The Dove in the Eagle's Nest

by Charlotte M. Yonge

  CHAPTER XITHE CHOICE IN LIFE

  “FRIEDEL, wake!”

  “Is it day?” said Friedel, slowly wakening, and crossing himself as heopened his eyes. “Surely the sun is not up—?”

  “We must be before the sun!” said Ebbo, who was on his feet, beginning todress himself. “Hush, and come! Do not wake the mother. It must be ereshe or aught else be astir! Thy prayers—I tell thee this is a work asgood as prayer.”

  Half awake, and entirely bewildered, Friedel dipped his finger in thepearl mussel shell of holy water over their bed, and crossed his own browand his brother’s; then, carrying their shoes, they crossed theirmother’s chamber, and crept down stairs. Ebbo muttered to his brother,“Stand thou still there, and pray the saints to keep her asleep;” andthen, with bare feet, moved noiselessly behind the wooden partition thatshut off his grandmother’s box-bedstead from the rest of the hall. Shelay asleep with open mouth, snoring loudly, and on her pillow lay thebunch of castle keys, that was always carried to her at night. It was amoment of peril when Ebbo touched it; but he had nerved himself to beboth steady and dexterous, and he secured it without a jingle, and then,without entering the hall, descended into a passage lit by a roughopening cut in the rock. Friedel, who began to comprehend, followed himclose and joyfully, and at the first door he fitted in, and with somedifficulty turned, a key, and pushed open the door of a vault, wheremorning light, streaming through the grated window, showed two captives,who had started to their feet, and now stood regarding the pair in thedoorway as if they thought their dreams were multiplying the young Baronwho had led the attack.

  “_Signori_—” began the principal of the two; but Ebbo spoke.

  “Sir, you have been brought here by a mistake in the absence of mymother, the lady of the castle. If you will follow me, I will restoreall that is within my reach, and put you on your way.”

  The merchant’s knowledge of German was small, but the purport of thewords was plain, and he gladly left the damp, chilly vault. Ebbo pointedto the bales that strewed the hall. “Take all that can be carried,” hesaid. “Here is your sword, and your purse,” he said, for these had beengiven to him in the moment of victory. “I will bring out your horse andlead you to the pass.”

  “Give him food,” whispered Friedel; but the merchant was too anxious tohave any appetite. Only he faltered in broken German a proposal to payhis respects to the Signora Castellana, to whom he owed so much.

  “No! _Dormit in lecto_,” said Ebbo, with a sudden inspiration caughtfrom the Latinized sound of some of the Italian words, but colouringdesperately as he spoke.

  The Latin proved most serviceable, and the merchant understood that hisproperty was restored, and made all speed to gather it together, andtransport it to the stable. One or two of his beasts of burden had beenlost in the fray, and there were more packages than could well be carriedby the merchant, his servant, and his horse. Ebbo gave the aid of theold white mare—now very white indeed—and in truth the boys pitied themerchant’s fine young bay for being put to base trading uses, and wererather shocked to hear that it had been taken in payment for a knight’sbranched velvet gown, and would be sold again at Ulm.

  “What a poor coxcomb of a knight!” said they to one another, as theypatted the creature’s neck with such fervent admiration that the merchantlonged to present it to them, when he saw that the old white mare was thesole steed they possessed, and watched their tender guidance both of herand of the bay up the rocky path so familiar to them.

  “But ah, _signorini miei_, I am an _infelice infelicissimo_, everpersecuted by _le Fate_.”

  “By whom? A count like Schlangenwald?” asked Ebbo.

  “_Das Schicksal_,” whispered Friedel.

  “Three long miserable years did I spend as a captive among the Moors,having lost all, my ships and all I had, and being forced to row theirgalleys, _gli scomunicati_.”

  “Galleys!” exclaimed Ebbo; “there are some pictured in our _World Historybefore Carthage_. Would that I could see one!”

  “The _signorino_ would soon have seen his fill, were he between thedecks, chained to the bench for weeks together, without ceasing to rowfor twenty-four hours together, with a renegade standing over to lash us,or to put a morsel into our mouths if we were fainting.”

  “The dogs! Do they thus use Christian men?” cried Friedel.

