Collected Works of Eugène Sue

by Eugène Sue

“No, father; it is at the most a half hour’s walk if we move briskly.”

  “Lead the way, my dear sons — we will follow.”

  “Oh, father, the impious people of this community little dream at this hour that the punishment of heaven is ready to descend upon their heads!”

  “Move quickly, my sons — justice will soon be done.”

  “Hermanfred,” said the chief of the warriors turning to one of the men in his troop, “have you with you the rope and iron manacles?”

  “Yes, seigneur Gondowald.”

  CHAPTER IV.

  BRUNHILD AND FREDEGONDE.

  AT THE MONASTERY the banquet was in full swing. Convivial cordiality presided over the celebration. At the table where Loysik, Ronan, the Master of the Hounds and their respective families were seated, the conversation continued animated and lively. At this moment the subject was the atrocities that took place in the gloomy palace of Queen Brunhild. The happy inhabitants of the Valley listened to the horrible account with the greedy, uneasy and shuddering curiosity that is often felt at night when, seated by a peaceful hearth, one hears some awe-inspiring history. Happy, humble and unknown, the listeners feel certain they will never find themselves concerned in any adventure of the frightful nature of the one that causes them to shudder; they fear and yet they like to hear the end of the tale.

  “In order to unravel the sanguinary tangle, and seeing that Brunhild, the present ruler of Burgundy, is the theme, let us first sum up the facts in a few words. Clotaire died not long after he had his son Chram, together with the latter’s wife and daughter, burned alive. That was about fifty-three years ago. Is it not so?” Ronan was saying.

  “Yes, father,” answered Gregory; “we are now in the year 613.”

  “Clotaire left four sons — Charibert reigned in Paris, Gontran was King of Orleans and Bourges, Sigebert was King of Austrasia and resided in Metz, and Chilperic was left King of Neustria, occupying the royal residence of Soissons, our conquerors, as you know, having given the names of Neustria and Austrasia to the provinces of the north and the east of Gaul.”

  “Did you say Chilperic, father?” asked Ronan’s son. “Chilperic, the Nero of Gaul, one of whose edicts closed with these words: ‘Let whomsoever refuses obedience to this law have his eyes put out!’”

  “Yes, we were speaking of him and of his brother Sigebert. Let us leave the other two aside, seeing that both Charibert and Gontran died childless, the former in 566, the latter in 593. Although they both showed themselves worthy descendants of Clovis, they need not now occupy us.”

  “Father, the account that we wish to hear is that of Brunhild and Fredegonde. These two names seem to be inseparable and are both steeped in blood—”

  “I am coming to the history of these two monsters and of their two husbands, Chilperic and Sigebert — the two she-wolves have each her wolf, and, what is still worse for Gaul, her whelps. Although married to Andowere, Chilperic had among his numerous concubines a Frankish female slave, a woman of dazzling beauty, and endowed, it is said, with an irresistible power of seduction. Her name was Fredegonde. He became so fascinated with her that, in order to enjoy the company of the slave with utter freedom, he cast off his wife Andowere, who soon thereupon died, in a convent. But Chilperic presently tired of Fredegonde also, and, anxious to emulate his brother Sigebert, who married a princess of royal blood named Brunhild, the daughter of Athanagild, a King of Germanic stock like the Franks, and whose ancestors conquered Spain as Clovis did Gaul, he asked and obtained the hand of Brunhild’s sister, Galeswinthe. It is said that nothing was comparable with the sweetness of the face of this princess, while the goodness of her heart matched the angelic qualities of her face. When she was about to leave Spain to come to Gaul and marry Chilperic, the unhappy soul had sad presentiments of a speedy death. Nor did her presentiments deceive her. Six years after her marriage she was smothered to death in her bed by her own husband.”

  “Like Wisigarde, the fourth wife of Neroweg, who was strangled to death by that Frankish count, whose family still lives in Auvergne,” remarked Gregory. “The Frankish kings and seigneurs all follow the same custom.”

  “Poor Galeswinthe! But why did her husband Chilperic indulge such ferocity toward her?”

