Chapter EIGHTEEN: The King’s Avenger

Ludovic of Hungary paused in his march to Naples to visit the little gray convent of Santo-Pietro-a-Majello.

Toward sunset, a few men following him, he rode to the scene of his brother’s murder; up the fragrant garden where Andreas had passed only a few months ago, under the doorway Andreas had entered, laughing, the evening of September the thirteenth.

Ludovic spoke no word of his brother, but his usual arrogant demeanor was subdued to an utter quiet as the cowled monk conducted him to the chamber where Andreas had been murdered. The low, quiet chamber, hung with arras, picturing the virtues struggling with the vices.

The dying sun reddened walls and floor; touched the contorted figures in the tapestry and the placid gilt madonna on her bracket; the table below, and the brass bowl Queen Giovanna’s fingers had once filled with lilies. Through the open arches of the window showed the balcony, the little red roses with their long, thorny stems and crinkled leaves, and the wide landscape spreading toward Naples.

Ludovic pulled off his cap and stood inside the door looking about him. His tall figure, the splendor of his dress, the dark, wild beauty of his face showed in sharp contrast to the sunny, silent chamber, that appeared fitted better for the quiet presence of monks moving softly to and fro.

Presently he went to the window. The shifting of his chain armor, the clink of his huge spurs, broke the stillness sharply. In the last blaze of the sun his surtout, striped in scarlet and gold, and bearing the double-headed eagle, glistened fiercely as he stepped onto the balcony. The broken roses had grown again, the bloodstains been wiped away. On the balustrade where they had tied the rope a dove preened itself. A little warm wind stirred the scent from the vivid red blossoms. Ludovic leaned over the balustrade and looked down on the syringa bushes. Then he stepped back into the room.

Konrad of Gottif stood inside the door. The two men looked at each other.

“Where did he sleep?” asked the King.

Konrad pointed out the room. Ludovic crossed to the chamber, opened the door and glanced in.

Nothing there but an empty bed, an empty table and a bar of sunlight falling from a high window across the dusty floor.

The King closed the door. His dark face was markedly pale, his heavy brows frowning.

“And the Queen?” he asked, his tone lowered.

“The Queen slept in the chamber opposite.” Konrad of Gottif glanced at him curiously.

The King saw the look and paused in his walk across the room.

“Well?” he said. “An’ if she did, good my lord?”

“’Tis but a few paces from that room to the balcony,” was the answer. “God keep us from judgment, but----”

He paused, eying the King steadily.

“What more?” demanded Ludovic.

“Good my liege, she must have heard.”

“Must!” repeated Ludovic haughtily. “You would damn a woman on so small a surmise, Konrad of Gottif?”

He entered the Queen’s chamber without pausing for a reply.

There also was nothing out of the usual. It was a larger room than the other. In the center a carved bedstead hung with red, on one wall a crucifix, a dark chest, a chair completed the furniture.

Konrad of Gottif followed the King, his keen eyes fell on the bed.

“Mark the bed curtains, fair liege,” he said under his breath.

“Wherefore?” Ludovic glanced at them, half angrily. One was tied back with a thick silk cord, the other hung loose.

“You cannot hang a man without a rope,” said Konrad of Gottif dryly. “Where is the other cord?”

Ludovic looked at him in silence.

“What did they hang him with?” repeated the other. “Is it not a strange thing her bed should be so despoiled?”

“A hundred different matters might account for that, good Knight,” answered the King frowning. “Nay, we do not know that the chamber be as she left it.”

“The monks declare the rooms have been locked until they handed you the keys to-day----”

Ludovic interrupted him hotly:

“Would you tell me she was fiend enough to take the trappings from her bed to hang her husband--that his murderers entered her very chamber?”

Konrad of Gottif turned on his heel. “I have no more to say since you have sworn to believe this woman innocent.”

They descended into the outer room, and there the King, with a flushed face, laid his brown hand on Konrad’s sleeve.

“Tell me what you mean?” he said.

Konrad laughed. “What matter? I was your brother’s friend, my liege.”

Ludovic interrupted. “You think I am cold in his vengeance?” he demanded fiercely.

“I think,” was the steady answer, “that the woman won you too easily, by God, too easily!”

The dusky color flamed deeper in the King’s face; his brows lowered so that his eyes were hidden; he said nothing.

