The Brethren, H. Rider Haggard [ebooks that read to you .txt] 📗

Rosamund was led from the Hall of Steeple across the meadow down to the quay at Steeple Creek, where a great boat waited--that of which the brethren had found the impress in the mud. In this the band embarked, placing their dead and wounded, with one or two to tend them, in the fishing skiff that had belonged to her father. This skiff having been made fast to the stern of the boat, they pushed off, and in utter silence rowed down the creek till they reached the tidal stream of the Blackwater, where they turned their bow seawards. Through the thick night and the falling snow slowly they felt their way along, sometimes rowing, sometimes drifting, while the false palmer Nicholas steered them. The journey proved dangerous, for they could scarcely see the shore, although they kept as close to it as they dared

The end of it was that they grounded on a mud bank, and, do what they would, could not thrust themselves free. Now hope rose in the heart of Rosamund, who sat still as a statue in the middle of the boat, the prince Hassan at her side and the armed men--twenty or thirty of them--all about her. Perhaps, she thought, they would remain fast there till daybreak, and be seen and rescued when the brethren woke from their drugged sleep. But Hassan read her mind, and said to her gently enough:

"Be not deceived, lady, for I must tell you that if the worst comes to the worst, we shall place you in the little skiff and go on, leaving the rest to take their chance."

As it happened, at the full tide they floated off the bank and drifted with the ebb down towards the sea. At the first break of dawn she looked up, and there, looming large in the mist, lay a galley, anchored in the mouth of the river. Giving thanks to Allah for their safe arrival, the band brought her aboard and led her towards the cabin. On the poop stood a tall man, who was commanding the sailors that they should get up the anchor. As she came he advanced to her, bowing and saying:

"Lady Rosamund, thus you find me once more, who doubtless you never thought to see again."

She looked at him in the faint light and her blood went cold. It was the knight Lozelle.

"You here, Sir Hugh?" she gasped.

"Where you are, there I am," he answered, with a sneer upon his coarse, handsome face. "Did I not swear that it should be so, beauteous Rosamund, after your saintly cousin worsted me in the fray?"

"You here?" she repeated, "you, a Christian knight, and in the pay of Saladin!"

"In the pay of anyone who leads me to you, Rosamund." Then, seeing the emir Hassan approach, he turned to give some orders to the sailors, and she passed on to the cabin and in her agony fell upon her knees.

When Rosamund rose from them she felt that the ship was moving, and, desiring to look her last on Essex land, went out again upon the poop, where Hassan and Sir Hugh placed themselves, one upon either side of her. Then it was that she saw the tower of St. Peter's-on-the-Wall and her cousins seated on horseback in front of it, the light of the risen sun shining upon their mail. Also she saw Wulf spur his horse into the sea, and faintly heard his great cry of "Fear not! We follow, we follow!"

A thought came to her, and she sprang towards the bulwark; but they were watching and held her, so that all that she could do was to throw up her arms in token.

Now the wind caught the sail and the ship went forward swiftly, so that soon she lost sight of them. Then in her grief and rage Rosamund turned upon Sir Hugh Lozelle and beat him with bitter words till he shrank before her.

"Coward and traitor!" she said. "So it was you who planned this, knowing every secret of our home, where often you were a guest! You who for Paynim gold have murdered my father, not daring to show your face before his sword, but hanging like a thief upon the coast, ready to receive what braver men had stolen. Oh! may God avenge his blood and me on you, false knight--false to Him and me and faith and honour--as avenge He will! Heard you not what my kinsman called to me? 'We follow. We follow !' Yes, they follow, and their swords--those swords you feared to look on--shall yet pierce your heart and give up your soul to your master Satan," and she paused, trembling with her righteous wrath, while Hassan stared at her and muttered:

"By Allah, a princess indeed! So have I seen Salah-ed-din look in his rage. Yes, and she has his very eyes."

But Sir Hugh answered in a thick voice.

"Let them follow--one or both. I fear them not and out there my foot will not slip in the snow."

"Then I say that it shall slip in the sand or on a rock," she answered, and turning, fled to the cabin and cast herself down and wept till she thought that her heart would break.

Well might Rosamund weep whose beloved sire was slain, who was torn from her home to fend herself in the power of a man she hated. Yet there was hope for her. Hassan, Eastern trickster as he might be, was her friend; and her uncle, Saladin, at least, would never wish that she should be shamed. Most like he knew nothing of this man Lozelle, except as one of those Christian traitors who were ever ready to betray the Cross for gold. But Saladin was far away and her home lay behind her, and her cousins and lovers were eating out their hearts upon that fading shore. And she--one woman alone--was on this ship with the evil man Lozelle, who thus had kept his promise, and there were none save Easterns to protect her, none save them--and God, Who had permitted that such things should be.

