, will she be my glory and my sorrow. Never owned I brother, but I trow ye two were one in no common sort."

"Such brothers as we saw at Ulm were little like us," returned Ebbo, from the bottom of his heart. "We were knit together so that all will begin with me as if it were the left hand remaining alone to do it! I am glad that my old life may not even in shadow be renewed till after I have gone in quest of my father."

"Be not over hasty in that quest," said the guest, "or the infidels may chance to gain two Freiherren instead of one. Hast any designs?"

Ebbo explained that he thought of making his way to Genoa to consult the merchant Gian Battista dei Battiste, whose description of the captive German noble had so strongly impressed Friedel. Ebbo knew the difference between Turks and Moors, but Friedel's impulse guided him, and he further thought that at Genoa he should learn the way to deal with either variety of infidel. Theurdank thought this a prudent course, since the Genoese had dealings both at Tripoli and Constantinople; and, moreover, the transfer was not impossible, since the two different hordes of Moslems trafficked among themselves when either had made an unusually successful razzia.

"Shame," he broke out, "that these Eastern locusts, these ravening hounds, should prey unmolested on the fairest lands of the earth, and our German nobles lie here like swine, grunting and squealing over the plunder they grub up from one another, deaf to any summons from heaven or earth! Did not Heaven's own voice speak in thunder this last year, even in November, hurling the mighty thunderbolt of Alsace, an ell long, weighing two hundred and fifteen pounds? Did I not cause it to be hung up in the church of Encisheim, as a witness and warning of the plagues that hang over us? But no, nothing will quicken them from their sloth and drunkenness till the foe are at their doors; and, if a man arise of different mould, with some heart for the knightly, the good, and the true, then they kill him for me! But thou, Adlerstein, this pious quest over, thou wilt return to me. Thou hast head to think and heart to feel for the shame and woe of this misguided land."

"I trust so, my lord," said Ebbo. "Truly, I have suffered bitterly for pursuing my own quarrel rather than the crusade."

"I meant not thee," said Theurdank, kindly. "Thy bridge is a benefit to me, as much as, or more than, ever it can be to thee. Dost know Italian? There is something of Italy in thine eye."

"My mother's mother was Italian, my lord; but she died so early that her language has not descended to my mother or myself."

"Thou shouldst learn it. It will be pastime while thou art bed-fast, and serve thee well in dealing with the Moslem. Moreover, I may have work for thee in Welschland. Books? I will send thee books. There is the whole chronicle of Karl the Great, and all his Palsgrafen, by Pulci and Boiardo, a brave Count and gentleman himself, governor of Reggio, and worthy to sing of deeds of arms; so choice, too, as to the names of his heroes, that they say he caused his church bells to be rung when he had found one for Rodomonte, his infidel Hector. He has shown up Roland as a love-sick knight, though, which is out of all accord with Archbishop Turpin. Wilt have him?"

"When we were together, we used to love tales of chivalry."

"Ah! Or wilt have the stern old Ghibelline Florentine, who explored the three realms of the departed? Deep lore, and well-nigh unsearchable, is his; but I love him for the sake of his Beatrice, who guided him. May we find such guides in our day!"

"I have heard of him," said Ebbo. "If he will tell me where my Friedel walks in light, then, my lord, I would read him with all my heart."

"Or wouldst thou have rare Franciscus Petrarca? I wot thou art too young as yet for the yearnings of his sonnets, but their voice is sweet to the bereft heart."

And he murmured over, in their melodious Italian flow, the lines on Laura's death

"Not pallid, but yet whiter than the snow By wind unstirred that on a hillside lies; Rest seemed as on a weary frame to grow, A gentle slumber pressed her lovely eyes."

"Ah!" he added aloud to himself, "it is ever to me as though the poet had watched in that chamber at Ghent."

Such were the discourses of that morning, now on poetry and book lore; now admiration of the carvings that decked the room; now talk on grand architectural designs, or improvements in fire-arms, or the discussion of hunting adventures. There seemed nothing in art, life, or learning in which the versatile mind of Theurdank was not at home, or that did not end in some strange personal reminiscence of his own. All was so kind, so gracious, and brilliant, that at first the interview was full of wondering delight to Ebbo, but latterly it became very fatiguing from the strain of attention, above all towards a guest who evidently knew that he was known, while not permitting such recognition to be avowed. Ebbo began to long for an interruption, but, though he could see by the lightened sky that the weather had cleared up, it would have been impossible to have suggested to any guest that the way might now probably be open, and more especially to such a guest as this. Considerate as his visitor had been the night before, the pleasure of talk seemed to have done away with the remembrance of his host's weakness, till Ebbo so flagged that at last he was scarcely alive to more than the continued sound of the voice, and all the pain that for a while had been in abeyance seemed to have mastered him; but his guest, half reading his books, half discoursing, seemed too much immersed in his own plans, theories, and adventures, to mark the condition of his auditor.

Interruption came at last, however. There was a sudden knock at the door at noon, and with scant ceremony Heinz entered, followed by three other of the men-at-arms, fully equipped.