“When I rode to Hungary,” continued Konrad with flashing eyes, “it was to bring you to demand blood as the price of blood--blood spilled at the hands of a slave’s son--you came, armed with retribution, you defied the Church, you set Naples under your heel, very splendidly. Then this woman comes to you with soft words and you give her back her throne, and cry peace! when you should cry vengeance!”

“’Fore God, Konrad,” said the King thickly, “she is innocent!”

“You did not think so when the Princess Maria appealed to you--when you heard how Andreas had died, foully beneath her roof--what did you say then--‘between her and me the sword decides.’”

“I had not seen her then,” answered Ludovic in a hard voice. “I did not know----”

“That she had a baby face and golden hair,” flashed Konrad. “And a soft voice, and red lips to plead with----”

“Good my lord, you come near insolence,” Ludovic spoke evenly, but his square jaw was set hard as iron and the angry color glowed in his brown cheek.

But Konrad of Gottif, standing where his lord had been slain, speaking to the man whom he had brought to execute vengeance, was roused beyond any such consideration or fear of growing anger. “To be turned by a woman!” he said hotly. “You, a king and the avenger of a king--in one poor half hour to be swayed by a woman! How did she persuade you her husband’s death lay not at her door?”

Ludovic stood immovable. On his mouth a look of hard pride that came near obstinacy, in his hazel eyes an intolerant disdain of unpalatable speech. Sweet airs stole in through the windows, stirred the stiff surtout on his comely figure, and ruffled the heavy hair on his forehead.

“What proof, what evidence did she bring?” persisted Konrad of Gottif, breathing quickly.

From the height of his arrogance the King deigned to answer.

“None--it is sufficient that I believe her.”

Great wrath paled Count Konrad’s face.

“God wot, she is a witch, strong in the lures of the devil.”

The King’s lips curved into a hard smile.

“Think you I am a man easily bewitched, or one to follow the beckoning of a woman’s hand?” he asked proudly.

“Yea, I have always thought so----”

“Listen,” Ludovic interrupted, speaking impressively. “Good my friend--you mistake me, you mistake her--she has been the tool of many men, the puppet of a faction--I think she has done no evil thing in all her life.”

“You did not see her with your brother,” answered Konrad. “You did not mark how she insulted and flouted him----”

Ludovic made a half-turn about the room.

“Am I to bring judgment on her because she did not love her husband?” he demanded. “Well, I wot he was not of her choosing.”

Konrad’s hand fell to the strap of his sword, and clasped there fiercely.

“It is not for you, standing where he died, to make excuses for her or cheapen him to exalt her. I think you came to avenge Andreas, not to champion Giovanna.”

Ludovic looked at him steadily.

“And I do think I know my errand, Konrad of Gottif,” he frowned gloomily. “Most of those who slew him have already paid, and by her commands, mark that, she punished them.”

“Yet somewhat late for her fair fame,” answered the other sternly. “And what of Raymond de Cabane, to whom her sister is promised?”

“She has sworn to send him to me,” said Ludovic, “and I do think she will.”

“The slyer traitress she!” cried Konrad of Gottif. “What blacker thing than this--to sell her accomplice for her pardon?”

“So black a thing no woman would have the courage to do it,” answered Ludovic hotly. “It is proof enough in itself she is innocent. I say she looked at me straightly, she did not change color, no, nor tremble, when I asked for the murderer. Could guilt act so well? And the man has a tongue--would he be loyal to the mistress who had betrayed him--would he not speak--would she not think of that and be afraid?”

“The devil lends great cunning to his servants,” answered Konrad quietly.

The wrathful color darkened in the King’s somber face. His eyes, clear and bright behind the thick dusky lashes, turned a hard look on the Count.

“I say I do believe her,” he said, his soft voice strained with anger. “Would guilt have dared come to me as she came? Nought but innocence would have had such courage--and I do tell you, Konrad of Gottif, that I promised my lady cousin to enter Naples in all peace and friendship if she would keep her word with me as to Raymond de Cabane and her sister--and here in this accursed place, I vow to you, that neither speech nor deeds shall turn me from my given word.”

Konrad looked at the soft, clear-cut face, burning red in the brown cheeks with passion. He noted the stubborn curl of the beautiful mouth, the disdainful swell of the nostril, the eyes proud and masterful, the head held haughtily, and he answered wearily:

“You are not a man easy to advise, Ludovic of Hungary--you are the master--yet I am sorry for the Queen’s sister.”

“What of her?” The King spoke again with natural sweetness, but his proud face contradicted the softness of his speech.

“She is to be your wife--and, good, my liege, the Queen loves her not and she hates the Queen.”

