Julian smiled as he listened to her but he still could not be persuaded to yield to her advice.
One evening in August they were in their bedchamber. She had just got into bed and he was on his knees saying his prayers when he heard the bark of a fox followed by the scuffle of paws beneath the window. He could dimly make out the shapes of animals in the darkness. Temptation overcame him. He took his quiver from the wall.
His wife seemed surprised.
‘I am doing as you bade me!’ he said. ‘I shall be back by sunrise.’
But she was afraid that something dreadful might happen to him.
He assured her that all would be well and left the room. Her changes of mood astonished him.
Shortly afterwards a page came to tell her that two strangers had arrived who, in the absence of his lordship, insisted on speaking with the lady of the castle immediately.
A few moments later, in came an old man and an old woman, bent at the back, covered in dust, dressed in coarse linen and each leaning on a stick.
Plucking up their courage, they announced that they had come to bring Julian news of his parents.
She leant forward to hear what they had to say.
They quickly exchanged glances and then asked whether Julian still loved his parents and whether he still spoke of them.
‘Oh, yes,’ she said.
‘Well, we are they!’ they cried and they sat down out of sheer weariness and exhaustion.
The young wife was far from convinced that her husband really was their son but they gave her proof by describing certain distinguishing marks on his body.
She leapt from her bed, called her page and had a meal brought to them.
Although they were both extremely hungry, they could eat hardly anything at all. Out of the corner of her eye she noticed that their bony hands shook as they lifted their goblets to their lips.
They plied her with endless questions about Julian. She answered them all but was careful to say nothing about Julian's fears concerning them.
When Julian had failed to return, they had left their castle in search of him. They had been wandering for several years, with only the vaguest hints of his whereabouts to guide them. But they had never given up hope of finding him. They had needed so much money to pay ferrymen and to stay at hostelries, to meet the dues of princes and the demands of robbers that their purse was now empty and they were reduced to beggary. But what did this matter, since very soon they would once again be able to hold their son in their arms! They extolled his good fortune in having such a charming wife; they could hardly take their eyes off her or refrain from kissing her.
They were amazed at the opulent furnishings of the room. The old man, having carefully examined the walls, asked why they bore the coat of arms of the Emperor of Occitania.
‘The Emperor is my father,’ she replied.
The old man gave a start, recalling the gypsy's prophecy, while the old woman remembered the words of the hermit. No doubt her son's success was but a prelude to the greater glories to come. They sat there open-mouthed in the light of the candelabrum that stood on the table.
They must have been a very handsome couple in their youth. The mother still had a fine head of hair, which fell in delicate tresses to the bottom of her cheeks like drifts of snow, while the father, with his tall build and his long beard, looked like a statue in a church.
Julian's wife urged them not to wait up for him. She installed them in her own bed and closed the casement window. Soon they were sound asleep. Day was just about to dawn and outside the window the birds were beginning to sing.
Meanwhile, Julian had slipped out of the palace gardens and was making his way through the forest. He walked with eager anticipation, enjoying the soft feel of the turf beneath his feet and the sweetness of the air.
The trees cast shadows over the mossy ground. Here and there patches of white moonlight showed in the clearings and he picked his way forward more cautiously, thinking that this might be a pool of water or the grass-green surface of a stagnant pond. There was not a sound to be heard. The animals, which a few minutes before had been prowling around his castle, were now nowhere to be seen.
The forest grew thicker and the darkness more intense. Wafts of warm air blew by him, laden with scents which dulled his senses. He found himself sinking into heaps of dead leaves and leant against an oak tree to catch his breath.
Suddenly, just behind him, a darker shape leapt across his path – a wild boar. Julian had no time to take up his bow and felt grieved by this as if by some terrible misfortune.
As he emerged from the wood he caught sight of a wolf running alongside a hedge.
Julian fired an arrow at it. The wolf stopped, turned its head to look at Julian and then continued on its way. It trotted on ahead of him, always keeping the same distance and occasionally stopping. But the minute Julian took aim with his bow it would start to run forward again.
The pursuit led Julian across an endless plain and over a succession of sandhills until finally he found himself on a high plateau which looked out over a vast stretch of country beyond. The ground was scattered with great flat stones which lay among the crumbling ruins of burial vaults. He stumbled over the bones of the dead; here and there worm-eaten crosses leant at pitiful angles. He saw vague shapes moving in the shadow of the tombs; suddenly out sprang a pack of startled hyenas, panting heavily. They came up to him, their claws tapping on the stones, and sniffed around him, baring their teeth to their gums. Julian drew his sword. The hyenas immediately scattered in all directions, scuttling off as fast as they could and disappearing in the distance in a cloud of dust.
An hour later he came across a wild bull in a ravine, its horns lowered and scraping the sand with its hoof. Julian thrust his lance into its neck. The lance shattered as if the animal had been made of bronze. Julian closed his eyes, thinking his end had come. When he opened them again, the bull had disappeared.
