Collected Works of Eugène Sue

by Eugène Sue

  “The ... belle ... Gloriande ... of ... Chivry ...” repeated Conrad, as if tearing the words from his breast.

  “High, puissant and redoubtable seigneur of Nointel, Jacques Bonhomme pardons you for the outrage he perpetrated upon you!” now put in Mazurec in the midst of a fresh explosion of triumphant laughter and contemptuous jeers uttered by the Jacques.

  “The sword! The sword!” cried Conrad rising livid and fearful with rage, but with his hands still pinioned behind him, and addressing Jocelyn. “You promised me blood ... yours ... or mine.... I wish to die seeing blood.... To the sword, to the sword!”

  “Remove his bonds,” said the champion with his feet still on the sword that lay on the ground and drawing his own.

  While the Jacques were unfastening the bonds that held the arms of the seigneur of Nointel, the knight of Chaumontel took a step towards his friend and said to him: “Farewell, Conrad ... you are blinded with rage ... you are weakened by the trials of last night ... you will be killed by that Hercules ... a champion by profession.... But we shall be revenged.”

  “I killed!” cried the Sire of Nointel with a ghostly smile. “No, no; it is I who will kill the dog.... I will cut the vagabond’s throat!”

  “Recommend your soul to St. James,” said Gerard in a penetrating voice to Conrad; “an invocation to him is sovereign in cases of duels.”

  “Oh, I shall invoke my hatred,” replied Conrad twitching his arms that Adam the Devil was about to unloosen. But Jocelyn made a sign to his companion to wait a moment before untying the Sire of Nointel, and then turning to the revolted serfs he made to them this vigorous and terse address:

  “It is now eleven hundred years ago ... one of my ancestors, Schavanoch the Soldier — the foster brother of Victoria the Great, the emperor woman who predicted the enfranchisement of Gaul — fought against one of the chiefs of the Frankish hordes who then threatened to invade Gaul, our mother country; that Frankish chieftain was called Neroweg the Terrible Eagle, and he was the ancestor of the Sire of Nointel, whom you there see before you.... Two centuries later, the Franks, thanks to the complicity of the Bishop of Rome, had succeeded in conquering Gaul and in reducing her inhabitants to a condition of most cruel slavery; our land thereupon became a prey to our conquerors, and we moistened it with our sweat, our tears and our blood.... During the first years of the Frankish conquest, Karadeuk the Bagaude, the ancestor of both Mazurec and myself, a revolted slave, fought with Neroweg, Count of Auvergne, count by the right of rapine and murder. That Neroweg had subjected to a cruel torture Loysik the Working-Hermit and Ronan the Vagre, sons of Karadeuk the Bagaude. Bagaudie and Vagrerie were the Jacquerie of those days. Vagres and Bagaudes revenged themselves then as the Jacques do now for the oppression of the seigneurs. In that fight between Karadeuk the Bagaude and the Count Neroweg, Neroweg fell under the axe of Karadeuk.... Coming down to three centuries ago, another of my ancestors, Den-Brao the Mason was buried alive together with several other serfs, his fellow workmen, by Neroweg IV, Count of Plouernel in Brittany.”

  “That noble thereby buried together with Den-Brao the secret of an underground passage that they had been made to construct, leading from the feudal manor into the forest. The grandson of Den-Brao, who remained a serf of the seigniory of Plouernel, was called Fergan the Quarryman. Neroweg VI kidnapped a son of Fergan for the purpose of applying the child to the bloody sorceries of a witch. Fergan succeeded in rescuing his child, but he witnessed the murder of his two relatives Bezenecq the Rich and Bezenecq’s daughter Isoline. Unable to pay an enormous ransom imposed upon him by Neroweg VI, Bezenecq perished under the torture, while Isoline, the witness of her father’s torment, became insane and died. Then came the days of the Crusades. Fergan and his seigneur met face to face and alone in the middle of the desert of Syria. Fergan could have killed him by surprise, but he fought him and vanquished.... Finally, only a year ago, my brother Mazurec the Lambkin has seen his bride dishonored by the Sire of Nointel, the scion of the Nerowegs of old, he forced my brother to make him the amende honorable at his feet, and thereupon to fight half naked with the knight of Chaumontel in full armor. Vanquished in this unequal combat and sentenced to be drowned in a bag, Mazurec would have perished but for Adam the Devil and myself, who succeeded in drawing him out of the river betimes, but his wife, Aveline-who-never-lied, died an atrocious death only a few days ago. The history of my family’s sufferings is the history of the families of us all, the enslaved and oppressed of your class, Sire of Nointel, during so many centuries! Aye, among the thousands upon thousands of revolted vassals, who at this hour are running to arms, there is not one whose family has not undergone what mine has! The narrative of Mazurec’s family and mine is theirs also. Do you now understand the treasury of hatred and of vengeance that has been heaping up from century to century in the indignant breast of Jacques Bonhomme? Do you understand that from age to age the fathers bequeathed this hatred to their children as the only heritage left to them by servitude? Do you understand that the vassal has a frightful account to settle with his seigneur? Do you understand how, in his turn, Jacques Bonhomme has no mercy and no pity? Do you, finally, understand that if at this moment, instead of fighting you, I were to kill you like a wolf caught in a trap, the act would be just? You have but one life, but innumerable are the lives of the Gauls taken by you, and much larger yet those taken by your class!”