Ludovic was silent. He gazed in front of him at the wide, rich landscape and the purple hills behind which the amber clouds of sunset floated.

“Even though you be very proud and very certain, have a care of this same Queen.”

Ludovic laughed gently.

“Why, would you warn me of my little cousin?”

“I would warn you of the woman who has beguiled you so far so easily,” answered Konrad sourly.

“Oh, hold your peace of that matter,” said the King. “However you rail against her you cannot move me. Think you that even if my little cousin wove spells and enchantments, I should fear them?”

“God wot you are a soft man to women. Take heed of this woman, lest she shame you with her lies.”

“Wearisome is this talk, Konrad of Gottif. If so greatly you mislike my actions--the road lies wide back to Hungary.”

Count Konrad strode to the door and laid his hand on the latch.

“I would rather return to Hungary than see the Queen triumph again--yea, rather return with my vengeance unglutted than watch you meet her in friendship--even though what some said at Buda when you left be repeated and I have to answer, ‘’Tis even so.’”

He opened the door. It seemed that he would leave in silence, when the King’s soft voice gave him pause.

“And what did they say at Buda?”

“They said, my lord of Hungary, that you did not gather your armies and leave your kingdom to avenge a boy’s blood, but for glory, wanton triumph, and pleasure.”

The King turned swiftly, the gold coat shimmering on the silver light of his armor.

“They lied,” he said languidly. “But go you and confirm their lie if you dare. My motives are not for common questioning. They rest between me and God, and the actions of my sword hand are above any man’s asking.”

Konrad of Gottif descended, without a sound, into the blackness of the narrow stairs.

The sun had set, leaving the chamber in the purple light of twilight, the haggard figures of the combatants on the tapestry appeared to glow with a ghostly life in the uncertain lights and shadows. Under their feet their names were worked in twisted scrolls. Ludovic found himself idly reading them: Prudence, Valor, Fidelity, Humility, trampling on the writhing forms of Pride, Greed, Envy, Sloth, and Malice. The placid little Madonna smiled from the dark bracket. Without the fine stems and thin leaves of the roses quivered dark against the sweep of light fading sky.

Ludovic moved softly down the room, again opened the door of the Queen’s chamber and looked in. Ghostly now it seemed with the heavy blackness cast by the curtains over the dismantled bed, the pearl pale square of light window in the darkness of the wall.

Here she had lain that night while outside her door the King was murdered. Only a short time ago, yet for the inscrutable silence, for the blankness of walls and stones, it might have been a thousand years since blood was shed.

There was no mark nor stain of it, no echo of a desperate struggle, no sound of wild shrieks imprisoned forever, no ghost of a young King lurking in the doorways, nothing but three empty rooms, a stone balcony grown with peaceful roses, and a wide view of an evening landscape. Yet under all his panoply of studded armor and trappings of heavy silk, Ludovic of Hungary shivered as if on the sudden it had fallen cold. A curious sense of mistrust of Giovanna came over him, a feeling in no way the result of Konrad’s words, but rather part of the atmosphere of the place and the sight of that cordless red curtain hanging by her deserted bed, but--he was “a man soft to women.”

He went heavily downstairs, shutting the door carefully, as if it were the gate of a tomb. Below in the dim pillared hall, the abbot and some of the monks waited for him. He handed them the keys.

“Tell me what happened that night,” he said. He seated himself under one of the lancet-shaped windows, and through the scarlet and blue of the pictured saints a faint-colored light fell upon the circlet of curls on his dark head, the folds of the yellow mantle on his shoulders, and the clasp of gold and green at his full throat. It caught also the end of his long pointed steel shoe resting on the flags, and glittered down his greaves.

“Tell me the manner of my brother’s death,” he said, shifting his question into a plainer form.

The Abbot motioned forward the two monks who had recited the psalms by the side of Andreas. One of them commenced speaking, his cowl shrouding his face, his voice low and even.

“Where the King lodged is far from our cells and chapel. We heard nothing save some faint sounds that we thought were the soldiers brawling until Madonna Maria came to seek us.”

“So she had heard something?” questioned Ludovic under his breath.

“Shrieking, she said. She vowed the King was being murdered----”

“Why should she think it was the King?” demanded Ludovic.

“Because of the ill terms that he was on with the Queen and the Queen’s friends. We followed her to the King’s apartment and found it empty. We knocked at the Queen’s chamber and received no answer.”

