Black Magic, Marjorie Bowen [100 books to read TXT] 📗

>As they must wait for the horse to get a foothold on the slippery

stones, for the servant to go ahead and cast the lantern light across

the blackness, their progress was slow, but neither of the three spoke

until they halted before a gate in a high wall that appeared to rise

up, suddenly before them, out of the night.

 

The servant handed the lantern to his master and clanged the bell that

hung beside the gate. Theirry could see by the massive size of the

buttresses that flanked the entrance that it was a large castle the

night concealed from him; the dwelling, certainly, of some great

noble. The gates were opened by two men carrying lights. The horseman

rode through, the two students at his heels.

 

“Tell my lady,” said he to one of the men, “that I bring two who

desire her hospitality;” he turned and spoke over his shoulder to

Theirry, “I am the steward here, my lady is very gentle-hearted.”

 

They crossed a courtyard and found themselves before the square door

of the donjon.

 

Dirk looked at Theirry, but he kept his eyes lowered and was markedly

silent; their guide dismounted, gave the reins to one of the varlets

who hung about the door, and commanded them to follow him.

 

The door opened straight on to a large chamber the entire size of the

donjon; it was lit by torches stuck into the wall and fastened by iron

clamps; a number of men stood or sat about, some in a livery of bright

golden-coloured and blue cloth, others in armour or hunting attire;

one or two were pilgrims with the cockle-shells round their hats.

 

The steward passed through this company, who saluted him with but

little attention to his companions, and ascended a flight of stairs

set in the wall at the far end; these were steep, damp and gloomy, ill

lit by a lamp placed in the niche of the one narrow deep-set window;

Dirk shuddered in his soaked clothes; the steward was unfastening his

mantle; it left trails of wet on the cold stone steps; Theirry marked

it, he knew not why.

 

At the top of the stairs they paused on a small stone landing.

 

“Who is your lady?” asked Theirry.

 

“Jacobea of Martzburg, the Emperor’s ward,” answered the steward. He

had taken off his mantle and his hat, and showed himself to be young

and dark, plainly dressed in a suit of deep rose colour, with high

boots, spurred, and a short sword in his belt.

 

As he opened the door Dirk whispered to Theirry, “It is the lady—ye

met to-day?” “To-day!” breathed Theirry. “Yea, it is the lady.”

 

They entered by a little door and stepped into an immense chamber; the

great size of the place was emphasised by the bareness of it and the

dim shifting light that fell from the circles of candles hanging from

the roof; facing them, in the opposite wall, was a high arched window,

faintly seen in the shadows, to the left a huge fireplace with a

domed top meeting the wooden supports of the lofty beamed roof, beside

this a small door stood open on a flight of steps and beyond were two

windows, deep set and furnished with stone seats.

 

The brick walls were hung with tapestries of a dull purple and gold

colour, the beams of the ceiling painted; at the far end was a table,

and in the centre of the hearth lay a slender white boarhound, asleep.

 

So vast was the chamber and so filled with shadows that it seemed as

if empty save for the dog; but Theirry, after a second discerned the

figures of two ladies in the furthest window-seat. The steward crossed

to them and the students followed.

 

One lady sat back in the niched seat, her feet on the stone ledge, her

arm along the windowsill; she wore a brown dress shot with gold

thread, and behind her and along the seat hung and lay draperies of

blue and purple; on her lap rested a small grey cat, asleep.

 

The other lady sat along the floor on cushions of crimson and yellow;

her green dress was twisted tight about her feet and she stitched a

scarlet lily on a piece of red samite.

 

“This is the chatelaine,” said the steward; the lady in the window-seat turned her head; it was Jacobea of Martzburg, as Theirry had

known since his eyes first rested on her. “And this is my wife,

Sybilla.”

 

Both women looked at the strangers.

 

“These are your guests until to-morrow, my lady,” said the steward.

 

Jacobea leant forward.

 

“Oh!” she exclaimed, and flushed faintly. “Why, you are welcome.”

 

Theirry found it hard to speak; he cursed the chance that had made him

beholden to her hospitality.

 

“We are leaving the college,” he answered, not looking at her. “And

for tonight could find no shelter.”

 

“Meeting them I brought them here,” added the steward.

 

“You did well, Sebastian, surely,” answered Jacobea. “Will it please

you sit, sirs?”

