"But how could we have merited the terrible punishment that seems reserved to us?"

"Oh," replied the bourgeois of Nantes with a sigh, "my happiness rendered me forgetful of the misfortune of our brothers! I was selfish!"

"Dear father, you surely exaggerate the faults or errors of your life."

"Millions of serfs and villeins people the lands of the seigneurs and the clergy. Among them, some drag along a painful existence, that ends in death from exhaustion and misery; others are hanged from the patibulary forks. Those unhappy people are Gauls like ourselves. If some townsmen live in tranquility in the cities, when they have for seigneur so gentle a master as Simon of Nantes, millions of serfs and villeins, on the other hand, are devoted to all the miseries of life, and victims to the seigniories and the Church."

"But, father, it did not depend upon you to alleviate the ills of these wretched folks."

"My father spoke like a brave and generous man when he said to the bourgeoisie of the city of Laon: 'We are subject to the exactions of the bishop, our seigneur. But, after all, we townsmen enjoy certain franchises. It, therefore, devolves upon us, being more intelligent and less miserable than the serfs of the fields, to aid these to their deliverance by ourselves rising against the seigneurs, and thus setting the example of revolt against oppression. In the instances where, of their own accord, they rise as happened in Normandy, as happened in Picardy, as happened in Brittany, it is then our duty to place ourselves at their head, in order to insure the success of the insurrection. Is it not a shame; an unworthy timidity, to allow those unhappy men to be crushed and punished for a cause that is ours as much as theirs? Does not the tyranny of the n.o.bles and the friars weigh upon us also. Are not we the prey of the feudal brigands the moment we leave the enclosure of the cities, where we suffer an amplitude of affronts?' But my father's words were not able to convince the townsmen to decide upon insurrection. They feared to risk their property and make their lot worse. Myself, having grown rich, sided with the self-seekers, and I echoed the views of the other merchants: 'No doubt, the condition of the serfs is horrible, but I can do nothing to improve it, and I dare not stake my life and fortune upon the result of an insurrection.' Our cowardly and selfish indifference increased the audacity of the seigneurs, until to-day we cannot set foot outside the cities without being exposed to the brigandage of the chatelains. Oh, my child, I am punished for having lacked energy and for disregarding the precepts of my father!"

"We are lost; there is no hope left!" exclaimed the maid, no longer able to restrain her sobs. "Death, a shocking death awaits us!" And Isoline, whose teeth chattered with terror, directed her father's attention, with a gesture, to the instruments of torture that furnished the cell. Hiding her face in her hands, she moaned convulsively.

"Isoline," rejoined Bezenecq imploringly and overcome with grief, "my beloved child, listen to the word of reason. Terror exaggerates. The aspect of this subterranean dungeon frightens. Oh, I understand that.

But let's not lose all hope. When I shall have subscribed to all that the seigneur of Plouernel can exact from me, when I shall have consented to strip myself for his benefit of all that I possess, what do you imagine he could still do? Of what use to him would it be to have me tortured? He entertains against me no personal hatred. He is after my wealth. I shall give it all, absolutely all."

"Good father, you are seeking to calm my spirit. I thank you a thousand times."

"Is not our fate sufficiently sad? Why make the reality still darker? I had hoped to give you a rich dower, to bequeath to you later my property, that would have insured the happiness of your children. And now I am about to be stripped of all. Our descendants will be reduced to poverty!"

"Oh, if only the seigneur of Plouernel grants us our lives, I would care little for that wealth that, for my sake, you bemoan."

"Nor shall I be less courageous than you," said Bezenecq, tenderly clasping the hands of his daughter: "I shall imagine I placed all my money on board a ship that went down. Once out of this infernal castle, dear child, we shall return to Nantes. I shall see my friend Thibault the Silversmith. He knows my apt.i.tude for commerce. He will employ me, and will pay me a salary that will suffice for our needs. But it will be necessary, my pretty Isoline," Bezenecq proceeded, forcing a smile to calm his daughter, "it will then be necessary for you to sew our clothes with your own little white hands, and prepare our frugal meals. Instead of inhabiting our beautiful house on the place of Marche-Neuf, we shall take humble lodgings in the quarter of the ramparts. But, what of it, provided the heart is joyful! Moreover, I shall always have in my pocket a few deniers wherewith occasionally, on my return home, to buy you a new ribbon for your neck, my dear, sweet child, or a bouquet of roses to cheer your little bedroom."

Isoline felt hope rising within her at the words of her father, and shut her eyes not to be reminded of the horrible reality by the sight of the hideous stone mask and of the instruments of punishment. The maid hid her face on the breast of her father and murmured with emotion: "Oh, if only your words would prove true! If we only could quit this castle! So far from regretting our lost riches, I would thank G.o.d for affording me the opportunity of working for my venerated father!"

"Damosel Isoline, I shall know how to provide," gayly replied Bezenecq.

"Moreover, who knows, but I may soon find an a.s.sistant. Who knows but that some worthy lad will demand you in marriage, falling in love with this charming face, when it shall have regained its rosy hue?," added the merchant, tenderly embracing his daughter.

