THE SAFFRON CROSS

Moon and stars began to pale. The camp-followers up the stream had poultry with them, for from that direction a cock crew and was answered. The herd-girl waked the jongleur. “I have black bread in my scrip,” she said. “Look if you have not the same.”

He found a portion of a loaf; they sat by the brook Saint Laurent and he cut the bread with his dagger and they ate and drank of the water.

Light strengthened, it became grey-pearl under the pines. “Chill! chill!” said the herd-girl. “Often I think of how it would be to lie out under the sky, winter, spring, summer and now! So many thousands do.—Now, we will be going.”

They moved along the bank of the stream. “We go north,” said Garin’s mind. “Will she go to the King at Paris?” But he waited without question until she was ready to say. Jongleur and herd-girl, they walked through the grey and dewy world. The trees now stood further apart, they were coming to open ground. To their right the east showed stripes of carnation. The cocks crew again; the mutter and murmur of the night suddenly took height and depth, became inarticulate clamour of the day and an encamped, huge host. The light strengthened. Between the stems of trees they saw, at no great distance, huts and booths of autumn branches. They stood still for a little in the flush of the brightening dawn—divers regarding the sea into which they were to plunge, the sea whose every wave was inimical. They looked, then, each turning a little, their eyes met. It was but for a moment; immediately they went forward.

Elias of Montaudon was all dusk and green of garb, and dusk of brow and cheek. But his dagger hung in a gilt sheath and his lute by a red ribbon, and his eyes were grey with glints of blue. Jael the herd, too, was hued like a Martinmas leaf, and her hair hung over her bosom and to her knee, in long, dusk braids. The jongleur had a vision of dark hair loosened and spread in elf-lock and wave, half hiding a face more girlish than this face, but as this face might have been, eight years agone. Impossibilities—dreams, phantasies, magic somewhere, impossibilities!

They were now almost clear of the broken ground and the remnant of wood. They looked back and saw Roche-de-FrÊne lifted against the solemn sky; stood still and for a minute or more gazed, and as though the walls were glass, viewed the tense life within.

“Did you ever see Richard of Aquitaine?” asked the herd-girl.

“No,” answered the jongleur, and felt a momentary wonder, then the dawn of a conjecture.

The herd-girl turned again to their wandering and he followed her, then walked beside her.... Leaving the last group of trees, they came with suddenness upon a little pebbly shore of the stream and upon half a dozen women, kneeling and beginning the washing of clothes. Several ragged children sat by a fire of sticks and made an outcry when the two came from the wood. The women looked up. “HÈ! a jongleur!” cried one. “Come trill me a love-lay while I wash my sergeant’s one shirt!”

Elias and Jael came near, sat by the fire of sticks, and felt the warmth pleasant. The first drew his hand across the strings of his lute and sang:—

“Sweet May, come! the lovers’ sweet season.
In May Love seems the height of reason!
Try your love when the year grows older,
The birds depart and the earth is colder.—”

He stopped. “Saint Michael! the mist is yet in my throat. Your fire, gossips, is the sweet, crackling singer—”

One of the women sat back upon her heels, and, hands on hips, regarded the two. “From what camp are you? You are not of our camp?”

“No. We have been over yonder—near to the young count.”

“If Cap-du-Loup saw you he would have your lute broken and you sent to wait on fighting men! Cap-du-Loup loatheth jongleurs and monks! Your douce there he might take—but no, I think that he would not. She is not fair, and she has the look of one with claws—”

“I have claws, sister,” said Jael. “But I know how to keep them sheathed.” She yawned. “This good fire makes you sleepy. Pretty children, let me rest my head upon that log for a bit! Play to us, Elias, if you cannot sing.”

She put her head down, closed her eyes, lying in the firelight. The jongleur played and he played strange quaint airs that made the washerwomen laugh, nod their heads, and pat with their hands. After this he played quieter strains, a dreamy and monotonous music, humming to it a thought of the East. They listened, then turned to their rubbing and beating of clothes, working as in a dream, to a soothed and unquestioning mood.

