Chapter XXXIV: The Deed Under the Beechwood

It was six good leagues from Marburg to Giessen. We put our horses at speed, but the afternoon was half sped when we clattered over the stones of the little South Hessian city. We lost more precious time in searching the inns for Moritz and for my own retainers, who had wisely attached themselves to him. At last at the “Landgraf” we found them. Time fails to relate all the laughter and greetings, and what I said, and Moritz said, and Ilsa said, or how Adolf and Gunter almost hugged me like bears when they fairly had me. Then when the raptures had ended we held a hurried but sober council. Forli had nigh ten hours the start of us, and I had not been able to overhear, in my captivity, all the details of the route he intended to follow. The only thing whereof we could be certain was that he was posting for Eisenach, and that near that city Dr. Luther had intended to halt and visit his kinsfolk. There seemed nothing for it save to spur after, and to trust to such tidings as we could get along the way to guide us more securely.

Then when this seemed settled Moritz and I both looked at one another and spoke one word.

“Ilsa?” Manifestly it had been impossible to leave her amongst strangers at Marburg, as manifestly it seemed impossible to leave her alone at Giessen. I was even talking of seeking whether a local nunnery could harbor her a few days, when Ilsa cut all knots for us.

“Dear brother, you know all that I am to Walter and what I wish to do. Could I not ride with the best over the slopes of the Brocken? Give me a horse. I will show myself your sister still. And then come what may,” her hand stole into mine, “we shall always be together.”

Moritz pursed his lips and frowned, but ended with a laugh.

“Another horse,” he ordered. And then he looked at Ilsa’s clothes. For though at Marburg we had called into requisition one of Sister Hemma’s cloaks, a nun’s dress was a strange enough habit for a ride like ours. But Ilsa’s face turned rosy red; a red that did me good, her cheeks had been pale so long. “I will ride, brother. By the time the horse is ready, I am ready also. Leave the rest to me and to Andrea.” So we suffered her to quit us, being ourselves full of such matters as sifting out the best of our men, providing weapons, and looking to the saddlery.

At last, even as we ordered “One side-saddle” to the grooms, forth to the courtyard to greet us came as pert and smiling a page-boy as ever wore a red doublet, high black boots, or a rakish green cap and feather, which sat delightfully upon a mass of waving golden hair. How Andrea had found the costume, time lacked to inquire; but I was long past wondering at his legerdemain. Moritz frowned again; but who could deny her now? Lightly as a sprite she bounded to the saddle of my tallest palfrey, and looked down on me, smiling radiantly.

“Do you wonder, Walter, why I am not lying pale with horror at this day? Do not ask me! Do not ask me! I only know that I am like the bird who has broken his cage and whose wings are catching the air. I may have leisure for dread and trembling some time; to think of the awful end of Aunt Theckla, and--that woman. But now I remember only this. I have you, and I am free!”

Our chosen troop was at length mounted; Adolf, Gunter, Andrea, two Blankenburgers, Ilsa, Moritz, and myself. I was the last to swing into the saddle. I should have known that my wounded thigh was paining me, but I never felt it. Out of the gray Ost-tor we thundered. The good steeds under us had been chafing long. We felt their lengthening gallops as they caught the road. For a long time Ilsa and I flew on side by side through the soft air of the deepening evening. We did not speak often. From time to time we talked with our eyes, and a flash told all we would say. We whirled through the little red-roofed Hessian villages, now down the winding river roads, now under a steep where a black pinnacled castle cast over us its jagged shadows. The blue smocked peasant girls stopped to marvel at us, we flew so fast.