  “_Sì_, _sì—ja wohl_. There were a good fourscore of us, and among them aTedesco, a good man and true, from whom I learnt _la lingua loro_.”

  “Our tongue!—from whom?” asked one twin of the other.

  “A Tedesco, a fellow-countryman of _sue eccellenze_.”

  “_Deutscher_!” cried both boys, turning in horror, “our Germans sotreated by the pagan villains?”

  “Yea, truly, _signorini miei_. This fellow-captive of mine was a_cavaliere_ in his own land, but he had been betrayed and sold by hisenemies, and he mourned piteously for _la sposa sua_—his bride, as theysay here. A goodly man and a tall, piteously cramped in the narrow deck,I grieved to leave him there when the good _confraternità_ at Genoa paidmy ransom. Having learnt to speak _il Tedesco_, and being no longer ableto fit out a vessel, I made my venture beyond the Alps; but, alas! tillthis moment fortune has still been adverse. My mules died of the toil ofcrossing the mountains; and, when with reduced baggage I came to theriver beneath there—when my horses fell and my servants fled, and thepeasants came down with their hayforks—I thought myself in hands nobetter than those of the Moors themselves.”

  “It was wrongly done,” said Ebbo, in an honest, open tone, thoughblushing. “I have indeed a right to what may be stranded on the bank,but never more shall foul means be employed for the overthrow.”

  The boys had by this time led the traveller through the Gemsbock’s Pass,within sight of the convent. “There,” said Ebbo, “will they give youharbourage, food, a guide, and a beast to carry the rest of your goods.We are now upon convent land, and none will dare to touch your bales; soI will unload old Schimmel.”

  “Ah, _signorino_, if I might offer any token of gratitude—”

  “Nay,” said Ebbo, with boyish lordliness, “make me not a spoiler.”

  “If the _signorini_ should ever come to Genoa,” continued the trader,“and would honour Gian Battista dei Battiste with a call, his whole housewould be at their feet.”

  “Thanks; I would that we could see strange lands!” said Ebbo. “But come,Friedel, the sun is high, and I locked them all into the castle to makematters safe.”

  “May the liberated captive know the name of his deliverers, that he maycommend it to the saints?” asked the merchant.

  “I am Eberhard, Freiherr von Adlerstein, and this is Freiherr Friedmund,my brother. Farewell, sir.”

  “Strange,” muttered the merchant, as he watched the two boys turn downthe pass, “strange how like one barbarous name is to another. Eberardo!That was what we called _il Tedesco_, and, when he once told me hisfamily name, it ended in _stino_; but all these foreign names soundalike. Let us speed on, lest these accursed peasants should wake, and bebeyond the control of the _signorino_.”

  “Ah!” sighed Ebbo, as soon as he had hurried out of reach of thetemptation, “small use in being a baron if one is to be no bettermounted!”

  “Thou art glad to have let that fair creature go free, though,” saidFriedel.

  “Nay, my mother’s eyes would let me have no rest in keeping him.Otherwise—Talk not to me of gladness, Friedel! Thou shouldst knowbetter. How is one to be a knight with nothing to ride but a beast oldenough to be his grandmother?”

  “Knighthood of the heart may be content to go afoot,” said Friedel. “Oh,Ebbo, what a brother thou art! How happy the mother will be!”

  “Pfui, Friedel; what boots heart without spur? I am sick of being mewedup here within these walls of rock! No sport, not even with falling on atraveller. I am worse off than ever were my forefathers!”

  “But how is it? I cannot understand,” asked Fried
el. “What has changedthy mind?”

  “Thou, and the mother, and, more than all, the grandame. Listen,Friedel: when thou camest up, in all the whirl of eagerness and gladpreparation, with thy grave face and murmur that Jobst had put forkedstakes in the stream, it was past man’s endurance to be baulked of thefray. Thou hast forgotten what I said to thee then, good Friedel?”

  “Long since. No doubt I thrust in vexatiously.”