The ship swayed, she grew sick and faint. Hassan brought her food with his own hands, but she loathed it who only desired to die. The day turned to night, the night turned to day again, and always Hassan brought her food and strove to comfort her, till at length she remembered no more.

Then came a long, long sleep, and in the sleep dreams of her father standing with his face to the foe and sweeping them down with his long sword as a sickle sweeps corn--of her father felled by the pilgrim knave, dying upon the floor of his own house, and saying "God will guard you. His will be done." Dreams of Godwin and Wulf also fighting to save her, plighting their troths and swearing their oaths, and between the dreams blackness.

Rosamund awoke to feel the sun streaming warmly through the shutter of her cabin, and to see a woman who held a cup in her hand, watching her--a stout woman of middle age with a not unkindly face. She looked about her and remembered all. So she was still in the ship.

"Whence come you?" she asked the woman.

"From France, lady. This ship put in at Marseilles, and there I was hired to nurse one who lay sick, which suited me very well, as I wished to go to Jerusalem to seek my husband, and good money was offered me. Still, had I known that they were all Saracens on this ship, I am not sure that I should have come--that is, except the captain, Sir Hugh, and the palmer Nicholas; though what they, or you either, are doing in such company I cannot guess."

"What is your name?" asked Rosamund idly.

"Marie--Marie Bouchet. My husband is a fishmonger, or was, until one of those crusading priests got hold of him and took him off to kill Paynims and save his soul, much against my will. Well, I promised him that if he did not return in five years I would come to look for him. So here I am, but where he may be is another matter."

"It is brave of you to go," said Rosamund, then added by an afterthought, "How long is it since we left Marseilles?"

Marie counted on her fat fingers, and answered:

"Five--nearly six weeks. You have been wandering in your mind all that time, talking of many strange things, and we have called at three ports. I forget their names, but the last one was an island with a beautiful harbour. Now, in about twenty days, if all goes well, we should reach another island called Cyprus. But you must not talk so much, you must sleep. The Saracen called Hassan, who is a clever doctor, told me so."

So Rosamund slept, and from that time forward, floating on the calm Mediterranean sea, her strength began to come back again rapidly, who was young and strong in body and constitution. Three days later she was helped to the deck, where the first man she saw was Hassan, who came forward to greet her with many Eastern salutations and joy written on his dark, wrinkled face.

"I give thanks to Allah for your sake and my own," he said. "For yours that you still live whom I thought would die, and for myself that had you died your life would have been required at my hands by Salah-ed-din, my master."

"If so, he should have blamed Azrael, not you," answered Rosamund, smiling; then suddenly turned cold, for before her was Sir Hugh Lozelle, who also thanked Heaven that she had recovered. She listened to him coldly, and presently he went away, but soon was at her side again. Indeed, she could never be free of him, for whenever she appeared on deck he was there, nor could he be repelled, since neither silence nor rebuff would stir him. Always he sat near, talking in his false, hateful voice, and devouring her with the greedy eyes which she could feel fixed upon her face. With him often was his jackal, the false palmer Nicholas, who crawled about her like a snake and strove to flatter her, but to this man she would never speak a word.

At last she could bear it no longer, and when her health had returned to her, summoned Hassan to her cabin.

"Tell me, prince," she said, "who rules upon this vessel?"

"Three people," he answered, bowing. "The knight, Sir Hugh Lozelle, who, as a skilled navigator, is the captain and rules the sailors; I, who rule the fighting men; and you, Princess, who rule us all."

"Then I command that the rogue named Nicholas shall not be allowed to approach me. Is it to be borne that I must associate with my father's murderer? "

"I fear that in that business we all had a hand, nevertheless your order shall be obeyed. To tell you the truth, lady, I hate the fellow, who is but a common spy."

"I desire also," went on Rosamund, "to speak no more with Sir Hugh Lozelle."

"That is more difficult," said Hassan, "since he is the captain whom my master ordered me to obey in all things that have to do with the ship."

"I have nothing to do with the ship," answered Rosamund; "and surely the princess of Baalbec, if so I am, may choose her own companions. I wish to see more of you and less of Sir Hugh Lozelle."

"I