As we rode I fell to musing on how it was scarce four years since that other early evening when I had rowed with Marianna upon the yellow Tiber beneath the domes of Rome. Four years! Four centuries seemed that hour away. As I looked on Ilsa and her tossing hair, felt the great sword now at my side and thought on the manful task ahead, I strove to go back to those other hours, the long dalliance over Theocritus’s Idylls and Lorenzo’s love sonnets, the tinkling lutes in the rose gardens, the rustle of fans and silk, the delicate minstrelsy, the soft words and the sensuous glances. Vanished! All vanished--to a past as dim as Egypt and her fabled kings! I knew now I was a true son of the fighting North, whose music had been the jangling ring mail and the snort of the speeding stallions. I felt my breath come fiercely like the hard blasts of the Baltic wind, and my blood was aglow as the blood of many a Regenstein had glowed when they spurred on the hostile hundreds. I had found my bride. Yes! And I had found my true faith in God and in myself. Wherefore should I not rejoice in life’s fair span?

“Walter,” spoke Ilsa, riding very close, “wherefore is your face so set and stern?”

“Is it?” was my reply. “Then I was thinking of Dr. Luther and his peril.”

“We will save him! We will save him!” she kept repeating. “The dear God has been with us this day. After the rest--how can we fail?”

So onward we swept, till the night closed down, till the stars shone clear above us, and a young moon made the track of the road just visible. The horses grew weary at last, but we pressed them, hoping to make our relay by midnight. Once we were halted at a forking of the way till Gunter found a cabin and a grumbling peasant. I knew that Ilsa’s head was hanging heavily long before we saw the great towers of Fulda traced against the violet-black sky. The gates of the town were already closed, but Adolf knew of a kind of inn outside the walls, and hither we turned, just after the great abbey clock within the ramparts sent twelve strokes pealing into the silent night.

Much ado we had to rouse host or horseboys. However, at last convinced we were no bandits, there was a racing with lanterns and unbarring of doors, and we clattered into the courtyard.

“Eight horses in two hours, mine host,” was Moritz’s order, banging his sword as he spoke it; “and the fiends to pay if they are not fresh or are late.”

“Your Lordship commands the impossible,” was the deprecating answer. “It is scarce two hours since a great French gentleman rode away with our best, and his own beasts had been ridden from Marburg.”

“From Marburg? And when did he set forth?”

“Why, one of his grooms swore he had started at dawn, but near Ehringhaus his Lordship’s saddle-girth parted, so that he had a pretty fall, being a gentleman of weight, and they had much delay ere they could ride again. His Lordship was cursing like the Grand Turk’s janizaries all the time he tarried here, although whether from pain or at the delay I know not. I have none of his language.”

We all breathed easier. Again heaven had prospered us. I fear I had no great grief at the posterior pangs of his Eminenza di Forli. We had made up most of the chase, but to wait till dawn while our own horses were resting was impossible. We argued long with the landlord. Money and threats could not move him. “I have no horses,” was all his answer. Moritz was desperate, but I knew one last arrow.

“Master Host,” spoke I, after sullen argument, “will you still say ‘no horses’ when I say that saying that means a heretic’s death for Dr. Luther?”

“Ei! Dr. Luther?” and instantly he blew another tune. So I told him for what wagers we were casting, and in a twinkling all was changed. “Dr. Luther to the stake? Oh! the glozing papist dogs! Horses you shall have, though I pillage every stable in Fulda.”

So we waited, while many lights were lit, and men ran in and men ran out. I cannot tell just how mine host made the city gates unlock, and gaping grooms lead forth fresh palfreys; all that I left to Moritz. For myself I stood guard, hand on hilt, while Ilsa lay snug and warm on a great straw stack in one corner of the inn yard, hid from any ken save mine and that of the friendly moon. She had fallen asleep the instant she had touched her rude pillow. Pacing sentry before her couch I felt even as a would-be knight, keeping his vigil around the high altar all the dark hours before his accolade. I almost grudged the promptness wherewith the new horses were gathered. Once or twice I cast my eyes on her, a dark heap upon the yellow pile, then withdrew my sight as from a dazzling mystery whereof I was not worthy. And ever I kept repeating, “God is with us. God is with us.”

Two hours at least she slept, before Moritz’s call summoned “All is ready!”

I stepped across, and with infinite reluctance touched her hand. “We must be riding, Ilsa,” spoke I, as with a little sigh she turned and rubbed her eyes.