"Father!" screamed Isoline, pointing with a gesture of dread toward the wall where the hideous stone mask was sculptured, and whose eyes seemed lighted from within. "Look, look at those flashes of light that escape from it! Some one has been spying upon us!"

The merchant quickly turned his head in the direction of the wall indicated by Isoline and to which he had given his back up to that instant. But the light had disappeared. Bezenecq took it for an illusion, proceeding from the wrought-up spirit of Isoline, and answered: "You must have deceived yourself. How do you expect the eyes of that rude figure to flash light? It would require a candle in the middle of the wall. Is that possible my child? Regain your senses!"

Suddenly the door of the cell opposite the mask was opened. Bezenecq the Rich and his daughter saw the bailiff, Garin the Serf-eater, enter with the scribe of the seigneur of Plouernel, and followed by several men of sinister mien. One of these carried a forge-bellows and a bag of coal; another bore several f.a.ggots. Isoline, for a moment rea.s.sured by her father, but now recalled to reality by the approach of the gaolers, uttered a scream of fright. In order to calm the agonies of his daughter, Bezenecq rose and said to the bailiff in a firm voice, while pointing to the scribe: "That, dear sir, is certainly the notary of the seigneur of Plouernel?" Garin the Serf-eater nodded in the affirmative.

"This notary," continued the bourgeois of Nantes, "comes to obtain my signature to the doc.u.ment by which I consent to pay ransom?" The bailiff again nodded in the affirmative. Addressing himself then to his daughter and affecting absolute calmness, almost cheerfulness: "Fear nothing, dear child, I and these worthy men will soon agree, after which, I am certain, we shall have nothing to fear from them and they will set us free. Note, then, master scribe, I am ready, by means of an authentic deed in favor of the seigneur of Plouernel, to give and cede to him all my possessions, consisting of five thousand and three hundred silver pieces, deposited with my friend Thibault, the silversmith and minter of the Bishop of Nantes; secondly, eight hundred and sixty gold pieces and nine bars of silver, deposited in my house in a secret closet that I shall indicate to the person whom the seigneur count may commission to go to Nantes; thirdly, a large quant.i.ty of silver vessels, precious fabrics and furniture, which it will be easy to bring here by wagon, upon the written order that I shall issue to my confidential servant.

There, finally, remains my house. Seeing it would not be quite practicable, worthy masters, to transport that also, I shall write and place in your hand a letter to my friend Thibault. Only two days before my departure from Nantes he promised to buy my house for two hundred pieces of gold. He will keep his promise, I am sure, especially when he learns of the tight place that I now find myself in. Accordingly, that's two hundred more gold pieces that, at my order, Thibault will have to deliver to the envoy of the seigneur of Plouernel. These a.s.signments made, there remain to me and my daughter the clothes we have on. Now, worthy scribe, draw up the a.s.signment, I shall sign it, and I shall join to it the letters to my servant and to my friend the silversmith. He knows too well the fashion of these times to fail to acquiesce in my wishes in the matter of the deposit that he has and of the purchase of the house. He will deliver the sum to the messenger whom the seigneur count is to dispatch to Nantes. As to the money in the secret closet of my house, it will be easy to find it with the help of this key and the directions that I shall dictate to the scribe----"

"The notary will first have to draw up the a.s.signment, then, you shall write the letters to your friend," broke in Garin. "The directions for the secret closet will follow. Now hurry up."

"You are right, worthy bailiff," replied the bourgeois of Nantes with eagerness, fully at ease by the tone of Garin; and, leaning towards his daughter, who was seated on the edge of the bed, he said to her in an undertone: "Was I not right, my dear bundle of fears, in a.s.suring you that, by a complete surrender of all my goods, these worthy masters would abstain from harming us?" Again embracing Isoline, whose fears began to make room for hope, and wiping with the back of his hand the tears that, despite himself, he was shedding, he turned to Garin: "Excuse me, bailiff, you would understand my emotion if you knew the foolish fears of this child. But what else can we expect! At her age, having until now lived happily at my side, she is easily alarmed----"

"First item: Five thousand and three hundred silver pieces deposited with the silversmith Thibault," recited the scribe, interrupting Bezenecq with his harsh voice; and, taking his seat on the edge of the gridiron, he wrote, on his knees for a desk, by the light of one of the lanterns. "Next and secondly," he pursued, "how many pieces of gold are there in the secret treasure of the Nantes house?"

"Eight hundred and sixty pieces of gold," Bezenecq hastened to answer, as if in a hurry to disengage himself of his riches; "and also nine bars of silver of different thicknesses." And, thus proceeding to enumerate his goods to the scribe, who entered them apace, the merchant pressed the hands of his daughter in an intoxication of pleasure to add to her confidence and courage.

"And now, Bezenecq the Rich," said Garin, "we shall want the two letters to your confidential servant and your friend Thibault the Silversmith."