At this, Julian's soul was overcome with shame. He felt that his strength was being drained by some higher power. He decided to return home and turned back into the forest.
The forest had now become choked with creepers. He was beginning to clear a way through them with his sword when a marten suddenly slipped between his legs, a panther leapt over his shoulder and a snake wound its way up an ash tree.
In the leaves of the ash tree there was an enormous jackdaw looking down at him; suddenly he became aware of a great twinkling of lights, scattered among the branches, as though the heavens had rained down all their stars upon the forest. They were the eyes of animals – wild cats, squirrels, owls, parrots and monkeys.
Julian shot his arrows at them but the feathered shafts dropped gently on to the leaves of the tree like a flutter of white butterflies. He threw stones at them but the stones missed their mark and fell back to the ground. He cursed his luck. He felt utterly thwarted. He screamed and swore and choked with rage.
And then all the animals that he had been hunting reappeared, forming a tight circle around him. Some sat on their haunches, others stood on all fours. Julian stood in the middle of them, frozen with terror and unable to move a muscle. By a supreme effort of will, he managed to take one step forward. The birds that were perched up in the trees spread their wings, the creatures that stood on the ground stretched their limbs and the whole company set off with him.
The hyenas went in front of him; the wolf and the wild boar came behind. On his right walked the bull, swaying its head from side to side, and on his left the snake slithered through the grass, while the panther, arching its back, paced stealthily along beside. Julian walked as slowly as he could so as not to annoy them. Other animals appeared out of the bushes to swell the throng – porcupines, foxes, vipers, jackals and bears.
Julian began to run; the animals ran with him. The snake hissed; other animals slavered at the mouth and filled the air with their foul stench. The wild boar prodded his heels with its tusks and the wolf wiped its whiskery muzzle on the palms o
f his hands. The monkeys pinched him and pulled faces at him; the marten twisted itself around his feet. One of the bears knocked his hat off with a swipe of its paw and the panther, with a gesture of contempt, threw away one of Julian's arrows which it had been carrying in its mouth.
It was clear from the tricks that they played on him that the animals were making fun of Julian. They looked at him out of the corner of their eyes and seemed to be working out some plan of revenge. His ears were deafened by the buzz of insects, his face smarted from the whipping of birds' tails and he felt he was being suffocated by the breath of animals. He walked forward like a blind man, his arms outstretched and his eyes closed, without even the strength to cry for mercy.
A cock-crow rang in the air. Others followed. It was morning. Beyond the tops of the orange trees he recognized the roof of his palace.
Then, at the edge of a field, just three paces away from him, he saw a flock of red partridges fluttering among the stubble. He unfastened his cloak and threw it down over them like a net. But when he lifted the cloak up, there was only one partridge there. It had been dead for a long time and was already rotten.
This disappointment upset him more than all the others. His thirst for slaughter returned; since he could not kill animals he would gladly kill men.
He climbed the three terraces and thrust open the door with a blow of his fist. But at the foot of the staircase the thought of his dear wife softened his heart. She was no doubt asleep in bed. He would go up and give her a surprise.
He took off his sandals, turned the key gently in the lock and went in.
The leaded window panes darkened the early morning light. Julian caught his foot in some clothes on the floor and, walking forward, he bumped into a side table still laden with dishes. ‘She must have had something to eat,’ he thought and went towards the bed, which stood in a dark corner at the far end of the room. As he came to the bedside in order to kiss his wife, he leant over the pillow upon which the two heads reclined side by side. He felt the touch of a beard against his mouth.
He drew back with a start, thinking that he must be going mad. But he came back to the bed and ran his fingers over the covers until they came to rest on some very long strands of hair. Still convinced that he must be mistaken, he slowly passed his hand over the pillow a second time. This time there was no doubt about it; it was a beard. There was a man in his bed! A man sleeping with his wife!
In a rush of unbridled fury he leapt upon them, stabbing them repeatedly with his dagger. He smote the ground with his feet, foamed at the mouth and howled like a wild beast. At last he stood still. The two dead bodies lay in front of him, pierced through the heart; they had not even moved. He listened intently to the concerted rattle of their dying breath and as it subsided it was taken up by another sound from somewhere far away. He heard it only faintly at first – a plaintive voice, but persistent, and gradually coming nearer, getting louder and more cruel. With horror, Julian recognized the belling of the great black stag.
As he turned round, he saw framed in the doorway what he imagined was the ghost of his wife holding a lamp in her hand.
She had been drawn to the room by the noise of the murder. She took one look at the scene in front of her and realized immediately what had happened. She fled in horror, dropping the burning lamp on the floor.
Julian picked it up.