“Oh! blessed waking,” was her first cry. “I dreamed I was again in the convent, and Aunt Theckla had ordered me to lie all night on the chapel stones spread out like a cross. Can I ever forget!--”

“I will aid you,” I said, my arm under her.

Her step was not so blithesome as when she mounted at Giessen, but she carried herself bravely. Moritz thanked and compounded with our zealous host. We rode out into the black night again. The inn lights were engulfed behind us. Then with only the stars and the sentinel arms of the great trees to point our pathway, we gave our new horses the spur, and once more for a long time Ilsa and I rode silently, side by side.

It was a magic night. The touch of the spring was all in the air. The very ground was soft and spongy under the flying hoofs. In our nostrils blew the delicious odor of green things growing. Sometimes we were whirled by great black farmsteads where wakeful cocks crowed as we passed, and sleepy dogs arose to bark fitfully as our hoof beats died in the distance. Sometimes we saw the dim glint of the hurrying streams, and our horses plashed with cool strides across the unseen pebbles of the fords. Insensibly we knew the paths led upward, height succeeded height, we were skirting rolling hills which lifted spiked summits of trees against the faintly traced skyline. I knew we were entering the famous Thüringer Wald, the mighty forest land which rolled away, westward and northward, until it merged into our own wilder Harz.

Mentally I counted the leagues as we told them off. Four hours’ start Forli had possessed; but one great thing was in our favor. Dr. Luther at least would not travel by night, and the Cardinal would hardly be mad enough to attack him in his lodgings; rather, fearing no pursuit, he would follow at safe distance until the Wittenberger’s little company was on a solitary road, ere speeding his foul arrow. I knew the chances were still even as to ultimate failure; that any mistake in the road, any least delay, would ruin all; but after the deeds of the past day I could misdoubt nothing. Every creaking tree, every chattering brook, spoke the same words, “God is with us! God is with us!”

At length as we rode with our faces towards the East, we saw the first bright bars that tell of day. Touched by the red enchanter, rocks, streams, woods, and uplands were leaping out into glorious being. The horses themselves found again their speed and carried us swiftly forward. And with the young dawn full on her face, Ilsa turned to me and spoke, “Dear Walter, do you believe in omens?”

“Just now I believe in them implicitly.”

“And so do I. We have ridden out of the darkness into the light. We will ride in it hand in hand forever.”

Our horses kept pace as we flew on together. If Moritz saw me riding with Ilsa’s hand in mine, no protest came from him, dear fellow; and so we sped out of the Maytime twilight into the Maytime morning. From overhead, all out of sight, came the song of the soaring lark, closer down, so that the soft leaves whipped in our faces, was the whisper of the uncounted beeches. Weary as we were with the sleepless night in the saddle, the morning air came to us like wine.

“God is with us! We will save Luther!” so we called to one another, and mounted another steep.

The sun had fairly given us the new day when we whirled into the one long wandering street of Liebenstein, nestling between its guardian hills and beside a clear-flowing little river. We felt not need of food, nor drink, nor rest; but for the sake of the horses we were fain to halt for a little baiting and to ask a few questions.

“Had a party of riders passed before us through the village?”

The brawny hostler nodded. They had spoiled his sleep a good three hours before. Eight to ten men, well mounted and armed, and seemingly hot on the road to Ruhla where the Eisenach highway came in from the west.

“Is Dr. Luther in Eisenach?” demanded I with a quickness that made the fellow start.

“Why, yes, your Lordship; that is, he was reported as spending the day there with his kinsfolk, and about to set forth this morning for his former journey homeward.”

“Hark you, my man,” I asked, not mincing further words. “Are you his foe or friend? Do you love Germany or Italy the best? If Luther and Germany, give us a guide. It is his life or death we ride for.”

“Luther and Germany? _Donnerwetter!_ what may I do for _him_!” He spoke it out in a kind of wrath at seeming to be doubted.