Jael sat up, warmed her hands at the fire, looked to the west. On the other side of the brook of Saint Laurent a trampling sound arose and grew. The mist yielded a grey vision of horsemen approaching in number. They loomed, there ran before them noise—harsh voices, ribald laughter. The washerwomen sprang to their feet, gathered hastily into their arms the scattered garments, seized by the hands the children.

“Jacques le Noir and his men! Get out of their way! Jesu! What a world where your own side tramples and abuses—”

They turned up the stream, quarrelling as they went. With them and the children went the jongleur and the herd-girl, all faring along the bank together, in the mist that was now being torn by golden arrows. One of the women, with a load of wet, half-washed clothing, let fall a part of the burden. The herd-girl, stooping, gathered it up. “I’ll help you here, sister!” A child struck its foot against a stone, fell, and began to cry. The jongleur lifted him to his shoulder. Behind them they heard Jacques le Noir splash with his horsemen into the stream. The washerwomen and the two from Roche-de-FrÊne went on like one family or like old acquaintances, and so came into the thickly peopled camp of the followers of Cap-du-Loup and his fighting men.

The sun was now risen. The pied and various world in which they found themselves had breakfasted or was breakfasting. Noise prevailed, self-wrought into some kind of harmony. Here were women, soldiers’ and others’ wives, and frank harlots, and here were children, seraphic, impish, and all between. Here harboured men of sorts, men who cared for horses, were smiths, menders of harness and armour, fitters of lance-heads to lances, fletchers of arrows. Here were barber-surgeons, cooks, and servitors of servitors. Sutlers and merchants of small wares showed both men and women, as did also the amusement-mongers. There abounded folk of nondescript and uncertain trades, or of no trades at all, mere followers and feeders, a true rabble. And there were gamesters and cunning thieves.

Elias of Montaudon and Jael the herd came into this throng in the company of the women who had washed by the brook of Saint Laurent. The air was yet hung with mist-wreaths; they entered with these about them, and none took especial notice.

The washerwomen did not stray from the brook. Down they flung their half-washed, wet, and dripping loads, and complained loudly to any who would listen of Jacques le Noir and his demon band. Some listened, some did not; the most had recitals of their own. Voices sprang like grass-blades, were confounded.... With the others Jael threw upon the ground her load, Elias set down the child he had carried. Then in the confusion they went away, leaving without staying word or hand the group that had brought them thus far. They followed the brook Saint Laurent and they passed many folk, buried in their own concerns. To an eye not observant beyond a certain point, the two would seem a loitering couple of the camp, vacant and idly straying, being set at the moment to no task. None greeted them as acquaintances—but there seemed here no eye to note that fact. Units and groups shifted like the bits of glass in a kaleidoscope. Continually the tube was shaken and there came up new arrangements. The two went on, and none saw in them wandering bodies from outer and hostile space, pursuing a course athwart the field of the kaleidoscope.... The mist was gone, the sun poured light; looking back, they saw Roche-de-FrÊne, indeed, but always farther, farther from them.

They approached the edge of the camp-followers’ demesne. It frayed out among trees and gullies and heaps of refuse. Presently came a strip of bare earth, recently burned over, licked clean by the flame, and desert of human works or being. Beyond, flung widely, grey reefs across their way, were soldiers’ tents. Jael the herd’s lips moved. “Come down, for a minute, into this hollow where none will see.”

Descending a miniature slope, they stood in a narrow space between walls of parched earth. The camp behind them, the camp before them, sank abruptly from view, though the sound of each remained. Roche-de-FrÊne sank from view; they were roofed by the blue sky. A lizard ran from stone to stone; a wind, circling the place, lifted into air dead leaves and particles of earth. The herd-girl, seating herself, opened the scrip that she carried. The jongleur watched her take from it something at which he started. It was a piece of saffron-coloured cloth, cut in the shape of a cross. The upright measured near two feet, it and the arms had a palm’s breadth. The next thing that she did was to find a needle and thread; then she took her frieze mantle, and after an instant of looking into the pure, deep heavens, began to fasten upon the mantle the saffron cross.