  “For the reason that the passion which once drew him to Fredegonde and which had cooled for a time, resumed the upper hand with him more hotly than before. He put his second wife out of the way in order to marry the concubine. Thus Fredegonde was married to Chilperic after the murder of Galeswinthe, and became one of the queens of Gaul. At times odd contrasts are seen in the same family. Galeswinthe was an angel, her sister Brunhild, married to Sigebert, was an infernal being. Of exceptional beauty, gifted with an iron will, vindictive to the point of ferocity, animated by an insatiable ambition, and endowed with an intelligence of such high grade that it would have equalled genius had she only not applied her extraordinary faculties to the blackest deeds — Brunhild could not choose but create for herself a fame at which the world grows pale. She first set her cap to revenge Galeswinthe, who was strangled to death by Chilperic at the instigation of Fredegonde. A frightful feud broke out, accordingly, between the two women who now were mortal enemies, and each of whom reigned with her husband over a part of Gaul: poison, the assassin’s dagger, conflagrations, civil war, wholesale butcheries, conflicts between fathers and sons, brothers and brothers — such were the means that the two furies employed against each other. The people of Gaul did not, of course, escape the devastating storm. The provinces that were subject to Sigebert and Brunhild were pitilessly ravaged by Chilperic, while the possessions of the latter were in turn laid waste by Sigebert. Thus driven by the fury of their wives, the two brothers fought each other until they were both assassinated.”

  “Oh, if only Gallic blood did not have to flow in torrents, if only these frightful disasters did not heap fresh ills upon our unhappy country, I would be ready to see in the conflict between those two women, who thus blasted the families that they joined, a positive punishment sent down by heaven,” observed Loysik. “But, alas, what ills, what frightful sufferings do not these royal hatreds afflict our own people with!”

  “And did the two female monsters ever find ready tools for their vengeance?”

  “The murders that they did not themselves commit with the aid of poison, they caused to be committed with the dagger. Fredegonde, whose depravity surpassed Messalina’s of old, surrounded herself with young pages; she intoxicated them with unspeakable voluptuousness; she threw their reasoning into disorder by means of philters that she herself concocted; by means of these she rendered them frenetic, and then she would hurl them against the appointed victims. It was by such means that she contrived the assassination of King Sigebert, Brunhild’s husband, and that she succeeded in poisoning their son Childebert. It was by such means that she caused a large number of her enemies to be despatched with the dagger and, if the chronicles are to be trusted, her own husband Chilperic was numbered among her victims.”

  “So, then, that veritable fury spewed out of hell — Fredegonde — spared not even her own husband?”

  “Some historians, at least, lay his murder to her door; others charge it to Brunhild. Both theories may be correct; the one Queen, as well as the other, had an interest in putting Chilperic out of the way — Brunhild in order to avenge her sister Galeswinthe, Fredegonde in order to escape the punishment that she feared for the depravity of her life.”

  “And did punishment finally overtake the abominable woman?”

  “Queen Fredegonde died peaceably in her bed in the year 597 at the age of fifty-five years. Her funeral was pompously celebrated by the Catholic priests and she was buried in consecrated ground in the basilica of St. Germain-des-Pres at Paris. In the language of the panegyrists of our Kings, ‘Fredegonde reigned long, happy and ably.’ At her death she left her kingdom intact to her son Clotaire the younger.”

  A shudder of horror passed over the hearers of this shocking hist
ory. The royal abominations stood in such strong contrast to the morals of the inhabitants of the Valley, that these good people imagined they had heard the narrative of some frightful dream, the fabric of the delusion of a fever.

  Gregory was the first to break the silence that ensued:

  “Accordingly, Clotaire the younger, son of Fredegonde and Chilperic, is the grandson of Clotaire the elder, the slayer of his little nephews, and is great-grandson to Clovis?”

  “Yes — and how worthy of his stock he is proving himself you may judge, my son, by the era of new crimes that follows. His mother Fredegonde bequeathed to him the implacable hatred with which she was herself animated against Brunhild. Accordingly, the mortal duel continued unabated between the latter and the son of her enemy.”

  “Alas, fresh disasters will befall Gaul, with the renewal of the sanguinary conflict!”