So again we had a friend, and were off again, only waiting long enough for Humfried, a very zealous and honest fellow, to clap a saddle on an ungainly but fairly swift pad, and ride himself to guide us. The chase was ending at last in very truth, though only heaven knew the fortune of our hunting. Humfried could tell with a certainty the glade where the Ruhla road crossed the main highway from Eisenach, and here, unless all calculations failed, we would find the Cardinal in ambush for his prey. But would we be in time? I knew Luther’s habits well; how sometimes he set forth before cockcrow. Once or twice even my warm hopes would falter, and a shadow of fear would cross my mind. To come so close? to fail? Ah, Heaven which had done so much, had not that bitter cup in store!

But whenever I doubted I was reassured by the flashing light in my Lady’s eyes, and she spoke the word that had cheered us all the way.

“God is with us!” And I only answered, “Even so--yet faster!”

Onward and onward, with a view now of Schloss Altenstein upon a distant crest; now ever mounting the hillocks; now flying with deadened hoof beats under venerable pines across their carpets of needles; now into the clear sunshine of green meadows; now again under the shimmering green and gold of the kingly beeches. Suddenly Humfried, who rode at our head, held up a warning hand and drew rein.

“Softly. Here is the glade,” he enjoined. Our horses fell to a walk. We crossed a swift little brook, and mounted slowly a steep slope. Before us opened a wide green lane, closed in on either side by the dense forest. There we halted. For a moment our senses caught nothing more noxious than the purling of the brook and the rustling of the trees, but Gunter (sly forester) pointed down. The fresh tracks of many horses were on the clean sod beside the way. Dismounting and nosing around like a fox he quickly made plain whither the party had turned aside into the greenwood. Humfried confirmed his judgment. Manifestly Forli (who doubtless had with him some rascal who knew the country well) had withdrawn into the dense covert overlooking the angle of the Eisenach and Ruhla roads, whence any traveller upon the former was at his mercy. Our task was exceeding plain.

“Ah! Wälterchen, must it be again--these?” asked Ilsa, for the first time on the ride a little pale, when she saw me look to the charges of my pistols after we dismounted.

“Would that I could pleasure you,” I replied, with a shake of the head. “It is men’s work now, and not woman’s; but pray God it is soon over. There will be no blood if I can spare it; yet what must be, must.”

She was hardly pleased, but refused to abide with the horses, which we tethered a little back of the way. I ordered her, however, to walk the last, and she obeyed reluctantly, the more reluctantly as I strode first, beside the guiding Humfried. With every man’s weapon at hand, we forced through the underbrush. Luckily the ground was soft with rain. The fresh young twigs bent noiselessly. We attacked a party equal or superior to ourselves, but in that moment we would have gone against forty with full confidence. Suddenly we halted by a friendly thicket. Before us opened a little plat of greensward. Horses were tethered beside it. To the left the bushes sprang apart a little, giving a fair view of the Eisenach road. Here seated carelessly on the grass, was a villainously bearded sentry with one eye upon the highway, the other upon some pleasant pottage that was cooking in an iron pot over a snapping fire of sticks. The rest of Forli’s party lolled in easy attitudes around the blaze. His Eminence himself, rosy and portly, a trifle heavy-eyed perhaps from hard riding, but seemingly having borne his galloping exceedingly well, sat a little apart, propped up against a saddle, while before him with numerous airy gestures squatted the estimable Ettore Orosi, talking a voluble stream of Tuscan.

“I do assure you, Eminenza, by my honor as a Christian and Catholic bravo”--so I caught the clapper of his tongue going--“that it was only the malific evil eye which that most damnable heretic cast over me, which thwarted my most admirably conceived attempt upon him at Worms; but that attack you will graciously recall, was made in the night time; while the learned and ingenious virtuoso Giuseppe Salvali of Bergamo assures us that wizards, though most potent under stars and moon, are correspondingly feeble in clear sunlight.”