Garin held his breath. Holy Church had many penances for erring souls, and the most were acquiesced in with the least possible inner pain, and some were dreaded, and a few were direfully dreaded, shudderingly looked upon. The most were burdensome but matter-of-fact; some gave the weak flesh sharp pain, but did not necessarily humble one in the eyes of the world and the neighbours. A certain number had for label, Humiliation, and they were dreaded. A few were more sinister than these, frightening the imagination. One or two brought a dark terror, dark and cold. These did not partake of the nature of prostrations, or of prayers in multiplied repetition, or of flagellations, or pilgrimages, or amercement of goods. Flagellation was of temporary account; pilgrimages a way to see the world as well as to wipe out sin; loss in money and land a serious thing, God knew! but though bitter, without ignominy. None of these came under the same sky with excommunication, which was not penance, but doom and living death! But to wear a cross like this came under the same sky.

It carried no physical pain with it, nor imprisonment within material walls. Of itself, it did not dip into the purse, or shear away house and land. Of itself, it did not say, “Leave your home, penitent, and wander to many a shrine, know many calvaries!” Incidentally it might have come after—most often it did come after—these lesser things. It was rarely bound, like the mark of Cain, upon the young in offending. It came somewhat rarely upon any but the poor. So long as there was any wealth there might be compounding for something less than the millstone.... It was not likely to be imposed for any less time than a long, long while. Perhaps it was worn for years, perhaps they died wearing it. It weighed hardly anything materially, but it weighed life down. The people regarded it with superstitious horror. It said, “Lo, shadow and substance of sin that may hardly be pardoned! Lo, here the Obdurate, the Ancient and Resigned to the Prince of the Power of the Air—preserved that ye may see—set aside in the midst of you that ye may know! Not to be touched, not to be dealt with in pleasant, human ways—any more than a leper!”

Garin looked. His face had paled beneath the stain applied by the true Elias. “Ah!” he said, “what people of the future comes, my Lady Audiart, from such as you!”

The other stood up, her sewing finished. She drew the cloak over her shoulders, and her right arm and side showed the saffron cross. Her dark eyes met Garin’s. “Now you are my brother. We are twin, and Saint Peter himself would not have you utterly forsake me! Let us go.”

They came out from the crack in the earth and proceeded to cross the burned strip. All in all, they had now penetrated some distance in the dragon’s field. When they looked over their shoulder, Roche-de-FrÊne yet showed with grandeur in the morning light, against the south-east quarter of a fleckless sky. But it showed as somewhat distant.... Garin understood now that they were to cross the dragon’s field, to leave it behind them, to escape as quickly as might be from its poisonous breath, from the reach of its talons. He saw also that, danger-grown as was their path of travel, it was the least so that should have been taken from the beleaguered place. The dragon lay here, too, but not, perhaps, the brain nor eyes of him.

The day shone bright and cool. Directly ahead a large campfire yet smoked and smouldered, and right and left of it and beyond grew the somewhat tattered tents of Cap-du-Loup’s force. In the assault, on the way to the assault, Cap-du-Loup drove his men like a storm. At other times he let them live as they would.

There were Free Companions, a score or so, around the fire. These caught sight of the two upon the burned and blackened strip between them and the followers’ camp. There was passage to and fro, as the gods of license knew! Many figures of the world strayed almost at will, found lanes enough through the loose warp of the time’s armies. A woman and a jongleur might find a groove, so easy, so worn—There were, however, toll-gates.

Men who had been lying on the ground sat up. “Come across! Come across!” called one. Another rose to his feet and went to touch first, so claim first. A third sprang up, ran after, but a young giant, starting fourth, outstripped him, gained on the first. The men had been idle after a night’s sleep. Breakfast of goat’s flesh and bread was digested, the slight enough camp tasks disposed of, after which came idleness and yawning. Cap-du-Loup meant to join Aimeric the Bastard in a night attack upon Roche-de-FrÊne’s western gate, and until then the storm slept. The Free Companions were ready for movement, enterprise, deviltry. They rose from the ashy fire, and finding pleasure in stretching of the limbs, raced after their fellows. The distance was a pygmy one; immediately they were at their goal—the giant just the first.