 

It seemed that she would leave it at that, with neither question nor

comment, but Sybilla, the steward’s wife, looked up smiling from her

embroidery.

 

“Now wherefore left you the college, on foot on a wet night?” she

said.

 

“I killed a man—or nearly,” answered Theirry curtly.

 

Jacobea looked at her steward.

 

“Are they not wet, Sebastian?”

 

“I am well enough,” said Theirry quickly; he unclasped his mantle.

“Certes, under this I am dry.”

 

“That am not I!” cried Dirk.

 

At the sound of his voice both women looked at him; he stood apart

from the others and his great eyes were fixed on Jacobea.

 

“The rain has cut me to the skin,” he said, and Theirry crimsoned for

shame at his complaining tone.

 

“It is true,” answered Jacobea courteously. “Sebastian, will you not

take the gentle clerk to a chamber—we have enough empty, I wot—and

give him another habit?”

 

“Mine are too large,” said the steward in his indifferent voice.

 

“The youth will fall with an ague,” remarked his wife. “Give him

something, Sebastian, I warrant he will not quarrel about the fit.”

 

Sebastian turned to the open door beside the fireplace.

 

“Follow him, fair sir,” said Jacobea gently; Dirk bent his head and

ascended the stairs after the steward.

 

The chatelaine pulled a red bell-rope that hung close to her, and a

page in the gold and blue livery came after a while; she gave him

instructions in a low voice; he picked up Theirry’s wet mantle, set

him a carved chair and left.

 

Theirry seated himself; he was alone with the two women and they were

silent, not looking at him; a sense of distraction, of uneasiness was

over him—he wished that he was anywhere but here, sitting a dumb

suppliant in this woman’s presence.

 

Furtively he observed her—her clinging gown, her little velvet shoes

beneath the hem of it, her long white hands resting on the soft grey

fur of the cat on her knee, her yellow hair, knotted on her neck, and

her lovely, meek face.

 

Then he noticed the steward’s wife, Sybilla; she was pale, of a type

not greatly admired or belauded, but gorgeous, perhaps, to the taste

of some; her russet red hair was splendid in its gleam through the

gold net that confined it; her mouth was a beautiful shape and colour,

but her brows were too thick, her skin too pale and her blue eyes over

bright and hard.

 

Theirry’s glance came back to Jacobea; his pride rose that she did not

speak to him, but sat there idle as if she had forgotten him; words

rose to his lips, but he checked them and was mute, flushing now and

then as she moved in her place and still did not speak.

 

Presently the steward returned and took his place on a chair between

Theirry and his wife, for no reason save that it happened to be there,

it seemed.

 

He played with the tagged laces on his sleeves and said nothing.

 

The mysterious atmosphere of the place stole over Theirry with a sense

of the portentous; he felt that something was brooding over these

quiet people who did not speak to each other, something intangible yet

horrible; he clasped his hands together and stared at Jacobea.

 

Sebastian spoke at last.

 

“You go to Frankfort?”

 

“Yea,” answered Theirry.

 

“We also, soon, do we not, Sebastian?” said Jacobea.

 

“You will go to the court,” said Theirry.

 

“I am the Emperor’s ward,” she answered.

 

Again there was silence; only the sound of the silk drawn through the

samite as Sybilla stitched the red lily; her husband was watching her;

Theirry glancing at him saw his face fully for the first time, and was

half startled.

 

It was a passionate face, in marked contrast with his voice; a dark

face with a high arched nose and long black eyes; a strange face.

 

“How quiet the castle is tonight,” said Jacobea; her voice seemed to

faint beneath the weight of the stillness.

 

“There is noise enough below,” answered Sebastian, “but we cannot hear

it.”

 

The page returned, carrying a salver bearing tall glasses of wine,

which he offered to Theirry, then to the steward.

 

Theirry felt the green glass cold to his fingers and shuddered; was

that sense of something awful impending only matter of his own mind,

stored of late with terrible images?

 

What was the matter with these people…Jacobea had seemed so

different this afternoon…he tasted the wine; it burnt and stung his

lips, his tongue, and sent the blood to his face.

 

“It still rains,” said Jacobea; she put her hand out of the open

window and brought it back wet. “But it is hot,” said Sybilla.

 

Once more the heavy silence; the page took back the glasses and left

the room.

 

Then the door beside the fireplace was pushed open and Dirk entered

softly into the mute company.