“_Si_,” assented the Cardinal dryly, “no doubt the valor of Signor Orosi is improved by a bright morning and plenty of armed friends. Ho there, fellow! Does a wagon seem to be coming down the road?”

“Not a crow or hare is in sight,” answered the sentry.

“Well said, unless your worthy watchman will deign to look the other way,” spoke I in Italian, emerging from the thicket as unwarned as a ghost. Forli leaped to his feet as men rise from adders’ nests. His eight gallows-birds clutched for their weapons, but I seemed utterly unconcerned. In my right hand I held only my blue riding cap.

“A fair morning, your Christian Eminence,” I continued, shaking out my cloak with deliberation, while Forli for once looked abject and aghast. “And may I ask for what noble enterprise the Pope’s Legate watches the roads like a bandit in this our poor northern Thuringian country?”

“How in the name of all fiends!--How, save by Ganymede’s eagle, came you here?” at length articulated the Cardinal, not forgetting his classics even in this crisis.

“How? Why Dædalus made me a pair of wings, to be sure. I am certain your taste will approve the allusion.” Over my shoulder I could see my friends silently spreading themselves in the thicket, while all of Forli’s startled men crowded up behind their master, their group absolutely at the mercy of our levelled tubes.

“Has Marianna--?” began the Cardinal at length; “have you glozened her into releasing you? Oh! folly of womanhood, rightly says Juvenal--”

“Blame her not,” I commanded abruptly; “enough that I am here sorely against her wish, could she but know it. It was not _she_ that released me.”

“Who, then? The Emperor? Even he thought we went to France. He knew nothing of this.”

“A greater than Carolus Quintus, Eminenza.”

“You are jesting. Who released and sent you?”

“A certain high personage, yet one much despised in Rome, and whose pleasure has been little studied by your Eminence.”

“An end to riddles. Explain.”

“I will name him in German, for it is here men seem most to honor Him, _der liebe Gott_!”

“_Gott?_--_Dio?_--Chatter of no miracles, Gualtiero. Why are your eyes so terrible?”

“Because, Eminenza, we should cast aside our dominoes, and call the mask at an end. You seized my person foully, designing to hale me back to Italian bondage. You cozened the Emperor into consenting to your deed. You went a step further, and contrary to his known wishes, you would now seize the very deputy of heaven, Dr. Luther, in face of the safe-conduct. Let us understand one another. I am free, and go not to Italy. Your further plot is doomed to completer failure. Either bid your men to submit here and now as prisoners and yield your own person, or by the Power that brought me liberty at Marburg, you go to the prison house whence none go forth.”

The Cardinal looked at me stupidly, his ears refusing to accept my utterance.

“I? Papal and Apostolic Legate? Surrender myself a prisoner?”

“Do not hesitate,” I commanded; “I use no child’s words.”

Heaven knows whether he saw my party in the covert, and whether he would have yielded or fought; but at this instant I beheld Orosi, just behind his master, doubling like a cat and pulling a crooked and wicked blade. One instant more and Ilsa were widowed before her bridal.

“Fire!” I cried.

The thicket around burst into the death flame. The great charge from Gunter’s bell-mouthed arquebuse sang past me. Mercy we had shown that midnight in the garden at Worms, but the blast was pitiless now. Huddled together, Forli’s men fell like grass under the sickle, those unhit tumbling in sheer fright. Orosi had bounded half of the way toward me before a ball caught him in the groin. He fell right at my feet, waving his sinful weapon, and struggling desperately to reach me yet. But before I could draw to despatch him, Andrea had leaped past me with his own stiletto.

“Mine, Eccellenza,” rang his call; “such carrion is not for the sword of a cavaliere.”

The two grappled fiendishly. For a moment I feared Andrea had met his match, but right speedily I saw the Sienese writhe to the top, bend back the other’s right wrist, and send his own weapon home to the fifth rib. A mingled curse and howl, and Ettore Orosi was forever saved from the hangman.

“Bah,” spoke Andrea, rising and coolly wiping his knife. “And he called himself a man of _virtù_!”