  “Oh, indeed frightful disasters — frightful — because the crimes of Fredegonde pale before those of Brunhild, our present Queen, the Queen of the people of Burgundy.”

  “Father, can the crimes of Brunhild surpass Fredegonde’s?”

  “Ronan,” said Odille carrying both her hands to her temples. “This mass of murders, all committed in the same family, makes one’s head reel with dizziness. One’s mind feels over-burdened and tires in the effort to follow the bloody thread that alone can lead through the maze of such unnamable crimes. Great God, in what times do we live! What sights may yet be reserved for our children!”

  “Unless the demons themselves step next out of hell, little Odille, our children will see nothing that could surpass what is happening now. As I said to you, the crimes of Fredegonde are as naught beside Brunhild’s. If you only knew what is going on at this very hour in the magnificent castle of Chalon-on-the-Saone, where the old Queen — the daughter, wife and mother of kings — holds her own great-grandchildren under her tutelage — but no — I dare not — my lips refuse to narrate the shocking incidents—”

  “Ronan is right. Shocking things, that language is unable to render, take place to-day in the castle of Queen Brunhild,” replied Loysik with a shudder; but turning to his brother he proceeded to say: “Ronan, out of respect for these young families, out of respect for humanity at large, break off your narrative at where you now are.”

  “You are right, Loysik; I am bound to stop before the impossibility of narrating the misdeeds of Queen Brunhild, who, nevertheless, is one of God’s creatures, and belongs to the human species.”

  At that moment one of the monk laborers approached Loysik and notified him that someone was knocking at the outer gate of the monastery, and that a voice from without announced a message from the bishop of Chalon and from Queen Brunhild.

  CHAPTER V.

  THE ASSAULT.

  THE NAME OF the female fiend who then ruled Burgundy pronounced at that moment, produced a profound sensation among the assembled colonists. They were amazed, and a vague sense of apprehension ran over the assembly.

  “A message from the bishop and the Queen?” repeated Loysik rising and proceeding to the outward gate. “That is strange. The punt is tied every evening on this side of the river, and the watchers have imperative orders not to cross the stream at night. The messenger must have taken a boat at Noisan and rowed up the river.”

  With these thoughts running in his mind the superior of the community approached the massive gate bolted from within. Several monks bearing torches followed the venerable head of their establishment. Ronan, the Master of the Hounds, and several other colonists also accompanied Loysik. He made a sign. The heavy gate was unbolted and turned upon its hinges. It exposed to view, brightly lighted by the moon, the archdeacon and Gondowald, the Queen’s chamberlain. Behind them the armed men stood ranged in single file, casqued, cuirassed, their bucklers on their arms, lances in hand, and swords by their sides.

  “There is some treachery in this,” said Loysik in a low voice to Ronan; and turning to one of the monks he asked: “Who is keeping watch to-night at the lodge of the punt?”

  “The two priests — they volunteered to take the places of the two brothers whose turn it was to mount guard to-night.”

  “I see it all,” replied Loysik with bitterness, and stepping forward he addressed the archdeacon, who had also stepped forward but stopped at the threshold of the gate together with Gondowald, while their escort of soldiers remained where they were posted.

  “Who are you? What do you want?” he demanded.

  “My name is Salvien, archdeacon of the church of Chalon and nephew of the venerable Sidoine, bishop of this diocese. I am the bearer of orders from your spiritual chief.”

  “And I, Gondowald, chamberlain of our glorious Queen Brunhild, am commissioned by her to give the bishop’s envoy my own and my men’s support.”

  “Here is a letter for you from my uncle,” said the archdeacon handing a parchment to Loysik. “I wish you to inform yourself of its contents.”

  “My years have made my eyes too weak to read; one of my brothers will read the letter aloud to me.”

  “The letter may contain secret matters,” observed the archdeacon; “I recommend to you that you have it read in a low voice.”

  “We keep no secrets here from one another — read aloud, brother.”

  And Loysik passed the missive to one of the members of the community, who proceeded to do as ordered by his superior.