He put his hands upon the woman. “Come, my mie—come, my jewel!” The one who had started first began to clamour that he was first; there arose a noise as from any brute pack. The giant, dragged at by his fellows, half turned, turning with him her he grasped. The saffron cross came into view.

The Free Companion’s hands dropped. He, and every man as he saw it, gave back. The recoil left black earth between them and Jael and Elias. Quarrelling and laughter alike sank. Here was neither wooing nor taking, but a hand stole down, picked up a stone and threw it. It struck her, then she spoke. “Leave to the cross them who wear it, brave soldiers!”

The giant came from a hamlet that tilled Abbey fields, and he was wise beyond his fellows in what the Church said. Moreover he was by nature unresistant to Authority. It was not he who had thrown the stone, and now he struck down the arm of one who gathered a second missile. “Abbot Arnaut told us we mustn’t ever do that! If you do, God the Father’ll lengthen your score—burn you a year longer in Purgatory!”

“It’s the serpent of sin.—Naught’s doing but stoning!”

“You can’t strike man or woman when they’ve touched sanctuary! Yellow cross’s a kind of sanctuary—”

The giant found some upon his side. “That’s true! Father Andrew preached a sermon about it, Saint John Baptist’s day!—You don’t break into a house marked for plague. Holy Church says, ‘This cross’s my seal. I punish, and don’t you be trying to better it!’”

“That’s true! Holy Church says, ‘Have no communion, for good or for ill! Here is something fearful and not like it was mortal!’”

The black earth widened about Jael and Elias. “What is the man doing with her?” cried the first runner.

Another yet more reckless lifted voice. “Is a jongleur to be a heathen and we can’t? Is he to give the dare to a Free Companion?”

Despite the giant and those backing him, the pack came nearer, narrowing the black mark. Garin spoke. He was accustomed to lead and command men, fusing their will with his. Use gave him power here also, though they that he faced knew not what it was. And he had other powers over men and himself. He spoke. “Good soldiers! I am her brother, twin with her, and I had a vision that I was not utterly to forsake her. The priest said that I was to mind it.” He brought his lute forward, and as he spoke he drew from the strings notes of wistfulness and beauty. “So we started many months ago, on a pilgrimage from Pont-de-Lys in Limousin (for we are of Limousin) to Our Lady of Roche-de-FrÊne. And after that we fared on a long way to the north, to the famous shrine of Saint Thomas in Burgundy.” He was playing very sweetly, notes of unearthly tenderness and melancholy. “There the vision came again and told me to return the way we had come to Limousin, and then, without rest, to go on pilgrimage to Saint James, the brother of the Lord, at Compostella.”

He changed and deepened the strain until it had solemnity, became music played in churches. “She speaks not often to me, nor I to her. She touches me not, and I touch not her. But the vision said, ‘Go with her to Our Lady of Roche-de-FrÊne, and then to the shrine of Saint Thomas’; and then it said, ‘Turn and go with her to Compostella.’ The priest said, ‘Obey that which spoke to you, and It will see that you are not hindered.’” His lips shut. He had spoken in a voice that he knew how to use so as to bring the heart into acquiescence, and his fingers still spoke on, upon the strings of the lute.

The half-ring parted. It felt horror of the saffron cross, but, strange to itself, it also now felt pity and an impulse to help. Its ill passion fell cold and dead. Sufficiently swift and deep and for sufficiently long time came the change. Whether there was responsible some saint, or suggestion, or these beings’ proper motion, here was what answered for miracle. The giant was the spokesman.

“The way is clear so far as we are named! Go on, poor soul, and brother jongleur, and maybe there’s a star somewhere to shine for you!—Nay, I’ll go before and see that no man of Cap-du-Loup breaks sanctuary—no, nor harms you, jongleur!”