I, however, had Ilsa beside me now. She was white enough and all of a-tremble, nor could I convince her at once that I was totally unscathed. Our men were seizing such of the enemy as still survived, and pinioning their arms. They were too scared for either resistance or flight. Both of the other Italians who followed the Cardinal had caught the full discharge and would never need a dungeon.

Moritz had run at once to Forli. It had been impossible to spare him from the volley. A large ball had torn through his lungs. He was spitting blood upon his rich doublet as we raised him. Adolf, experienced in war surgery, gave him one glance.

“How long?” questioned Moritz.

“He will last an hour, hardly more,” spoke the veteran as complacently as though passing judgment on a speared stag. Yet Forli’s eyes opened at the words, and from him came a dreadful cry.

“One hour! One hour! Oh! to die now, here, thus! Where is the priest? The confession? There is no absolution, no viaticum; I am damned forever. The devils will have my soul.”

“Calm yourself,” I enjoined, contempt struggling with my pity; “recall your vaunted philosophy. How often you have praised Lucretius and Epicurus, and their disbelief in immortality. If you cannot die as a good Christian, die at least as a good pagan, and die as a brave man.”

But the Cardinal only raved the worse. “No viaticum. My life has been one vast lie. I have held the honors of the Church and lived the life of a Turk. Ah! Marianna’s mother--how I treated her! Years ago--I see it as yesterday. I was in all Pope Alexander’s plots. I have feared neither God nor devil. Now--”

More blood rushed to his lips, and for a moment he ceased moaning.

“It is possible to fetch a priest from Ruhla,” I remarked, melting fast, but Forli raged on again.

“No! no! I’ll have none of your pattering country parsons. What is their viaticum worth? ‘Absolvo’--a fool can say it. I’ll not believe it though spoken by Leo de’ Medici. Who is the Pope but the Master Rogue of all? If there’s a just God, he’ll damn me for all the absolutions and benedictions in Christendom. Oh! God, God!”

He was passing to awful blasphemies, when straight past me moved Ilsa, and I beheld her kneel by the stricken man, put her pure, soft hands against that coarse, sensual face, and under her touch for a moment he lay still, gazing with his dying eyes up into hers.

“Pray,” she commanded in the slow Latin she had learned at the convent, “pray to the Lord Christ; without priest or masses, even now He can forgive.”

Wonderingly he looked at her.

“Who are you?” he asked; “are you one of Fra Angelico’s seraphs winged down from heaven?”

“I am a simple German maiden to whom God has been exceeding kind.”

How their dialogue might have ended I know not, for Adolf plucked me by the sleeve.

“Countly Grace, a wagon is coming down the road from Eisenach.”

We left Ilsa still kneeling by our victim. Our men ranged themselves behind the great beeches along the way. Moritz and I exchanged assuring glances. Long since on the ride we had resolved what disposition to make of Dr. Luther if once Forli’s band were happily settled. In the midst of our scene of tragedy, not ended yet, must come the brighter dash of comedy. The wagon, the familiar vehicle I had followed all the miles from Wittenberg, was nearing rapidly, only the Imperial herald no longer rode before. As it approached I could see the occupants; the driver, the friar Johannes, honest Amsdorf, and, joy of joys, my dear master. Unsuspectingly it rattled onward. At a slight rising the stout horses fell to a walk. I gave a whistle. Instantly two of our varlets were at the heads of the team. I sprang from the covert with my sword flourished high.

“Stand all of you. Submit quietly. We seek only Dr. Luther.”

Adolf levelled an empty pistol at the driver’s breast. Gunter whipped out an oath worthy of a corsair. The unvalorous friar Johannes clapped his hands to his head and leaped down, bellowing mightily. Amsdorf, of nobler metal, was reaching for a knife, when my voice made him look on me twice, and despite my shaven face he knew me. Dr. Luther, who at the first onset had turned a little pale and clasped his hands, now flushed with a great light springing out of his eyes. In a low voice I spoke to them.