  The letter was to the effect that Sidoine, bishop of Chalon, instituted his archdeacon Salvien as abbot of the monastery of Charolles, wishing thereby to put an end to the scandals and enormities that for so many years afflicted Christianity by the example of this community; the same was thenceforth to be rigorously subject to the rules of St. Benoit, as were almost all the other monasteries of Gaul. The lay monks who, by their virtue and humble submission to the orders of their new abbot, should merit the favor, the entirely Christian favor, would be allowed to enter the clergy and become Roman monks. Furthermore, by virtue of the seventh canon of the council of Orleans, held two years previous (in the year 611), and which decreed that “the ownership of the domains, lands, vineyards, slaves and cattle, that may be donated to a parish, shall be vested in the bishop,” all the goods of the monastery and of the colony, which, properly speaking, constitute the parish of Charolles, were thenceforth to be vested in the bishop of Chalon, who commissioned his nephew, archdeacon Salvien, to administer said goods. The prelate closed his missive with an order to his beloved son in Christ, Loysik, to proceed upon the spot to the city of Chalon, and there receive the reproof of his bishop and spiritual father, and humbly undergo the punishment or penance that was to be inflicted upon him. Finally, seeing that it might happen that brother Loysik, listening to some diabolical suggestion, might commit the enormity of contemning the orders of his spiritual father, the noble Gondowald, chamberlain of the glorious Queen Brunhild, was commissioned by the illustrious princess to cause the orders of the bishop of Chalon to be carried out, by force, if need be, through the armed men that he would carry with him.

  Hardly had the monk laborer finished reading the missive than Gondowald added with a haughty and threatening air:

  “I, the chamberlain of the glorious Queen Brunhild, our very excellent and very redoubtable mistress, am commissioned by her to inform you that if you and yours should have the audacity to disobey the orders of the bishop, as may happen, judging from the insolent murmurs that I have just heard, I shall have you and the most recalcitrant of your fellows tied to the tails of the horses of my riders, and shall thus take you to Chalon, quickening your steps with the shafts of our lances over your backs.”

  In fact, the reading of the bishop’s missive was several times interrupted by the murmurs of the monk laborers and of the colonists, and these murmurs swelled to such proportions that the intervention of Loysik became necessary in order to hear the bishop’s letter to the end. But when the Frank Gondowald defiantly uttered his insolent threats, the crowd answered with an explosion of furious cries intermixed
with jeers and sneers.

  Ronan, the Master of the Hounds and several other old time Vagres were not among the last to murmur against the usurpatory pretensions of the Bishop of Chalon, who proposed to appropriate to himself the goods of the monk laborers and the colonists, and trample down their every right. Although age had whitened their heads and paled their faces, the Vagres felt their old fighting blood boil in their veins. Ever a man of action, Ronan quickly reverted to his early profession and whispered to the Master of the Hounds:

  “Pick out thirty resolute men, take them to the arsenal, arm yourselves and run to the punt so as to cut off the retreat of the Franks. I shall take charge of what is to be done here. By the faith of a Vagre, I feel myself grown younger by fifty years!”

  “And I, Ronan, while the insolent missive was being read, and especially when the valet of that infamous Queen dared to threaten us, my hand looked for a sword at my side.”

  Immediately the two old Vagres started to work among the crowd of colonists and monks; they moved hither and thither, whispering in the ears of the men whom they were choosing, and each of whom vanished successively amidst the increasing uproar, that Loysik’s firm and sonorous voice was hardly able to dominate as he answered the archdeacon:

  “The Bishop of Chalon has no right to impose upon this community either special rules or an abbot. We elect our chiefs ourselves and of our free will, in the same manner that we adopt such rules as we are willing to follow, provided they be Christian. Such was the former and original law that presided at the foundation of all the cloisters of Gaul. The bishops exercise over us only the spiritual jurisdiction that they exercise upon all other lay members. We are here the masters of our goods and of our persons, by virtue of a charter of the late King Clotaire, which expressly forbids his dukes, counts and bishops to incommode us. You speak of councils. One can find anything he wants in those councils, good and evil, what is just and what is unjust. My memory has not yet left me. This is what the council of 611 says upon this very subject: