"A first-cla.s.s joke," replied the other, finally overcoming her hilarity. "We shall rig out this villein in some grotesque costume, leaving her hump well exposed, and we shall present this star of beauty to the n.o.ble seigneurs. They will split their sides with laughter.

Imagine this darling in the midst of a bevy of pretty girls. Would you not call that a diamond?"

"Ha, ha, ha! An excellent idea!" the matron rejoined, now laughing no less noisily than her a.s.sistant. "We shall place upon her head a turban of peac.o.c.k feathers; we shall ornament her hump with all sorts of gew-gaws. Ha, ha! How those dear seigneurs will be amused. It will pay us well!"

"That's not all, Maria. My find is doubly good. Look at this marmot. It is a little cupid. Everyone to his taste!"

"He is certainly sweet, despite his leanness, and the dust that his features are stained with. His little face is attractive."

Seized with compa.s.sion at the sight of Joan and her child, Yolande had not shared in the cruel mirth of the two shrews. But Perrette, less tender, had broken out into a loud roar, when, suddenly struck by a sudden recollection, and attentively eyeing Joan, against whom Colombaik, no less confused and uneasy than his mother, was cuddling closely, the queen of the wenches cried out: "By all the Saints of Paradise! Did you not inhabit in Gaul one of the villages of a neighboring seigniory of Anjou?"

"Yes," answered the poor woman in a weak voice, "we started from there on the Crusade."

"Do you remember a young girl and a tall scamp who wanted to carry you along to Palestine?"

"I remember," answered Joan, regarding Perrette with astonishment; "but I managed to escape those wicked people."

"Rather say those 'good people,' because the young woman was myself, and the tall scamp my lover, Corentin. We wanted to take you to the Holy Land, a.s.suring you that you would be exhibited for money! Now, then, by the faith of the queen of the wenches! confess, Yolande, that I am a mighty prophetess!" added Perrette, turning to her companion. But the latter reproachfully answered her: "How have you the courage to mock a mother in the presence of her child!"

These words seemed to make an impression upon Perrette. She checked her laughter, relapsed into a brooding silence, and seemed touched by the fate of Joan, while Yolande addressed the woman kindly: "Poor, dear woman, how did you allow yourself to be brought here with your child?

You cannot know what place this is. You are in a house of prost.i.tution."

"I arrived in this city with a troop of pilgrims and Crusaders, who, by a miracle, escaped, like myself and son, a sand-spout that buried, a fortnight ago, so many travelers under the sands of the desert. I had sat down with my son under the shadow of a wall, exhausted with fatigue and hunger, when yonder woman," and Joan pointed to the shrew, "after long looking at me, said to me charitably: 'You seem to be very much tired out, you and your child. Will you follow me? I shall take you to a holy woman of great piety.' It was an unlooked-for piece of good luck to me," added Joan. "I put faith in the words of this woman, and I followed her hither."

"Alack! You have fallen into a hateful trap. They propose to make sport of you," Yolande replied in a low voice. "Did you not hear those two shrews?"

"I care little. I shall submit to all humiliation, all scorn, provided food and clothing be given to my child," rejoined Joan in accents that betokened both courage and resignation. "I will suffer anything upon condition that my poor child may rest for a while, recover himself and regain his health. Oh, he is now doubly dear to me----"

"Did you lose his father?"

"He remained, undoubtedly, buried in the sand," answered Joan, and like Colombaik, she could not restrain her tears at the memory of Fergan.

"When the sand-spout broke over us, I felt myself blinded and suffocated. My first movement was to take my child in my arms. The ground opened under my feet and I lost consciousness. I remember nothing after that."

"But how did you reach this city, poor woman?" asked the queen of the wenches, interested by so much sweetness and resignation. "The road is long across the desert, and you seem too feeble to sustain the fatigues of such a journey."

"When I regained consciousness," answered Joan, "I was lying in a wagon, near an old man who sold provisions to the Crusaders. He took pity upon me and my child, having found us in a dying condition, half buried under the sand. Surely my husband perished. The old man told me he saw other victims near us when he picked us up. Unfortunately the mule to which the wagon of the charitable man was. .h.i.tched died of fatigue ten leagues from Marhala. Compelled to remain on the road and to abandon the troop of pilgrims, our protector was killed trying to protect his provisions against the stragglers. They pillaged everything, but they did not harm us. We followed them, fearing to lose our way. I carried my child on my back when he found himself unable to walk. It was thus that we arrived in this city. It is a sad story!"

"But your husband may yet, like you, have escaped death. Do not despair," observed Yolande.

"If he escaped that danger, it was probably to fall into a greater, for the seigneur of Plouernel----"

"The seigneur of Plouernel!" exclaimed Yolande interrupting Joan, "do you know that scoundrel?"

"We were serfs in his seigniory. It is from the country of Plouernel that we departed for the Holy Land. Accident made us meet with the seigneur count shortly before the sand-spout burst upon us. My husband and he fought----"

"And did he not kill Neroweg?"

"No, he yielded to my prayers."

"What, pity for Neroweg, Worse than a Wolf!" exclaimed Yolande in an explosion of rage and hatred. "Oh, I am but a woman! But I would have stabbed him to the heart without remorse! The monster!"

"What did he do to you?"

"He deprived me of the inheritance of my father, and, falling from shame to shame, I have become the companion of the queen of the wenches."

"Oh, mademoiselle Yolande," remarked Perrette, returning to her cynic quips, "will you ever remain proud?"

"I?" answered the young woman with a sad and bitter smile. "No, no!

Pride is not allowed me. You are the queen. I am one of your humble subjects."