“Dear friends, you know I love you and the Cause right well, therefore fear nothing. But Dr. Luther must now come with me instantly, and do you, Magister Amsdorf, swear to all the world that you know not whether friends or foemen took him, nor whither they vanished.”

I seized Dr. Luther with some show of roughness and forced him out of the wagon. Johanne was already running up the Ruhla road, crying “help!” and “murder!” We let him flee. He would not reach a house, Humfried said, within a league. We thrust back Amsdorf into the vehicle, and Gunter, with more sly curses, bade the driver “lash his beasts as if the devil were after him, and never look around save as he wished to be chased by a bullet.” The frightened fellow obeyed instantly. The wagon was soon following the friar at full speed. Still, with mock roughness, we hustled Dr. Luther back into the covert of the beechwood, and then once face to face, with no part to play, I fell into his arms, nor do I shame to own to manly tears wherewith his also mingled.

“O gracious Heaven!” he cried when he could pass to words. “Oh joy, oh joy! I was sure the black dogs of Rome had devoured you in Worms, and I should meet you only in the Golden City. And you are here. You are here.”

“Here, dearest master,” spoke I, “and Providence has been good to me, for I have saved you.” Yet even in my delight I could not forget him who lay dying. In a few words I told how we had sore need of a priest. Quickly as I could I led him, still trembling with his joy, backward to where lay the Cardinal, under an imperial beech tree, with his sinful head on Ilsa’s lap.

“A priest,” I announced simply, for the pallor on the wounded man’s face told how time was pressing, and Forli looked up at us with dim, wistful eyes, inviting the other, yet dreading.

“Who is this man, a great noble?” asked Luther with a glance at the rich dress.

“Dear Doctor,” I said, “you are to hear the confession of Giovanni Paratini, called Cardinale di Forli, _legatus a latere_ from the Holy See, who half an hour since lay ambushed here, to hurry you a prisoner to Rome. God adjudged otherwise.”

“Who is this stranger?” cried Forli with a fearful gleam of intelligence.

“Your Eminence has asked for a priest. I bring him the fairest pardoner in the world--Dr. Martin Luther.”

A great shudder passed through the Cardinal’s frame; he raised his head from Ilsa’s lap.

“Oh! blessed Mother of God,” he cried, “have you no mercy? Am I not to be damned for enough sins without having your curses added? I sought your liberty and life. They have taken mine. Is not the reckoning washed clean? Spare me--spare--”

But here, with a tenderness infinite, Dr. Luther had dropped by the side of the dying. Gently as had Ilsa, he took the Italian’s hands in his own. And I thought as I stood gazing that Forli was happy even among dying sinners, soothed as he was by the noblest man and the noblest woman on God’s wide earth.

“To curse you, dearest brother? And wherefore should I curse? Are you not one of Christ’s sheep, and had He pity for only the ninety-and-nine who never went astray? And shall I, the servant, keep my wrath when forgiveness is proffered by the Master-shepherd?”

“Poetry; you are speaking of dreams,” cried the Cardinal, “hate has been hate, and vengeance vengeance since the world was. I care not what the Church says. Oh! my sins, my sins.”

Dr. Luther raised his hand, entreating. “Withdraw all of you, all but the lady (he did not know Ilsa’s name as yet). Our Lord has said, ‘this kind came not out save by prayer.’”

So we removed apart, every man bent on his own thoughts, until the pardoner spoke softly. “Return. The end is near.”

Forli’s head still lay on Ilsa’s lap, but in his dim eyes there was now a little token of peace. He looked at me, as if trying to form a question, but strength was failing for utterance. Luther made the words for him.

“He is seeking to know whether you forgive him also?”

“Cardinale di Forli,” said I, “for whatsoever thing wherein you have wronged me I forgive you every whit. May God show unto you all the pity and love He has revealed to me.”

A faint smile passed across the Italian’s face.