"Ha! what means this?" demanded Ebbo.

"Peace, Sir Baron," said Heinz, advancing so as to place his large person between Ebbo's bed and the strange hunter. "You know nothing of it. We are not going to lose you as well as your brother, and we mean to see how this knight likes to serve as a hostage instead of opening the gates as a traitor spy. On him, Koppel! it is thy right."

"Hands off! at your peril, villains!" exclaimed Ebbo, sitting up, and speaking in the steady resolute voice that had so early rendered him thoroughly their master, but much perplexed and dismayed, and entirely unassisted by Theurdank, who stood looking on with almost a smile, as if diverted by his predicament.

"By your leave, Herr Freiherr," said Heinz, putting his hand on his shoulder, "this is no concern of yours. While you cannot guard yourself or my lady, it is our part to do so. I tell you his minions are on their way to surprise the castle."

Even as Heinz spoke, Christina came panting into the room, and, hurrying to her son's side, said, "Sir Count, is this just, is this honourable, thus to return my son's welcome, in his helpless condition?"

"Mother, are you likewise distracted?" exclaimed Ebbo. "What is all this madness?"

"Alas, my son, it is no frenzy! There are armed men coming up the Eagle's Stairs on the one hand and by the Gemsbock's Pass on the other!"

"But not a hair of your head shall they hurt, lady," said Heinz. "This fellow's limbs shall be thrown to them over the battlements. On, Koppel!"

"Off, Koppel!" thundered Ebbo. "Would you brand me with shame for ever? Were he all the Schlangenwalds in one, he should go as freely as he came; but he is no more Schlangenwald than I am."

"He has deceived you, my lord," said Heinz. "My lady's own letter to Schlangenwald was in his chamber. 'Tis a treacherous disguise."

"Fool that thou art!" said Ebbo. "I know this gentleman well. I knew him at Ulm. Those who meet him here mean me no ill. Open the gates and receive them honourably! Mother, mother, trust me, all is well. I know what I am saying."

The men looked one upon another. Christina wrung her hands, uncertain whether her son were not under some strange fatal deception.

"My lord has his fancies," growled Koppel. "I'll not be balked of my right of vengeance for his scruples! Will he swear that this fellow is what he calls himself?"

"I swear," said Ebbo, slowly, "that he is a true loyal knight, well known to me."

"Swear it distinctly, Sir Baron," said Heinz. "We have all too deep a debt of vengeance to let off any one who comes here lurking in the interest of our foe. Swear that this is Theurdank, or we send his head to greet his friends."

Drops stood on Ebbo's brow, and his breath laboured as he felt his senses reeling, and his powers of defence for his guest failing him. Even should the stranger confess his name, the people of the castle might not believe him; and here he stood like one indifferent, evidently measuring how far his young host would go in his cause.

"I cannot swear that his real name is Theurdank," said Ebbo, rallying his forces, "but this I swear, that he is neither friend nor fosterer of Schlangenwald, that I know him, and I had rather die than that the slightest indignity were offered him." Here, and with a great effort that terribly wrenched his wounded leg, he reached past Heinz, and grasped his guest's hand, pulling him as near as he could.

"Sir," he said, "if they try to lay hands on you, strike my death- blow!"

A bugle-horn was wound outside. The men stood daunted—Christina in extreme terror for her son, who lay gasping, breathless, but still clutching the stranger's hand, and with eyes of fire glaring on the mutinous warriors. Another bugle-blast! Heinz was almost in the act of grappling with the silent foe, and Koppel cried as he raised his halbert, "Now or never!" but paused.

"Never, so please you," said the strange guest. "What if your young lord could not forswear himself that my name is Theurdank! Are you foes to all the world save Theurdank?"

"No masking," said Heinz, sternly. "Tell your true name as an honest man, and we will judge whether you be friend or foe."

"My name is a mouthful, as your master knows," said the guest, slowly, looking with strangely amused eyes on the confused lanzknechts, who were trying to devour their rage. "I was baptized Maximilianus; Archduke of Austria, by birth; by choice of the Germans, King of the Romans."

"The Kaisar!"

Christina dropped on her knee; the men-at-arms tumbled backwards; Ebbo pressed the hand he held to his lips, and fainted away. The bugle sounded for the third time.



CHAPTER XXII: PEACE



Slowly and painfully did Ebbo recover from his swoon, feeling as if the means of revival were rending him away from his brother. He was so completely spent that he was satisfied with a mere assurance that nothing was amiss, and presently dropped into a profound slumber, whence he awoke to find it still broad daylight, and his mother sitting by the side of his bed, all looking so much as it had done for the last six weeks, that his first inquiry was if all that had happened had been but a strange dream. His mother would scarcely answer till she had satisfied herself that his eye was clear, his voice steady, his hand cool, and that, as she said, "That Kaisar had done him no harm."

"Ah, then it was true! Where is he? Gone?" cried Ebbo, eagerly.

"No, in the hall below, busy with letters they have brought him. Lie still, my boy; he has done thee quite enough damage for one day."

"But, mother, what are you saying! Something disloyal, was it not?"