  An explosion of fury from the Jacques marked the close of these words. Sufficiently exasperated against the Sire of Nointel, they felt that the narrative of Jocelyn’s family was that of the martyrdom on earth endured by Jacques Bonhomme.

  “Death to the seigneur!... Death without combat!” repeated the insurgents. “Death to him, like a wolf caught in a trap!”

  “Vassal, you promised to fight with me!” cried Conrad of Nointel. “Of what use are these ancient stories?”

  “Do you repudiate the acts of your ancestors? Do you repudiate your class?”

  “Even with your sword at my throat I shall to the very end pronounce myself proud of belonging to the warrior class that has held you under the whip and the stick, ye miserable serfs.... Even dying would I smite your faces!”

  With a wafture of his hand Jocelyn restrains a fresh explosion of fury from the Jacques, and says to Adam the Devil: “Deliver the seigneur of his bonds.... Once more in the course of the centuries a son of Joel and a son of Neroweg shall take each other’s measure, sword in hand!”

  “And may my stock again meet yours to the undoing of your own!” answered Conrad of Nointel in a hollow voice. “The elder branch of my family still occupies its domains in Auvergne ... and my father’s brother has sons! The race of the Nerowegs will reappear across the ages!”

  “Battle!... Battle!” said Jocelyn. “It shall be a battle to the death, without quarter or mercy.... Battle!”

  “And also I, brother, shall have neither pity nor mercy for that thief, the cause of all my misfortunes!” cried Mazurec, pointing at the knight of Chaumontel, and added: “Adam, untie also his hands. There is room enough here for a double combat. My brother shall have the seigneur.... I shall take this thief of a knight. Give me a pitch-fork, the fork is the lance of Jacques Bonhomme.”

  Freed of his bonds and clad only in his shirt and hose, Gerard of Chaumontel receives from William Caillet a stick to defend himself with, and from Adam the Devil a rude push that throws him in front of Mazurec, who, protected from head to foot by the knight’s own armor, holds up his three-pronged and sharp fork.

  “Come up, you double thief!” Mazurec called out; “must I step forward to meet you?”

  [The knight of Chaumontel, pale from fright and pursued by the cries of (these words missing due to printer’s error, here translated from the French version by the etext transcriber)] the Jacques, grasps his stick with both hands and forcing a smile on his lips answers: “The heralds-at-arms have not yet given the signal.”

  In the meantime, Conrad of Nointel, whose arms have been unbound, stooped
down to seize the sword from which Jocelyn had not yet lifted his foot.

  “One moment!” cried the champion, always with his foot firmly on the sword. “Sire of Nointel, look me in the face ... if you dare!”

  Conrad raised his head, fastened his glistening eyes upon his adversary and asked: “What do you want?”

  “Worthy Sire, I wish to goad you to the combat. I mistrust your courage. You fled like a coward at the battle of Poitiers, and a minute ago you referred to me as a vile slave fit only for the whip and the cane—”

  “And I say so again!” yelled Conrad turning red and white with rage, “you vagabond!”

  “Take this for the insult!” came from Jocelyn like a flash while buffeting the livid face of Conrad of Nointel. “These slaps are the goad I promised you. Even if you were more cowardly than a hare, fury will now serve you instead of courage!” Saying this Jocelyn made a leap backward, placing himself on his guard and leaving the sword on the ground free. Crazed with rage, Conrad of Nointel seized the weapon and rushed upon Jocelyn at the very moment that, armed with his stick, Gerard of Chaumontel was rapidly retreating before the approaching prongs of Mazurec’s fork.