“It has all seemed a beautiful tale, a Platonic myth, this forgiveness of enemies. Yet, yet--” his words came in faint whispers, “if you and you can forgive, perchance God can do even likewise. It is all very strange. Tell Marianna so, and tell Leo de’ Medici we at Rome were wrong--”

No more. The blood rushed from his lips. His head fell back with the death pallor spreading on his face.

“_Requiescat in pace_,” spoke Luther solemnly. “The mercy of the Lord is from everlasting unto everlasting.”

Ilsa rose from the ground, while her brother cast a cloak over the form of him who had been a Prince of the Roman Church, the keenest critic of art and poetry in all the Eternal City, skilled in diplomacy, wise in counsel, the first pupil of Alexander Borgia.

“Who is this lady, so strangely dressed?” asked Luther, setting his gaze on Ilsa, and for the first time I knew that he had never met her.

“Dear Doctor,” I said, “this is the Gräfin Ilsa von Blankenburg, full soon to be my wife.”

Ilsa colored scarlet for the first time, at thought of her manly dress, but little enough recked Luther. With a great stride he went up to her, with never a “by-your-leave” he held her glowing face close to his and kissed her forehead.

“Dearest daughter,” he said, “I have remembered you in my prayers now morning and night these many months, ever since Walter brought me his burden touching you. I am taught again that God is stronger than the devil.”

He released Ilsa, and for a moment she tried to follow as we turned back to the horses; but in a moment I saw her color all fade to snow and like a crushed lily she was falling when I caught her in my arms. We laid her on the grass, and for a little I feared she was even as Forli; though brook water splashed on her face made her eyes open, and my first terrors end, her state, was very plain,--battling for life the day before, in the saddle all night save two hours rest on a strawrick, and now the dread scenes of this morning,--even we strong men knew we would be unstrung and lame for many a day. With my own arms I carried her, despite my limping thigh, to my horse and bore her before me in the saddle. Adolf protested he was stronger and far less wearied than I, but with such a burden, I could have played the Titan.

We laid the body of Forli across one of the captured horses, rough graves had been digged for the slain, the prisoners were duly strapped to our varlets’ saddle bows; a smart run we would give them ere they were lodged in some fit dungeon.

“Will not Forli be traced, and you be called in question?” asked Luther as we moved away.

“He has gone to France in the interests of peace,” I replied sagely; “it will be a long time before our friends at Rome pry too carefully into the precise place and circumstances of his vanishing. It would shatter too great a wasp’s nest. Doubtless we will hear that he died of disease in some obscure inn on the Paris road.”

So we left the glade with its triumph and tragedy. Humfried guided us by secret ways, up and down paths among the black beech stumps, until my own senses were mystified as to our route, only I saw by the sun that we were working steadily northward. Often we traced the edge of low precipices where unsteady horses would have fallen, and I would clutch Ilsa to my bosom fast; but little by little we came again out of the enshadowing greenwood, until at last down a wide natural avenue in the trees we beheld a wide patch of blue sky, and rising against it a lordly hill crowned by a lordlier citadel.

“The Kaiser Schloss,” announced Humfried, pointing; “the Wartburg.”

“And here,” added Moritz, “my good kinsman the Castellan for the Elector of Saxony will give Dr. Luther safe refuge until the present storms are passed.”

We galloped down the slope, and again by leaf-hidden ways ascended the steep, till the shadow of the great square tower of the Schloss was cast far over us. Then armed sentries challenged, the portcullis rose with chains loud rattling, and I saw the stalwart form of the commandant striding down to the gate house from the keep. Of a sudden I knew that I also was utterly spent and fainting, almost as was Ilsa. I was painfully wounded. I had slept little for many nights, I had been stretched for as many days on the rack of mental and spiritual agony. Dimness swam before my eyes. “Saved!” I urged upon myself, “saved! what folly to fail now.”

I remember giving Ilsa into the hands of her aunt, and away they took her amid a great flurry of women. Von Steinitz and his officers were standing by and pelting us with questions. Then even as I strove to dismount a wide black void seemed to spring up to enfold me. I was not conscious for many days.