"Well, Ebbo, I was very angry that he should have half killed you when he could so easily have spoken one word. Heaven forgive me if I did wrong, but I could not help it."

"Did HE forgive you, mother?" said Ebbo, anxiously.

"He—oh yes. To do him justice he was greatly concerned; devised ways of restoring thee, and now has promised not to come near thee again without my leave," said the mother, quite as persuaded of her own rightful sway in her son's sick chamber as ever Kunigunde had been of her dominion over the castle.

"And is he displeased with me? Those cowardly vindictive rascals, to fall on him, and set me at nought! Before him, too!" exclaimed Ebbo, bitterly.

"Nay, Ebbo, he thought thy part most gallant. I heard him say so, not only to me, but below stairs—both wise and true. Thou didst know him then?"

"From the first glance of his princely eye—the first of his keen smiles. I had seen him disguised before. I thought you knew him too, mother; I never guessed that your mind was running on Schlangenwald when we talked at cross purposes last night."

"Would that I had; but though I breathed no word openly, I encouraged Heinz's precautions. My boy, I could not help it; my heart would tremble for my only one, and I saw he could not be what he seemed."

"And what doth he here? Who were the men who were advancing?"

"They were the followers he had left at St. Ruprecht's, and likewise Master Schleiermacher and Sir Kasimir of Wildschloss."

"Ha!"

"What—he had not told thee?"

"No. He knew that I knew him, was at no pains to disguise himself, yet evidently meant me to treat him as a private knight. But what brought Wildschloss here?"

"It seems," said Christina, "that, on the return from Carinthia, the Kaisar expressed his intention of slipping away from his army in his own strange fashion, and himself inquiring into the matter of the Ford. So he took with him his own personal followers, the new Graf von Schlangenwald, Herr Kasimir, and Master Schleiermacher. The others he sent to Schlangenwald; he himself lodged at St. Ruprecht's, appointing that Sir Kasimir should meet him there this morning. From the convent he started on a chamois hunt, and made his way hither; but, when the snow came on, and he returned not, his followers became uneasy, and came in search of him."

"Ah!" said Ebbo, "he meant to intercede for Wildschloss—it might be he would have tried his power. No, for that he is too generous. How looked Wildschloss, mother?"

"How could I tell how any one looked save thee, my poor wan boy? Thou art paler than ever! I cannot have any king or kaisar of them all come to trouble thee."

"Nay, motherling, there is much more trouble and unrest to me in not knowing how my king will treat us after such a requital! Prithee let him know that I am at his service."

And, after having fed and refreshed her patient, the gentle potentate of his chamber consented to intimate her consent to admit the invader. But not till after delay enough to fret the impatient nerves of illness did Maximilian appear, handing her in, and saying, in the cheery voice that was one of his chief fascinations,

"Yea, truly, fair dame, I know thou wouldst sooner trust Schlangenwald himself than me alone with thy charge. How goes it, my true knight?"

"Well, right well, my liege," said Ebbo, "save for my shame and grief."

"Thou art the last to be ashamed for that," said the good-natured prince. "Have I never seen my faithful vassals more bent on their own feuds than on my word?—I who reign over a set of kings, who brook no will but their own."

"And may we ask your pardon," said Ebbo, "not only for ourselves, but for the misguided men-at-arms?"

"What! the grewsome giant that was prepared with the axe, and the honest lad that wanted to do his duty by his father? I honour that lad, Freiherr; I would enrol him in my guard, but that probably he is better off here than with Massimiliano pochi danari, as the Italians call me. But what I came hither to say was this," and he spoke gravely: "thou art sincere in desiring reconciliation with the house of Schlangenwald?"

"With all my heart," said Ebbo, "do I loathe the miserable debt of blood for blood!"

"And," said Maximilian, "Graf Dankwart is of like mind. Bred from pagedom in his Prussian commandery, he has never been exposed to the irritations that have fed the spirit of strife, and he will be thankful to lay it aside. The question next is how to solemnize this reconciliation, ere your retainers on one side or the other do something to set you by the ears together again, which, judging by this morning's work, is not improbable."

"Alas! no," said Ebbo, "while I am laid by."

"Had you both been in our camp, you should have sworn friendship in my chapel. Now must Dankwart come hither to thee, as I trow he had best do, while I am here to keep the peace. See, friend Ebbo, we will have him here to-morrow; thy chaplain shall deck the altar here, the Father Abbot shall say mass, and ye shall swear peace and brotherhood before me. And," he added, taking Ebbo's hand, "I shall know how to trust thine oaths as of one who sets the fear of God above that of his king."

This was truly the only chance of impressing on the wild vassals of the two houses an obligation that perhaps might override their ancient hatred; and the Baron and his mother gladly submitted to the arrangement. Maximilian withdrew to give directions for summoning the persons required and Christina was soon obliged to leave her son, while she provided for her influx of guests.

Ebbo was alone till nearly the end of the supper below stairs. He had been dozing, when a cautious tread came up the turret steps, and he started, and called out, "Who goes there? I am not asleep."