"Come, come, my daughters!" said the matron. "The day declines. Go to the baths of the Emir. As to you, my beauty," proceeded the devilish shrew, addressing Joan, "as to you, we shall rig you up, we shall perfume you, and above all we shall have your hump radiate with matchless l.u.s.tre."

"You may do with me what you please, when you will have given my child wherewithal to appease his hunger and thirst. He must recover his strength, he must sleep. I shall not leave him one instant."

"Be easy, my star of beauty, you shall remain at his side, nor shall your child want for anything. We shall pay due attention to him."

CHAPTER IV.

ORGIES OF THE CRUSADERS.

The interior court-yard of the palace of the Emir, of Marhala, presented that evening a fairy aspect. The court was a perfect square. Along the four sides ran a wide gallery of Moorish ogives carved with trifoil and supported by low pillars of rose-colored marble. Between each column and into the court, large vases of Oriental alabaster filled with flowers served as pedestals to gilded candelabras holding torches of perfumed wax. Mosaics of various colors ornamented the floor of the galleries.

The ceilings and walls disappeared under white arabesques chiseled on a purple background. Soft silken divans reclined against the walls, pierced with several ogive doors that were half closed with curtains fringed with pearls. These doors led to the interior apartments. At each corner of the galleries, gilded cages with silver bars held the rarest birds of Arabia, on whose plumage were mirrored the glint of the ruby, the emerald and the azure sapphire. In the center of the court a jet of crystalline water shot up from a large porphyry vase, falling back in a brilliant spray, and producing the murmur of a perpetual cascade as the water overflowed into a broad basin, from whose marble rim rose another circle of large and gilded candelabras, similar to those along the galleries. This refreshing fountain, sparkling with light, served as central ornament to a low table that wound around the basin and was covered with a cloth of embroidered silk. On it glistened the magnificent gold and silver vessels, carried from Gaul by the Duke of Aquitaine, and the rich spoils taken from the Saracens: goblets and decanters studded with precious stones, large amphoras filled with wine of Cyprus and Greece, huge gold platters on which were displayed Phoenician peac.o.c.ks, Asiatic pheasants, quarters of Syrian antelopes and mutton, Byzantine hams, heads of the wild boars of Zion, and pyramids of fruit and confectionery. The banquet hall had for its dome the starry vault. The night was calm and serene; not a breath of wind agitated the flames of the torches.

But the tumult of an orgie resounded at this sumptuous table, around which, seated or reclining upon couches, feasted the guests of William IX. Distinguished above all and occupying the place of honor, was the legate of the Pope; then followed, to the right and left of the Duke of Aquitaine, Bohemond, Prince of Taranto; Tancred; Robert Courte-Heuse, Duke of Normandy; Heracle, seigneur of Polignac; Siegfried, seigneur of Sabran; Gerhard, Duke of Roussillon; Radulf, seigneur of Haut-Poul; Arnulf, sire of Beaugency; and other seigneurs of Frankish origin, beside the knight, Walter the Pennyless. These n.o.blemen, already effeminated by Oriental habits, instead of remaining armed from dawn to dusk, as in Gaul, had exchanged their harness of war for long robes of silk. The Duke of Aquitaine, whose hair floated on a tunique of gold cloth, wore, after the fashion of the ancients, a chaplet of roses and violets, already wilted by the vapors of the feast. Azenor the Pale, whose lips, no longer white as of yore, but now red with life, was seated beside William, superbly ornamented with sparkling collars and bracelets of precious stones. The papal legate, clad in a robe of purple silk bordered with ermine, carried on his breast a cross of carbuncles hanging from a gold chain. Behind him, ready to wait upon his master, stood a young negro slave, in a short blouse of white silk with silver collar and bracelets ornamented with corals. The cup-bearers and equerries of the other seigneurs likewise attended the table. The wines of Cyprus and of Samos had been flowing from vermillion amphoras since the beginning of the feast, and flowed still, carrying away in their perfumed waves the senses of the guests. The Duke of Aquitaine, one arm encircling the waist of Azenor, and raising heavenward the gold goblet at which his mistress had just moistened her lips, called out: "I drink to you, my guests! May Bacchus and Venus be propitious to you! Honor to him who is deepest in love!"

Heracle, the seigneur of Polignac, in turn raised his cup and answered: "William, Duke of Aquitaine, we, your guests, drink to your courtesy and your splendid banquet!"

"Yes, yes!" joined the Crusaders; "let's drink to the banquet of William IX! Let's drink to the courtesy of the Duke of Aquitaine!"

"I drink gladly," said Arnulf, the seigneur of Beaugency, in his cups, and, shaking his head, he added meditatively, a sentence already repeated by him a score of times during the repast with the tenacity of the maudlin: "I'd like to know what my wife, the n.o.ble lady Capeluche, is doing at this hour in her chamber!"

"By my faith, seigneurs," said the seigneur of Haut-Poul, "as true as ten deniers were paid for an a.s.s's head during the scarcity at the siege of Antioch, I have not in my life feasted like to-night. Glory to the Duke of Aquitaine!"

"Let's talk of the scarcity," rejoined Bohemond, the Prince of Taranto; "its recollection may serve to rekindle our satisfied hunger and our extinguished thirst."

"I ate up my shoes soaked in water and seasoned with spices," said the sire of Montmorency.

"Do you know, n.o.ble seigneurs," put in Walter the Pennyless, "that there are comrades, luckier or wiser than we, who never suffered hunger in the Holy Land, and whose faces are fresh and ruddy?"

"Who are they, valiant chevalier?"

"The King of the Vagabonds and his band."

"The wretches who ate up the Saracens, and regaled themselves with human flesh?"