The Essential James Branch Cabell Collection - James Branch Cabell

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you know me to be vile. Then have a care of me! The strange woman am I, of whom we read that her house is the way to hell, going down to the chambers of death. Hoh, many strong men have been slain by me, and in the gray time to come will many others be slain by me, it may be; but never you among them, my Gregory, who are more wary, and more merciful, and who know that I have need to lay aside at least one comfortable thought against eternity."

      "I concede you to have been unwise--" he hoarsely began.

      About them fell the dying leaves, of many glorious colors, but the air of this new day seemed raw and chill.

      Then Rosamund came through the opening in the hedge. "Now, choose," she said; "the woman offers life and high place and wealth, and it may be, a greater love than I am capable of giving you. I offer a dishonorable death within the moment."

      And again, with that peculiar and imperious gesture, the man flung back his head, and he laughed. Said Gregory Darrell:

      "I am I! and I will so to live that I may face without shame not only God, but also my own scrutiny." He wheeled upon the Queen and spoke henceforward very leisurely. "I love you; all my life long I have loved you, Ysabeau, and even now I love you: and you, too, dear Rosamund, I love, though with a difference. And every fibre of my being lusts for the power that you would give me, Ysabeau, and for the good which I would do with it in the England which I or blustering Roger Mortimer must rule; as every fibre of my being lusts for the man that I would be could I choose death without debate. And I think also of the man that you would make of me, my Rosamund.

      "The man! And what is this man, this Gregory Darrell, that his welfare should be considered?--an ape who chatters to himself of kinship with the archangels while filthily he digs for groundnuts! This much I know, at bottom.

      "Yet more clearly do I perceive that this same man, like all his fellows, is a maimed god who walks the world dependent upon many wise and evil counsellors. He must measure, to a hair's-breadth, every content of the world by means of a bloodied sponge, tucked somewhere in his skull, a sponge which is ungeared by the first cup of wine and ruined by the touch of his own finger. He must appraise all that he judges with no better instruments than two bits of colored jelly, with a bungling makeshift so maladroit that the nearest horologer's apprentice could have devised a more accurate device. In fine, each man is under penalty condemned to compute eternity with false weights, to estimate infinity with a yard-stick: and he very often does it, and chooses his own death without debate. For though, 'If then I do that which I would not I consent unto the law,' saith even an Apostle; yet a braver Pagan answers him, 'Perceive at last that thou hast in thee something better and more divine than the things which cause the various effects and, as it were, pull thee by the strings.'

      "There lies the choice which every man must face,--whether rationally, as his reason goes, to accept his own limitations and make the best of his allotted prison-yard? or stupendously to play the fool and swear even to himself (while his own judgment shrieks and proves a flat denial), that he is at will omnipotent? You have chosen long ago, my poor proud Ysabeau; and I choose now, and differently: for poltroon that I am! being now in a cold drench of terror, I steadfastly protest I am not very much afraid, and I choose death without any more debate."

      It was toward Rosamund that the Queen looked, and smiled a little pitifully. "Should Queen Ysabeau be angry or vexed or very cruel now, my Rosamund? for at bottom she is glad."

      And the Queen said also: "I give you back your plighted word. I ride homeward to my husks, but you remain. Or rather, the Countess of Farrington departs for the convent of Ambresbury, disconsolate in her widowhood and desirous to have done with worldly affairs. It is most natural she should relinquish to her beloved and only brother all her dower-lands--or so at least Messire de Berners acknowledges. Here, then, is the grant, my Gregory, that conveys to you those lands of Ralph de Belomys which last year I confiscated. And this tedious Messire de Berners is willing now--he is eager to have you for a son-in-law."

      About them fell the dying leaves, of many glorious colors, but the air of this new day seemed raw and chill, while, very calmly, Dame Ysabeau took Sir Gregory's hand and laid it upon the hand of Rosamund Eastney. "Our paladin is, in the outcome, a mortal man, and therefore I do not altogether envy you. Yet he has his moments, and you are capable. Serve, then, not only his desires but mine also, dear Rosamund."

      There was a silence. The girl spoke as though it was a sacrament. "I will, madame and Queen."

      Thus did the Queen end her holiday.

      A little later the Countess of Farrington rode from Ordish with all her train save one; and riding from that place, where love was, she sang very softly.

      Sang Ysabeau:

      "As with her dupes dealt Circe Life deals with hers, for she Reshapes them without mercy, And shapes them swinishly, To wallow swinishly, And for eternity;

      "Though, harder than the witch was, Life, changing not the whole, Transmutes the body, which was Proud garment of the soul, And briefly drugs the soul, Whose ruin is her goal;

      "And means by this thereafter A subtler mirth to get, And mock with bitterer laughter Her helpless dupes' regret, Their swinish dull regret For what they half forget."

      And within the hour came Hubert Frayne to Ordish, on a foam-specked horse, as he rode to announce to the King's men the King's barbaric murder overnight, at Berkeley Castle, by Queen Ysabeau's order.

      "Ride southward," said Lord Berners, and panted as they buckled on his disused armor; "but harkee, Frayne! if you pass the Countess of Farrington's company, speak no syllable of your news, since it is not convenient that a lady so thoroughly and so praise-worthily--Lord, Lord, how I have fattened!--so intent on holy things, in fine, should have her meditations disturbed by any such unsettling tidings. Hey, son-in-law?"

      Sir Gregory Darrell laughed, very bitterly. "He that is without blemish among you--" he said. Then they armed completely, and went forth to battle against the murderous harlot.

      THE END OF THE FOURTH NOVEL

      FOOTNOTES:

      [Footnote 1: For this perplexing matter the curious may consult Paul Verville's _Notice sur la vie de Nicolas de Caen, p. 93 et seq_. The indebtedness to Antoine Riczi is, of course, conceded by Nicolas in his "EPILOGUE."]

      [Footnote 2: She was the daughter of King Ferdinand of Leon and Castile, whose conversion to sainthood the inquisitive may find recorded elsewhere.]

      [Footnote 3: Not without indulgence in anachronism. But Nicolas, be it repeated, was no Gradgrindian.]

      [Footnote 4: Nicolas gives this ballad in full, but, for obvious reasons, his translator would prefer to do otherwise.]

      V

      THE STORY OF THE HOUSEWIFE

      "Selh que m blasma vostr' amor ni m defen Non podon far en re mon cor mellor, Ni'l dous dezir qu'ieu ai de vos major, Ni l'enveya' ni'l dezir, ni'l talen."

      THE FIFTH NOVEL.--PHILIPPA OF HAINAULT DARES TO LOVE UNTHRIFTILY, AND WITH THE PRODIGALITY OF HER AFFECTION SHAMES TREACHERY, AND COMMON-SENSE, AND HIGH ROMANCE, QUITE STOLIDLY; BUT, AS LOVING GOES, IS OVERTOPPED BY HER MORE STOLID SQUIRE.

      _The Story of the Housewife_

      In the year of grace 1326, upon Walburga's Eve, some three hours after sunset (thus Nicolas begins), had you visited a certain garden on the outskirts of Valenciennes, you might there have stumbled upon a big, handsome boy, prone on the turf, where by turns he groaned and vented himself in sullen curses. His profanity had its palliation. Heir to England though he was, you must know that this boy's father in the flesh had hounded him from England, as more recently

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