"It is your kinsman, Freiherr," said a well-known voice; "I come by your mother's leave."

"Welcome, Sir Cousin," said Ebbo, holding out his hand. "You come to find everything changed."

"I have knelt in the chapel," said Wildschloss, gravely.

"And he loved you better than I!" said Ebbo.

"Your jealousy of me was a providential thing, for which all may be thankful," said Wildschloss gravely; "yet it is no small thing to lose the hope of so many years! However, young Baron, I have grave matter for your consideration. Know you the service on which I am to be sent? The Kaisar deems that the Armenians or some of the Christian nations on the skirts of the Ottoman empire might be made our allies, and attack the Turk in his rear. I am chosen as his envoy, and shall sail so soon as I can make my way to Venice. I only knew of the appointment since I came hither, he having been led thereto by letters brought him this day; and mayhap by the downfall of my hopes. He was peremptory, as his mood is, and seemed to think it no small favour," added Wildschloss, with some annoyance. "And meantime, what of my poor child? There she is in the cloister at Ulm, but an inheritance is a very mill-stone round the neck of an orphan maid. That insolent fellow, Lassla von Trautbach, hath already demanded to espouse the poor babe; he—a blood-stained, dicing, drunken rover, with whom I would not trust a dog that I loved! Yet my death would place her at the disposal of his father, who would give her at once to him. Nay, even his aunt, the abbess, will believe nothing against him, and hath even striven with me to have her betrothed at once. On the barest rumour of my death will they wed the poor little thing, and then woe to her, and woe to my vassals!"

"The King," suggested Ebbo. "Surely she might be made his ward."

"Young man," said Sir Kasimir, bending over him, and speaking in an undertone, "he may well have won your heart. As friend, when one is at his side, none can be so winning, or so sincere as he; but with all his brilliant gifts, he says truly of himself that he is a mere reckless huntsman. To-day, while I am with him, he would give me half Austria, or fight single-handed in my cause or Thekla's. Next month, when I am out of sight, comes Trautbach, just when his head is full of keeping the French out of Italy, or reforming the Church, or beating the Turk, or parcelling the empire into circles, or, maybe, of a new touch-hole for a cannon—nay, of a flower-garden, or of walking into a lion's den. He just says, 'Yea, well,' to be rid of the importunity, and all is over with my poor little maiden. Hare- brained and bewildered with schemes has he been as Romish King—how will it be with him as Kaisar? It is but of his wonted madness that he is here at all, when his Austrian states must be all astray for want of him. No, no; I would rather make a weathercock guardian to my daughter. You yourself are the only guard to whom I can safely intrust her."

"My sword as knight and kinsman—" began Ebbo.

"No, no; 'tis no matter of errant knight or distressed damsel. That is King Max's own line!" said Wildschloss, with a little of the irony that used to nettle Ebbo. "There is only one way in which you can save her, and that is as her husband."

Ebbo started, as well he might, but Sir Kasimir laid his hand on him with a gesture that bade him listen ere he spoke. "My first wish for my child," he said, "was to see her brought up by that peerless lady below stairs. The saints—in pity to one so like themselves—spared her the distress our union would have brought her. Now, it would be vain to place my little Thekla in her care, for Trautbach would easily feign my death, and claim his niece, nor are you of age to be made her guardian as head of our house. But, if this marriage rite were solemnized, then would her person and lands alike be yours, and I could leave her with an easy heart."

"But," said the confused, surprised Ebbo, "what can I do? They say I shall not walk for many weeks to come. And, even if I could, I am so young—I have so blundered in my dealings with my own mountaineers, and with this fatal bridge—how should I manage such estates as yours? Some better—"

"Look you, Ebbo," said Wildschloss; "you have erred—you have been hasty; but tell me where to find another youth, whose strongest purpose was as wise as your errors, or who cared for others' good more than for his own violence and vainglory? Brief as your time has been, one knows when one is on your bounds by the aspect of your serfs, the soundness of their dwellings, the prosperity of their crops and cattle above all, by their face and tone if one asks for their lord."

"Ah! it was Friedel they loved. They scarce knew me from Friedel."

"Such as you are, with all the blunders you have made and will make, you are the only youth I know to whom I could intrust my child or my lands. The old Wildschloss castle is a male fief, and would return to you, but there are domains since granted that will cause intolerable trouble and strife, unless you and my poor little heiress are united. As for age, you are—?"

"Eighteen next Easter."

"Then there are scarce eleven years between you. You will find the little one a blooming bride when your first deeds in arms have been fought out."

"And, if my mother trains her up," said Ebbo, thoughtfully, "she will be all the better daughter to her. But, Sir Cousin, you know I too must be going. So soon as I can brook the saddle, I must seek out and ransom my father."

"That is like to be a far shorter and safer journey than mine. The Genoese and Venetians understand traffic with the infidels for their captives, and only by your own fault could you get into danger. Even at the worst, should mishap befall you, you could so order matters as to leave your girl-widow in your mother's charge."

"Then," added Ebbo, "she would still have one left to love and cherish her. Sir Kasimir, it is well; though, if you knew me without my Friedel, you would repent of your bargain."