  “Infamous thief!” cried the vassal pressing the knight with his fork; “I had more courage than you.... I threw myself under the feet of your horse, and seized you hand to hand!”

  “My Jacques!” cried out Adam the Devil seeing the knight of Chaumontel still retreating before Mazurec, “cross your scythes behind that knight of cowardice; let him fall under your iron if he tries to escape Mazurec’s fork.”

  The Jacques followed Adam the Devil’s suggestion; at the same time that Mazurec ran forward with his fork Gerard of Chaumontel perceived a formidable array of scythes rise behind him.

  “Cowardly varlets! Infamous scamps! You abuse your strength!”

  “And you, worthy knight,” answered Adam the Devil, “did not you abuse your strength when you fought on horseback and in full armor against Mazurec half naked and with only a stick to defend himself?”

  During this short dialogue, the Sire of Nointel was impetuously charging upon Jocelyn. Rendered dexterous in the handling of the sword by the practice of the tourneys, young, agile and vigorous, he aims many an adroit blow at Jocelyn, who, however, parries them all like a consummate gladiator, while pricking his adversary with the contemptuous remark. “To know how to handle a sword so well, and yet to retreat so pitifully at the battle of Poitiers! What a shame!”

  With a rapid step back Jocelyn evades at that instant a dangerous thrust of Conrad of Nointel’s sword, retorts with a vigorous pass, smites his adversary on the shoulder and, to his great astonishment, sees him suddenly roll on the ground, seem to stiffen his members, and then remain motionless.

  “What?” observed the champion lowering his sword, “dead with so little? Beaten down so quickly?”

  “Brother, look out ... it probably is a ruse!” cried Mazurec, at whom Gerard of Chaumontel had finally aimed so furious a blow with his stick that it broke into splinters against the iron casque on the vassal’s head. “Without the casque I would now be a dead man. Oh! that’s a good practice you knights have of fighting so well armed against half naked Jacques Bonhomme!” Although somewhat dazed by the shock, Mazurec plunged his fork into the bowels of the robber knight, who fell blaspheming. Observing that Conrad still remained motionless on the ground, Mazurec repeated the warning: “Look out, brother! It is a ruse!”

  And so it was. Astonished at the fall of his adversary Jocelyn was stooping over him when the Sire of Nointel suddenly rose on his haunches, seized the champion’s leg with one hand, and with the other sought to stab his adversary in the flank with a dagger that he had kept concealed in his hose. Taken by surprise and pulled by a leg, Jocelyn lost his balance.

  “Viper!” cried Jocelyn dropping his sword and falling upon Conrad whose hand he struggled to overpower. “I was on the look-out.... I thought your death was feigned!” and wresting the dagger from Conrad’s hand, Jocelyn plunged it in his adversary’s breast: “Die, thou son of the Nerowegs!”

  “Gerard!” muttered Conrad, dying, “I ... was wrong ... in violating the vassal’s wife.... Oh, Gloriande!”

  Hardly had Jocelyn stepped aside from the corpse of the Sire of Nointel when his vassals, so often the victims of his cruelty, precipitated themselves upon the arena, and plying their forks, scythes and axes with savage fury on the still warm body of their recent tyrant, mutilated it beyond recognition. In the meantime, aided by other Jacques, Adam the Devil raised the knight of Chaumontel, who, though mortally wounded by the thrust of Mazurec’s fork, was still alive, and called out: “Fetch the bag and ropes!”

  A peasant brought a bag with which they had provided themselves at the castle of Chivry. The bleeding body of the knight of Chaumontel was placed within and tied fast so as to allow his cadaverous head to stick out, and the bundle was carried to the Orville bridge.

  “Do you recall my prophecy,” Mazurec asked the knight, with a diabolical smile; “I prophesied you would be drowned.”

  Gerard of Chaumontel uttered a deep moan. A superstitious terror now overpowered him. His wonted haughtiness was no more. In a fainting voice he murmured: “Oh, St. James, have pity upon me.... Oh, St. James, intercede for me.... with our Lord and all his saints.... I am justly punished.... I stole the vassal’s purse.... Oh, Lord, Oh, Lord, have pity upon me!”

  Arrived at the Orville bridge, the peasants threw the bagged body of the knight of Chaumontel into the river amid the frantic cheers of the Jacques, who exclaimed: “May thus perish all seigneurs!”

  CHAPTER VI.