In front of him lay his mother and father, stretched on their backs with a hole in their hearts. There was a look of serene majesty on their faces, which spoke of some secret that they would now guard for eternity. There were splashes and smears of blood on their white bodies, the bedsheets and the floor and even on the ivory crucifix which hung in the alcove. The sunlight shining through the stained-glass window gave a bright crimson hue to the bloodstains and seemed to spread them in profusion to every part of the room. Julian approached the two dead bodies telling himself and willing himself to believe that this was not possible, that he must be mistaken, that people can sometimes look incredibly alike. At last he leant forward to look at the old man more closely; between the half-closed eyelids he saw the lifeless stare of a pupil that burnt into him like fire. He then went round to the other side of the bed where the second body lay, its face half hidden by its long white hair. He lifted the curls with his fingers and raised the head. He looked at it, one of his hands outstretched to support it, the other holding the lamp to give light. Drops of blood seeped out of the mattress and fell one by one on the floor.
At the end of the day, he appeared before his wife and in a voice altogether different from his own he told her firstly that she must never again speak to him, come near him or even look at him. In addition, under pain of damnation, she must obey all his orders, which were irrevocable.
The funeral rites were to be conducted according to the written instructions he had left on a prayer stool in the bedroom where his dead parents lay. He was leaving her his palace, his vassals and all he possessed. He would not even keep the clothes he stood up in or his sandals, which she would find at the top of the stairs.
In causing him to commit his crime she had simply obeyed the will of God. She must now pray for his soul since from this day forward he ceased to exist.
The dead were buried with great ceremony in a monastery chapel three days' journey from the castle. The funeral procession was followed at a distance by a hooded monk whom no one dared to speak to.
During the mass he remained prone in the centre of the doorway, his arms outstretched in the form of a cross and his face in the dust.
After the burial he was seen taking the road which led up into the mountains. Several times he turned to look back and finally disappeared from sight.
3
Julian went away never to return, begging for his daily bread in every corner of the world.
He would hold out his hand to horse riders as they approached him on the highroad, accost harvesters in the fields on bended knee or stand motionless at courtyard gates, and the expression on his face was always so sad that no one ever refused to give him alms.
He would further humble himself by telling his story, whereupon everyone fled his presence with copious signs of the cross. In villages he had already been to, as soon as people saw him coming they shut their doors, shouted threats and threw stones at him. The more charitably disposed would leave a bowl of food on their window sills and close the shutters to avoid seeing him.
Because he was everywhere rejected he avoided the company of men. He fed himself on roots, plants, wild fruits and shellfish which he gathered on the seashore.
Sometimes as he rounded a bend on a hillside he would see below him a jumble of tightly packed rooftops, with stone spires, bridges, towers and a tangle of dark streets whose steady buzz of activity floated up to where he stood.
His longing to share in the lives of others sometimes prompted him to walk down into the town. But the ugly expressions on people's faces, the noise they made as they went about their work and the triviality of their conversation brought a chill to his heart. On feast days when the great cathedral bell rang out from early morning, summoning all the townspeople to their merrymaking, he would see them leave their homes and stand watching the dances in the squares, the beer fountains at street corners and the damask awnings which adorned the town houses of the nobility. In the evening he would peer in at the ground-floor windows and see families gathered together at the dinner table with grandparents holding young children on their knees. Sobs choked him; he would turn away and retrace his footsteps out into the open country.
His heart leapt with joy whenever he saw a foal in a meadow, a bird in its nest or an insect settling on a flower. But if he tried to come near, it would either run off, hide itself in sheer terror or fly quickly away.
He sought out lonely places. But the moaning of the wind sounded to his ears like gasps of dying breath; the drops of dew as they fell to the ground reminded him of certain other drops which had fallen more heavily to the floor. Every evening the
sun cast streaks of blood across the clouds and every night in his dreams the killing of his parents would begin afresh.
He made himself a hair shirt with iron spikes. Whenever he saw a chapel on top of a hill, he would climb up to it on his knees. But the unrelenting thought of his crime cast a shadow over the beauty of these sanctuaries and caused him even greater torture than the discomforts of his penance.
He did not rebel against God for having made him commit this act and yet the thought that he had actually perpetrated it filled him with despair.
He felt such loathing for his own body that in the hope of gaining release from it he subjected himself to the worst sorts of danger. He rescued the halt and lame from fires and children from bottomless chasms. But he rose from the abyss and walked unscathed from the flames.
Time did not ease his suffering. It became more than he could bear and he resolved to die.
One day he was standing beside a pool and as he leant over it to gauge the depth of the water he saw the face of an old man appear in front of him, thin and gaunt, wearing a white beard and looking so pitiful that he could not restrain his tears. As Julian wept, so too did the face. Julian did not recognize his own reflection and vaguely remembered having seen a face like this before. He let out a cry. It was his father! All thought of killing himself vanished.
And so Julian roamed from country to country, bearing the burden of his terrible memories. Eventually he came to a river which was dangerous to cross because of the swift current and because there was a broad stretch of mud along its banks. No one had dared to cross it for a very long time.
An old boat lay amongst the reeds, its stern buried in the mud and its bows pointing upwards. Julian examined it and discovered a pair of oars and it occurred to him that here was a way of placing his life at the service of others.
Three Tales Page 10