"Thanks from my heart," said Wildschloss, "but you need not be concerned. You have never been over-friendly with me even with Friedel at your side. But to business, my son. You will endure that title from me now? My time is short."

"What would you have me do? Shall I send the little one a betrothal ring, and ride to Ulm to wed and fetch her home in spring?"

"That may hardly serve. These kinsmen would have seized on her and the castle long ere that time. The only safety is the making wedlock as fast as it can be made with a child of such tender years. Mine is the only power that can make the abbess give her up, and therefore will I ride this moonlight night to Ulm, bring the little one back with me by the time the reconciliation be concluded, and then shall ye be wed by the Abbot of St. Ruprecht's, with the Kaisar for a witness, and thus will the knot be too strong for the Trautbachs to untie."

Ebbo looked disconcerted, and gasped, as if this were over-quick work.—"To-morrow!" he said. "Knows my mother?"

"I go to speak with her at once. The Kaisar's consent I have, as he says, 'If we have one vassal who has common sense and honesty, let us make the most of him.' Ah! my son, I shall return to see you his counsellor and friend."

Those days had no delicacies as to the lady's side taking the initiative: and, in effect, the wealth and power of Wildschloss so much exceeded those of the elder branch that it would have been presumptuous on Eberhard's part to have made the proposal. It was more a treaty than an affair of hearts, and Sir Kasimir had not even gone through the form of inquiring if Ebbo were fancy-free. It was true, indeed, that he was still a boy, with no passion for any one but his mother; but had he even formed a dream of a ladye love, it would scarcely have been deemed a rational objection. The days of romance were no days of romance in marriage.

Yet Christina, wedded herself for pure love, felt this obstacle strongly. The scheme was propounded to her over the hall fire by no less a person than Maximilian himself, and he, whose perceptions were extremely keen when he was not too much engrossed to use them, observed her reluctance through all her timid deference, and probed her reasons so successfully that she owned at last that, though it might sound like folly, she could scarce endure to see her son so bind himself that the romance of his life could hardly be innocent.

"Nay, lady," was the answer, in a tone of deep feeling. "Neither lands nor honours can weigh down the up-springing of true love;" and he bowed his head between his hands.

Verily, all the Low Countries had not impeded the true-hearted affection of Maximilian and Mary; and, though since her death his want of self-restraint had marred his personal character and morals, and though he was now on the point of concluding a most loveless political marriage, yet still Mary was—as he shows her as the Beatrice of both his strange autobiographical allegories—the guiding star of his fitful life; and in heart his fidelity was so unbroken that, when after a long pause he again looked up to Christina, he spoke as well understanding her feelings.

"I know what you would say, lady; your son hardly knows as yet how much is asked of him, and the little maid, to whom he vows his heart, is over-young to secure it. But, lady, I have often observed that men, whose family affections are as deep and fervent as your son's are for you and his brother, seldom have wandering passions, but that their love flows deep and steady in the channels prepared for it. Let your young Freiherr regard this damsel as his own, and you will see he will love her as such."

"I trust so, my liege."

"Moreover, if she turn out like the spiteful Trautbach folk," said Maximilian, rather wickedly, "plenty of holes can be picked in a baby-wedding. No fear of its over-firmness. I never saw one come to good; only he must keep firm hold on the lands."

This was not easy to answer, coming from a prince who had no small experience in premature bridals coming to nothing, and Christina felt that the matter was taken out of her hands, and that she had no more to do but to enjoy the warm-hearted Kaisar's praises of her son.

In fact, the general run of nobles were then so boorish and violent compared with the citizens, that a nobleman who possessed intellect, loyalty, and conscience was so valuable to the sovereign that Maximilian was rejoiced to do all that either could bind him to his service or increase his power. The true history of this expedition on the Emperor's part was this—that he had consulted Kasimir upon the question of the Debateable Ford and the feud of Adlerstein and Schlangenwald, asking further how his friend had sped in the wooing of the fair widow, to which he remembered having given his consent at Ulm.

Wildschloss replied that, though backed up by her kindred at Ulm, he had made no progress in consequence of the determined opposition of her two sons, and he had therefore resolved to wait a while, and let her and the young Baron feel their inability to extricate themselves from the difficulties that were sure to beset them, without his authority, influence, and experience—fully believing that some predicament might arise that would bring the mother to terms, if not the sons.

This disaster did seem to have fallen out, and he had meant at once to offer himself to the lady as her supporter and advocate, able to bring about all her son could desire; though he owned that his hopes would have been higher if the survivor had been the gentle, friendly Friedmund, rather than the hot and imperious Eberhard, who he knew must be brought very low ere his objections would be withdrawn.

The touch of romance had quite fascinated Maximilian. He would see the lady and her son. He would make all things easy by the personal influence that he so well knew how to exert, backed by his imperial authority; and both should see cause to be thankful to purchase consent to the bridge-building, and pardon for the fray, by the marriage between the widow and Sir Kasimir.