The speaker was an old man. He interrupted himself with feeble coughs, then continued in his impassive voice:

“Madonna Maria found blood on the floor of the outer chamber and a rope tied to the balcony. We descended to the garden and discovered the King. His head had been smashed with the fall and he lay in his own blood--it was among the syringa bushes. Two of us went to the Queen’s chamber and said, ‘Madonna, what shall we do with the body of your husband?’ She gave no answer. Early in the morning she returned to Naples with the Conte Raymond.”

The old monk coughed again; the gloomy shadows gathered among the grim pillars; the colors faded from the windows.

Through the gloom came the King’s soft voice:

“What rope did they hang him with?”

“The cord from the Queen’s bed.”

Ludovic made a quick movement. “How may you tell?”

“By the piece they left hanging to the balcony. One spake of it to the Queen. She said that early in the day one of them crept into her room and stole it, as it was the only cord in the convent, and their design was to hang the King.”

“That may well be,” said Ludovic quietly.

A little novice lit a thick yellow candle. The pointed red flame leaped up, smoking, and showed the gray arches sweeping into the shadow of the roof, and struck into points of glitter the rings on the King’s hand, his armor, and the gold threads on the scarlet surtout.

In the doorway waited the Hungarians he had brought with him. He rose and called one of them. The novice holding the candle stood in front of the cowled monks gazing at the warriors; as his hands shook, the light shifted vaguely in trailing yellow shapes over the half-seen figures.

Ludovic took his gauntlets from one knight and spoke to another. They heard him laugh in a weary fashion, then the soft bright chinking of gold. He turned and stepped close to the novice, the candle light falling over him.

“Pray for a King unshriven,” he said briefly, “and a foully murdered man.”

He flung his gauntlet at the monk’s feet and the gold pieces with which it was filled rolled over the floor, shining like flame.

Before the little novice rose the image of Humility in the tapestry upstairs, a meek figure in his sad-colored robe, and his companion, Pride. Ludovic of Hungary, flinging his gift to God as if it were a dole to a beggar, minded him of Pride in the arras. He stared at the gorgeous King, and the money rolled unheeded under his long robe.

“How shall such prosper?” whispered the monk next him. “A man of blazoned arrogance.”

The King passed into the garden and mounted in silence. Against the wall leaned Konrad of Gottif, and Ludovic spoke to him.

“What do you muse on, Konrad of Gottif?” His bare right hand tightened on the reins, his eyes held a challenge.

The Count broke forth fiercely: “On the white witch who has so much power--on the folly…” He strangled his words in his throat.

“You were better at home,” said the King unpleasantly. “You and I shall not agree on this question--get back to Hungary.”

He turned the horse’s head and rode down the broad flagged path. When he had passed through the gate he drew rein in the meadow, waiting for his company. A vivid blue twilight encompassed him, the stars seemed to float in the misty heavens, the poplar trees rose gray against this blue, and in their upper leaves a continuous wind rustled. Above the black convent a new moon swung in a wreath of white vapors, like a cut pearl in foam.

Ludovic became aware of a girl coming toward him through the thick grass. The dusky blue light caused her to appear dim yet luminous. She bore a shapely jar on her shoulder; her hair made a dark heap on the nape of her neck. She was singing to herself, but at sight of Ludovic she paused and stared through the twilight.

“A soldier?” she said, and stepped nearer. “I have never seen any here before, though I pass very often.” She laughed. “Did you come to see where Andreas of Hungary was slain?”

Her abrupt mention of his brother caused the King to look at her sharply. She was twirling a scarlet poppy between her white teeth. Her brown dress, carelessly laced, showed her slender throat and shoulders.

“What do you know of him?” asked Ludovic.

She laughed again sullenly. “I hope the Hungarians will burn the Queen,” she said. “Even as the others were burned.”

Then she looked up, saw Ludovic’s face and bearing, and, half-overawed, turned away through the flowers.

But he called after her: “Why should they burn the Queen?”

“Because she is a witch,” came the answer, and the girl hurried out of sight down the sloping fields.

Ludovic’s jaw set in iron lines of resolution. The more he was confronted with popular opinion of the Queen, the more firmly was he determined to abide by his own judgment.

He remembered her youth, her quiet, her most wonderful eyes, the simplicity of her defense, most of all the manner in which she had come to him, appealing to his justice, holding herself at his mercy, abiding his sentence. In that he saw a magnificence of action belonging only to regal innocence. She disdained alike proof and protestation, she appealed to him as a Queen to a King.