"Kind scribe," answered the merchant, "lend me your tablet, give me two parchment sheets and a pen, I shall write yonder on my daughter's knees," and, suiting the act to the words, he placed himself at Isoline's knees, where he lay the notary's tablet, and wrote the letters, occasionally addressing the poor child with a smile: "Do not shake my table that way; you will have these worthy gentlemen form a poor opinion of my handwriting." The two letters finished, the merchant pa.s.sed them over to Garin, who, after reading them, said:

"Now, we want the directions for the secret treasure, without which the a.s.signment may not be effective."

"Here are two keys," said the merchant, drawing them from his pocket.

"The one opens the door of a little vault which connects with the room that serves as my office----"

"In the room that serves as office," repeated the scribe, writing while he repeated the words of the merchant. The latter proceeded: "The other key opens an iron-bound box back of the vault. In that box will be found the bars of silver and a casket containing the eight hundred and sixty gold pieces. I own not another denier. And here, worthy masters, you have me and my daughter as poor as the poorest serf. I have not wronged the seigneur of Plouernel a single obole. But, for all that, we shall not lose courage!"

While the scribe finished transcribing the directions of Bezenecq, the latter, occupied only with his daughter, did not notice, any more than she, what was going on a few steps off in that cell, so feebly lighted by the lanterns, seeing that night had already fallen. One of the gaolers commenced heaping the coals and f.a.gots under the gridiron.

"The seigneur of Plouernel may send his messenger to Nantes with an escort," Bezenecq observed to Garin the Serf-eater. "If the messenger is quick he can be back to-morrow night. We shall surely, my daughter and I, be set at liberty when the seigneur count will be in possession of my property. Only, while waiting for the hour of our departure from the castle, be generous enough, bailiff, to have us taken to some other place, whatever it be, only less depressing than this. My daughter is broken down with fatigue; moreover, she is very timid. She would spend a sad night in this cell, surrounded by instruments of torture."

"Now that you mention these engines of punishment," said Garin the Serf-eater, with a strange smile, and taking the hand of the bourgeois, "come, Bezenecq the Rich, I wish to explain their use to you, especially their mechanism."

"I am not inquisitive to learn the details."

"Draw near to us, Bezenecq the Rich."

"That surname of 'Rich' that you insist in applying to me, is no longer mine," said the merchant with a sad smile; "rather call me Bezenecq the Poor."

"Oh," exclaimed Garin, as if in doubt and shrugging his shoulders. He then added: "Come on, Bezenecq the Rich!"

"Father!" cried out Isoline, uneasy, seeing her father stepping away from her. "Where are you going? Father, father, stay with me!"

"There is nothing to fear, dear child. Stay where you are. I am to give the bailiff certain directions as to the route that the messenger of the seigneur count will have to take." And, fearing to displease Garin, he followed him, happy at the thought that Isoline could not hear the explanations he was to receive from the Serf-eater. The latter stopped first before the iron gibbet that terminated in a carcan. One of the gaolers having raised the lantern at the order of Garin, he said to the merchant: "As you see, that carcan opens at will. You may guess its object."

"Yes. The neck of the patient being inserted in it, the poor fellow remains fast!"

"Just so. He is made to climb the ladder you see here. Then, as his neck is in the carcan, all you have to do is to close the collar with a latch and remove the ladder. The gibbet being raised nine or ten feet above the floor, you may imagine the rest."

"The patient remains hanged and strangled?"

"Not at all! He remains suspended, but not hanged. The carcan is too wide to strangle. Then, while our man is thus kicking in the air an equal distance between the ceiling and the floor, this large stone is fastened to his feet by means of these straps to moderate his kicking and induce him to keep quiet."

"That strain must be terrible."

"Terrible, Bezenecq the Rich, terrible! Just think of it! The jaws are dislocated, the neck is stretched, the jointures of the knees and hip crack fit to be heard ten paces off. And yet,--would you believe it?--there are people of such a stubborn make-up that they do not yield to this first trial?"

"What I do not understand," answered the merchant, suppressing his horror, "is that, instead of exposing themselves to this torture, they do not forthwith and loyally surrender all they own, as I have done.

One, at least, escapes physical suffering and regains his freedom. Not so, worthy bailiff?"

"Bezenecq the Rich, you are the pearl of townsmen. It is evident that you are of extraordinary sagacity."

"You flatter me. I merely put myself through a very simple process of reasoning," rejoined the merchant, endeavoring to capture the good will of Garin. "I reasoned thus with my daughter: Suppose my whole fortune were placed on board a vessel; it goes down; I lose all my wealth; I find myself in the same position that I am in to-day: but so far from allowing myself to be discouraged, I start to work anew with fresh vigor to sustain my child. Is not that the better choice, worthy bailiff?

Would you not do likewise?"

"You never will be reduced to that, Bezenecq the Rich. You have inexhaustible resources."

"You love to banter; you love to give me that surname of 'Rich,' to me, now no less poor than Job."

"No, no; I do not banter. But let's return to the torture. I was saying that if the first trial failed to convince a stubborn fellow to give up his goods, he is then put through the second torture, which I shall now explain," and Garin, keeping the hand of the merchant, conducted him to the iron p.r.o.ng. "You see this p.r.o.ng? It is of well-beaten metal, strong enough to hold the weight of an ox."