But the Last of the Knights was a gentleman, and the meek dignity of his hostess had hindered him from pressing on her any distasteful subject until her son's explanation of the uncertainty of her husband's death had precluded all mention of this intention. Besides, Maximilian was himself greatly charmed by Ebbo's own qualities—partly perhaps as an intelligent auditor, but also by his good sense, high spirit, and, above all, by the ready and delicate tact that had both penetrated and respected the disguise. Moreover, Maximilian, though a faulty, was a devout man, and could appreciate the youth's unswerving truth, under circumstances that did, in effect, imperil him more really than his guest. In this mood, Maximilian felt disposed to be rid to the very utmost of poor Sir Kasimir's unlucky attachment to a wedded lady; and receiving letters suggestive of the Eastern mission, instantly decided that it would only be doing as he would be done by instantly to order the disappointed suitor off to the utmost parts of the earth, where he would much have liked to go himself, save for the unlucky clog of all the realm of Germany. That Sir Kasimir had any tie to home he had for the moment entirely forgotten; and, had he remembered it, the knight was so eminently fitted to fulfil his purpose, that it could hardly have been regarded. But, when Wildschloss himself devised his little heiress' s union with the head of the direct line, it was a most acceptable proposal to the Emperor, who set himself to forward it at once, out of policy, and as compensation to all parties.

And so Christina's gentle remonstrance was passed by. Yet, with all her sense of the venture, it was thankworthy to look back on the trembling anxiety with which she had watched her boy's childhood, and all his temptations and perils, and compare her fears with his present position: his alliance courted, his wisdom honoured, the child of the proud, contemned outlaw received as the favourite of the Emperor, and the valued ally of her own honoured burgher world. Yet he was still a mere lad. How would it be for the future?

Would he be unspoiled? Yes, even as she already viewed one of her twins as the star on high—nay, when kneeling in the chapel, her dazzling tears made stars of the glint of the light reflected in his bright helmet—might she not trust that the other would yet run his course to and fro, as the spark in the stubble?



CHAPTER XXIII: THE ALTAR OF PEACE



No one could bear to waken the young Baron till the sun had risen high enough to fall on his face and unclose his eyes.

"Mother" (ever his first word), "you have let me sleep too long."

"Thou didst wake too long, I fear me."

"I hoped you knew it not. Yes, my wound throbbed sore, and the wonders of the day whirled round my brain like the wild huntsman's chase."

"And, cruel boy, thou didst not call to me."

"What, with such a yesterday, and such a morrow for you? while, chance what may, I can but lie still. I thought I must call, if I were still so wretched, when the last moonbeam faded; but, behold, sleep came, and therewith my Friedel sat by me, and has sung songs of peace ever since."

"And hath lulled thee to content, dear son?"

"Content as the echo of his voice and the fulfilment of his hope can make me," said Ebbo.

And so Christina made her son ready for the day's solemnities, arraying him in a fine holland shirt with exquisite broidery of her own on the collar and sleeves, and carefully disposing his long glossy, dark brown hair so as to fall on his shoulders as he lay propped up by cushions. She would have thrown his crimson mantle round him, but he repelled it indignantly. "Gay braveries for me, while my Friedel is not yet in his resting-place? Here—the black velvet cloak."

"Alas, Ebbo! it makes thee look more of a corpse than a bridegroom. Thou wilt scare thy poor little spouse. Ah! it was not thus I had fancied myself decking thee for thy wedding."

"Poor little one!" said Ebbo. "If, as your uncle says, mourning is the seed of joy, this bridal should prove a gladsome one! But let her prove a loving child to you, and honour my Friedel's memory, then shall I love her well. Do not fear, motherling; with the roots of hatred and jealousy taken out of the heart, even sorrow is such peace that it is almost joy."

It was over early for pain and sorrow to have taught that lesson, thought the mother, as with tender tears she gave place to the priest, who was to begin the solemnities of the day by shriving the young Baron. It was Father Norbert, who had in this very chamber baptized the brothers, while their grandmother was plotting the destruction of their godfather, even while he gave Friedmund his name of peace,—Father Norbert, who had from the very first encouraged the drooping, heart-stricken, solitary Christina not to be overcome of evil, but to overcome evil with good.

A temporary altar was erected between the windows, and hung with the silk and embroidery belonging to that in the chapel: a crucifix was placed on it, with the shrine of the stone of Nicaea, one or two other relics brought on St. Ruprecht's cloister, and a beautiful mother-of-pearl and gold pyx also from the abbey, containing the host. These were arranged by the chaplain, Father Norbert, and three of his brethren from the abbey. And then the Father Abbot, a kindly, dignified old man, who had long been on friendly terms with the young Baron, entered; and after a few kind though serious words to him, assumed a gorgeous cope stiff with gold embroidery, and, standing by the altar, awaited the arrival of the other assistants at the ceremony.

The slender, youthful-looking, pensive lady of the castle, in her wonted mourning dress, was courteously handed to her son's bedside by the Emperor. He was in his plain buff leathern hunting garb, unornamented, save by the rich clasp of his sword-belt and his gold chain, and his head was only covered by the long silken locks of fair hair that hung round his shoulders; but, now that his large keen dark blue eyes were gravely restrained, and his eager face composed, his countenance was so majestic, his bearing so lofty, that not all his crowns could have better marked his dignity.

Behind him came a sunburnt, hardy man, wearing the white mantle and black fleur-de-lis-pointed cross of the Teutonic Order. A thrill passed through Ebbo's veins as he beheld the man who to him represented the murderer of his brother and both his grandfathers, the cruel oppressor of his father, and the perpetrator of many a more remote, but equally unforgotten, injury. And in like manner Sir Dankwart beheld the actual slayer of his father, and the heir of a long score of deadly retribution. No wonder then that, while the Emperor spoke a few words of salutation and inquiry, gracious though not familiar, the two foes scanned one another with a shiver of mutual repulsing, and a sense that they would fain have fought it out as in the good old times.

However, Ebbo only beheld a somewhat dull, heavy, honest-looking visage of about thirty years old, good-nature written in all its flat German features, and a sort of puzzled wonder in the wide light eyes that stared fixedly at him, no doubt in amazement that the mighty huge-limbed Wolfgang could have been actually slain by the delicately-framed youth, now more colourless than ever in consequence of the morning's fast. Schleiermacher was also present, and the chief followers on either hand had come into the lower part of the room—Hatto, Heinz, and Koppel, looking far from contented; some of the Emperor's suite; and a few attendants of Schlangenwald, like himself connected with the Teutonic Order.

The Emperor spoke: "We have brought you together, Herr Graff von Schlangenwald, and Herr Freiherr von Adlerstein, because ye have given us reason to believe you willing to lay aside the remembrance of the foul and deadly strifes of your forefathers, and to live as good Christians in friendship and brotherhood."

"Sire, it is true," said Schlangenwald; and "It is true," said Ebbo.

"That is well," replied Maximilian. "Nor can our reign better begin than by the closing of a breach that has cost the land some of its bravest sons. Dankwart von Schlangenwald, art thou willing to pardon the heir of Adlerstein for having slain thy father in free and honourable combat, as well as, doubtless, for other deeds of his ancestors, more than I know or can specify?"

"Yea, truly; I pardon him, my liege, as befits my vow."

"And thou, Eberhard von Adlerstein, dost thou put from thee vengeance for thy twin brother's death, and all the other wrongs that thine house has suffered?"

"I put revenge from me for ever."

"Ye agree, further, then, instead of striving as to your rights to the piece of meadow called the Debateable Strand, and to the wrecks of burthens there cast up by the stream, ye will unite with the citizens of Ulm in building a bridge over the Braunwasser, where, your mutual portions thereof being decided by the Swabian League, toll may be taken from all vehicles and beasts passing there over?"

"We agree," said both knights.

"And I, also, on behalf of the two guilds of Ulm," added Moritz Schleiermacher.

"Likewise," continued the Emperor, "for avoidance of debate, and to consecrate the spot that has caused so much contention, ye will jointly erect a church, where may be buried both the relatives who fell in the late unhappy skirmish, and where ye will endow a perpetual mass for their souls, and those of others of your two races."

"Thereto I willingly agree," said the Teutonic knight. But to Ebbo it was a shock that the pure, gentle Friedmund should thus be classed with his treacherous assassin; and he had almost declared that it would be sacrilege, when he received from the Emperor a look of stern, surprised command, which reminded him that concession must not be all on one side, and that he could not do Friedel a greater wrong than to make him a cause of strife. So, though they half choked him, he contrived to utter the words, "I consent."

"And in token of amity I here tear up and burn all the feuds of Adlerstein," said Schlangenwald, producing from his pouch a collection of hostile literature, beginning from a crumpled strip of yellow parchment and ending with a coarse paper missive in the clerkly hand of burgher-bred Hugh Sorel, and bearing the crooked signatures of the last two Eberhards of Adlerstein—all with great seals of the eagle shield appended to them. A similar collection— which, with one or two other family defiances, and the letters of investiture recently obtained at Ulm, formed the whole archives of Adlerstein—had been prepared within Ebbo's reach; and each of the two, taking up a dagger, made extensive gashes in these documents, and then—with no mercy to the future antiquaries, who would have gloated over them—the whole were hurled into the flames on the hearth, where the odour they emitted, if not grateful to the physical sense, should have been highly agreeable to the moral.

"Then, holy Father Abbot," said Maximilian, "let us ratify this happy and Christian reconciliation by the blessed sacrifice of peace, over which these two faithful knights shall unite in swearing good-will and brotherhood."

Such solemn reconciliations were frequent, but, alas were too often a mockery. Here, however, both parties were men who felt the awe of the promise made before the Pardon-winner of all mankind. Ebbo, bred up by his mother in the true life of the Church, and comparatively apart from practical superstitions, felt the import to the depths of his inmost soul, with a force heightened by his bodily state of nervous impressibility; and his wan, wasted features and dark shining eyes had a strange spiritual beam, "half passion and half awe," as he followed the words of universal forgiveness and lofty praise that he had heard last in his anguished trance, when his brother lay dying beside him, and leaving him behind. He knew now that it was for this.