His pride was most delicately flattered, his generosity most delicately appealed to, his imagination most sweetly fired by violet eyes and a fine hand that had put in his two vivid carnations. These things were unknown to the crowd that defamed her, but between him and her they were bonds and pledges of an understanding.

When his company joined him and they galloped over the fields toward his camp, his thoughts dwelt on Raymond de Cabane, and all his wrath and vengeance, suddenly dammed, turned aside from the Queen and rebounded upon Conte d’Eboli. He was not of a cruel nature, but he desired a hard death for the man who had murdered his brother. Bitterly the slave should pay for the spilling of royal blood.

As they came to the camp a party of soldiers rode up. By the red, ragged light of torches that flaunted the stars, Ludovic recognized in the foremost rider the small features and amber curls of Carlo di Durazzo.

The two men reined up simultaneously, and the Duke drew his cap from his burnished hair.

“Fair lord, I come from the Queen,” he said in his lazy voice.

Ludovic spurred his horse forward.

“My cousin of Durazzo?” He held out his hand. The Duke was free from even suspicion of complicity in the murder of Andreas. The King desired to show he knew this, and his voice was warm.

Carlo di Durazzo glanced into the proud smiling face the torchlight showed, and his own was dull. He could not refuse his hand, but he gave it coldly.

“They make gallant preparations for your entry into Naples,” he said indifferently. “The Queen sends you her duty--Madonna Maria all fitting greeting.”

His careless tone became almost a sneer. Ludovic, quick to see and to resent even a touch of his own pride in any other man, turned haughty eyes on the cousin who had not responded to his condescension. But Carlo only laughed, and turned in his saddle.

“Bring the Queen’s gift,” he said over his shoulder, then he faced the King again. “Giovanna rejoices at your coming,” he added.

The remark was pointed and Ludovic replied to the meaning.

“And is not my cousin Maria glad?” he asked, though he had never thought of his betrothed since he set foot in Italy.

Carlo eyed him defiantly, hating his pride, his beauty, his splendor, thinking with a strange pang of Maria’s blue eyes and sad, fair face.

“As to that I know not,” he answered. “Some think she has forgotten to do aught but weep.”

A man-at-arms in blue and purple stepped from the ranks and came up to the two leaders. Carlo drew back his great white horse. The soldier went on one knee before the King of Hungary.

“Hold the torches higher, varlet,” commanded the Duke.

Ludovic looked down upon a kneeling man holding a scarlet cushion covered with a gold cloth.

“The Queen’s gift,” said Carlo. A pikeman drew off the cloth. The smoky torchlight revealed a hideous head, swollen, discolored, with blood-stained lips and eyes, lying on the scarlet cushion.

“Raymond de Cabane,” said the pikeman, and lifted the head by the coarse black hair.

Ludovic stared into the dead face of the man he had vowed to kill. So she had kept her word--in this fashion.

“Why did she send him to me dead?” he demanded sternly. “I did not ask it.”

“Never could he have been brought alive,” said Carlo. “He was a mighty fighter.”

In the red torchlight the defaced features appeared to contort with devilish life. Ludovic, gazing at them, thought: “And I had thought to question him.”

The lifeless face mocked him. Neither fear of Hell nor hope of Heaven, not the most fearful of torments, could wring from the Conte Raymond now the name of his accomplices. Those cold lips held forever the secret of the Queen’s guilt or innocence.

In a measure Ludovic felt balked of his vengeance. He could not punish the dead, nay, nor triumph over this disfigured flesh. He could extort nothing from Raymond de Cabane.

The flaring yellow lights staining the purple twilight and revealing the sharp glitter of armor and spear, the horses’ shining flanks, and the men’s faces hidden in the shade of their helms, flickered over the head of Raymond de Cabane and the dark splendor of the King’s face and throat above the gold collar of his mail.

“Take away that carrion,” he said gloomily, “I am cheated of my revenge.”

He rode away without a word to the Italians, and they could hear the soft clank of his harness as he spurred into the purple darkness.

“Think you Maria will favor him?” asked Carlo softly, leaning toward Luigi of Taranto.

That warrior pushed back his red hair.

“Any woman would,” he answered.

Carlo di Durazzo leaned from his horse and looked at the head, replaced now on the scarlet cushion. Sharp blue shadows lay on it; the grinning teeth showed behind a film of blood; on the wrinkled forehead were dull brown stains.

“They have all paid now,” he thought, “unless Giovanna--” He checked his thoughts and glanced up at the great soft stars.