  ON TO CLERMONT!

  TARRYING A MOMENT on the Orville bridge, which the Jacques had left on the march to join other bands and proceed in stronger force against other seigniories, Jocelyn noticed a rider approaching at full gallop. A few minutes later he recognized the rider to be Rufin the Tankard-smasher, who soon reined in near the bridge, followed at a distance by a considerable number of insurgents.

  Jumping off his horse Rufin said to Jocelyn: “I learned from the peasants coming up behind me that there was a large gathering of Jacques at this place; I thought I would find you among them and hastened hither to deliver to you a letter from Master Marcel.... Great events are transpiring in Paris.”

  Jocelyn eagerly took the missive, and while he read it, Rufin the Tankard-smasher went on saying: “By Jupiter! The company of an honorable woman brings good luck. When I used to have Margot on my arms, I always ran up against some accident; on the other hand, nothing could have been happier than this trip of mine to Paris with Alison the Huffy, who, I fancy, is huffy only at Cupid. We arrived in Paris without accident, and Dame Marguerite received Alison with great friendship. Oh, my friend! I worship that tavern-keeper. Fie! What an improper term! No! That Hebe! And was not Hebe the Olympian tavern-keeper? Oh, if Alison would only have me for her husband, we would set up a lovely tavern, intended especially for the students of the University. The shield would be splendid. It would exhibit Greek and Latin verses appealing to the topers, such as: “Like Bacchus does — —”

  Jocelyn here interrupted the student, saying with much animation after he had finished Etienne Marcel’s letter: “Rufin, I return with you to Paris; the provost has orders for me. Mazurec is revenged. Everywhere the Jacques are rising according to the information that reaches Marcel from the provinces. The formidable movement must now be directed and utilized. The Jacquerie must be organized. Wait for me a minute. I shall be back immediately.”

  Jocelyn thereupon called to Adam the Devil, Mazurec and William Caillet, who had also remained behind, took them aside and said: “Marcel calls me to his side. The Regent has withdrawn to Compiegne; he has declared Paris out of the pale of the law and is preparing to march upon the city at the head of the royal troops; they are waiting for him, and will give him a warm reception. All the communal towns, Meaux, Amiens, Laon, Beauvais, Noyons, Senlis are in arms. Everywhere the peasants are rising and t
he bourgeois and guild corporations are joining them. The King of Navarre is captain-general of Paris. The man deserves the nickname of ‘Wicked,’ nevertheless he is a powerful instrument. Marcel will break him if he deviate from the right path and refuse to bow before the popular sovereignty. The hour of Gaul’s enfranchisement has sounded at last. In order to carry the work to a successful issue, the Jacquerie will have to be regulated. These scattered and dispersed bands must gather together, must discipline their forces and form an army capable of coping, first with that of the Regent, and then with the English. We must first crush the inside foe and then the foreign one.”

  “That is right,” said Caillet, thoughtfully. “Ten scattered bands can not accomplish much; the ten together can. I am known in Beauvoisis. Our Jacques will follow me wherever I lead them. Once the seigneurs are exterminated, we shall fall upon the English, a vermin that gnaws at the little that seigneurs and their clergy leave us.”

  “Yesterday’s butcheries have opened my appetite,” cried Adam the Devil, brandishing his scythe. “We shall mow down the English to the last man. Death to all oppressors!”

  “The crop will be fine if we mow together,” replied Jocelyn. “Meaux, Senlis, Beauvais and Clermont are awaiting the Jacques with open arms. Their gates will be opened to the peasants. These will find there food and arms.”

  “Iron and bread! We need no more!” put in William Caillet. “And what is Marcel’s plan?”

  “These fortified cities, occupied by the Jacques and the armed bourgeoisie, will hold the Regent’s troops in check in the provinces,” answered Jocelyn. “The other sections of the country are to organize themselves similarly. Now, listen well to Marcel’s instructions. The King of Navarre is on our side because he expects with the support of the popular party to dethrone the Regent. He occupies Clermont with his troops. Thence he is to proceed to Paris and meet the royal army under the walls of the city. He needs reinforcements. Marcel mistrusts him. Now, then, you are to gather all the bands of Jacques into a body and proceed to Clermont at the head of eight thousand men. You can then join Charles the Wicked without fear, although he is never to be trusted. But as his own forces barely number two thousand foot soldiers and five hundred horsemen, in case of treason they would be crushed by the Jacques, who would out-number them four to one.”