His deep repressed ardour and excitement were no small contrast to the sober, matter-of-fact demeanour of the Teutonic knight, who comported himself with the mechanical decorum of an ecclesiastic, but quite as one who meant to keep his word. Maximilian served the mass in his royal character as sub-deacon. He was fond of so doing, either from humility, or love of incongruity, or both. No one, however, communicated except the clergy and the parties concerned— Dankwart first, as being monk as well as knight, then Eberhard and his mother; and then followed, interposed into the rite, the oath of pardon, friendship, and brotherhood administered by the abbot, and followed by the solemn kiss of peace. There was now no recoil; Eberhard raised himself to meet the lips of his foe, and his heart went with the embrace. Nay, his inward ear dwelt on Friedmund's song mingling with the concluding chants of praise.

The service ended, it was part of the pledge of amity that the reconciled enemies should break their fast together, and a collation of white bread and wine was provided for the purpose. The Emperor tried to promote free and friendly talk between the two adversaries, but not with great success; for Dankwart, though honest and sincere, seemed extremely dull. He appeared to have few ideas beyond his Prussian commandery and its routine discipline, and to be lost in a castle where all was at his sole will and disposal, and he caught eagerly at all proposals made to him as if they were new lights. As, for instance, that some impartial arbitrator should be demanded from the Swabian League to define the boundary; and that next Rogation- tide the two knights should ride or climb it in company, while meantime the serfs should be strictly charged not to trespass, and any transgressor should be immediately escorted to his own lord.

"But," quoth Sir Dankwart, in a most serious tone, "I am told that a she-bear wons in a den on yonder crag, between the pass you call the Gemsbock's and the Schlangenwald valley. They told me the right in it had never been decided, and I have not been up myself. To say truth, I have lived so long in the sand plains as to have lost my mountain legs, and I hesitated to see if a hunter could mount thither for fear of fresh offence; but, if she bide there till Rogation-tide, it will be ill for the lambs."

"Is that all?" cried Maximilian. "Then will I, a neutral, kill your bear for you, gentlemen, so that neither need transgress this new crag of debate. I'll go down and look at your bear spears, friend Ebbo, and be ready so soon as Kasimir has done with his bridal."

"That crag!" cried Ebbo. "Little good will it do either of us. Sire, it is a mere wall of sloping rock, slippery as ice, and with only a stone or matting of ivy here and there to serve as foothold."

"Where bear can go, man can go," replied the Kaisar.

"Oh, yes! We have been there, craving your pardon, Herr Graf," said Ebbo, "after a dead chamois that rolled into a cleft, but it is the worst crag on all the hill, and the frost will make it slippery. Sire, if you do venture it, I conjure you to take Koppel, and climb by the rocks from the left, not the right, which looks easiest. The yellow rock, with a face like a man's, is the safer; but ach, it is fearful for one who knows not the rocks."

"If I know not the rocks, all true German rocks know me," smiled Maximilian, to whom the danger seemed to be such a stimulus that he began to propose the bear-hunt immediately, as an interlude while waiting for the bride.

However, at that moment, half-a-dozen horsemen were seen coming up from the ford, by the nearer path, and a forerunner arrived with the tidings that the Baron of Adlerstein Wildschloss was close behind with the little Baroness Thekla.

Half the moonlight night had Sir Kasimir and his escort ridden; and, after a brief sleep at the nearest inn outside Ulm, he had entered in early morning, demanded admittance at the convent, made short work with the Abbess Ludmilla's arguments, claimed his daughter, and placing her on a cushion before him on his saddle, had borne her away, telling her of freedom, of the kind lady, and the young knight who had dazzled her childish fancy.

Christina went down to receive her. There was no time to lose, for the huntsman Kaisar was bent on the slaughter of his bear before dark, and, if he were to be witness of the wedding, it must be immediate. He was in a state of much impatience, which he beguiled by teasing his friend Wildschloss by reminding him how often he himself had been betrothed, and had managed to slip his neck out of the noose. "And, if my Margot be not soon back on my hands, I shall give the French credit," he said, tossing his bear-spear in the air, and catching it again. "Why, this bride is as long of busking her as if she were a beauty of seventeen! I must be off to my Lady Bearess."

Thus nothing could be done to prepare the little maiden but to divest her of her mufflings, and comb out her flaxen hair, crowning it with a wreath which Christina had already woven from the myrtle of her own girlhood, scarcely waiting to answer the bewildered queries and entreaties save by caresses and admonitions to her to be very good.

Poor little thing! She was tired, frightened, and confused; and, when she had been brought upstairs, she answered the half smiling, half shy greeting of her bridegroom with a shudder of alarm, and the exclamation, "Where is the beautiful young knight? That's a lady going to take the veil lying under the pall."

"You look rather like a little nun yourself," said Ebbo, for she wore a little conventual dress, "but we must take each other for such as we are;" and, as she hid her face and clung to his mother, he added in a more cheerful, coaxing tone, "You once said you would be my wife."