  “Not so,” said Ebbo; “and I saw thou hadst reason, for the stakes weremost maliciously planted, with long branches hid by the current; but thefellows were showing fight, and I could not stay to think then, or Ishould have seemed to fear them! I can tell you we made them run! But Inever meant the grandmother to put yon poor fellow in the dungeon, anduse him worse than a dog. I wot that he was my captive, and none ofhers. And then came the mother; and oh, Friedel, she looked as if I wereslaying her when she saw the spoil; and, ere I had made her see right andreason, the old lady came swooping down in full malice and spite, andactually came to blows. She struck the motherling—struck her on theface, Friedel!”

  “I fear me it has so been before,” said Friedel, sadly.

  “Never will it be so again,” said Ebbo, standing still. “I took the oldhag by the hands, and told her she had ruled long enough! My father’swife is as good a lady of the castle as my grandfather’s, and I myself amlord thereof; and, since my Lady Kunigunde chooses to cross me and beatmy mother about this capture, why she has seen the last of it, and maylearn who is master, and who is mistress!”

  “Oh, Ebbo! I would I had seen it! But was not she outrageous? Was notthe mother shrinking and ready to give back all her claims at once?”

  “Perhaps she would have been, but just then she found thou wast not withme, and I found thou wast not with her, and we thought of nought else.But thou must stand by me, Friedel, and help to keep the grandmother inher place, and the mother in hers.”

  “If the mother _will_ be kept,” said Friedel. “I fear me she will onlyplead to be left to the grandame’s treatment, as before.”

  “Never, Friedel! I will never see her so used again. I released thisman solely to show that she is to rule here.—Yes, I know all aboutfreebooting being a deadly sin, and moreover that it will bring theLeague about our ears; and it was a cowardly trick of Jobst to put thosebranches in the stream. Did I not go over it last night till my brainwas dizzy? But still, it is but living and dying like our fathers, and Ihate tameness or dullness, and it is like a fool to go back from what onehas once begun.”

  “No; it is like a brave man, when one has begun wrong,” said Friedel.

  “But then I thought of the grandame triumphing over the gentle mother—andI know the mother wept over her beads half the night. She _shall_ findshe has had her own way for once this morning.”

  Friedel was silent for a few moments, then said, “Let me tell thee what Isaw yesterday, Ebbo.”

  “So,” answered the other brother.

  “I liked not to vex my mother by my tidings, so I climbed up to the tarn.There is something always healing in that spot, is it not so, Ebbo? Whenthe grandmother has been raving” (hitherto Friedel’s worst grievance) “itis like getting up nearer the quiet sky in the stillness there, when thesky seems to have come down into the deep blue water, and all is sostill, so wondrous still and calm. I wonder if, when we see the greatDome Kirk itself, it will give one’s spirit wings, as does the gazing upfrom the Ptarmigan’s Pool.”

  “Thou minnesinger, was it the blue sky thou hadst to tell me of?”

  “No, brother, it was ere I reached it that I saw this sight. I hadscaled the peak where grows the stunted rowan, and I sat down to lookdown on the other side of the gorge. It was clear where I sat, but theravine was filled with clouds, and upon them—”

  “The shape of the blessed Friedmund, thy patron?”

  “_Our_ patron,” said Friedel; “I saw him, a giant form in gown and hood,traced in grey shadow upon the dazzling white cloud; and oh, Ebbo! he wasstruggling with a thinner, darker, wilder shape bearing a club. Hestrove to withhold it; his gestures threatened and warned! I watchedlike one spell-bound, for it was to me as the guardian spirit of our racestriving for thee with the enemy.”

  “How did it end?”

  “The cloud darkened, and swallowed them; nor should I have known theissue, if suddenly, on the very cloud where the strife had been, therehad not beamed forth a rainbow—not a common rainbow, Ebbo, but a perfectring, a soft-glancing, many-tinted crown of victory. Then I knew thesaint had won, and that thou wouldst win.”

  “I! What, not thyself—his own namesake?”

  “I thought, Ebbo, if the fight went very hard—nay, if for a time thegrandame led thee her way—that belike I might serve thee best by givingup all, and praying for thee in the hermit’s cave, or as a monk.”

  “Thou!—thou, my other self! Aid me by burrowing in a hole like a rat!What foolery wilt say next? No, no, Friedel, strike by my side, and Iwill strike with thee; pray by my side, and I will pray with thee; but ifthou takest none of the strokes, then will I none of the prayers!”

  “Ebbo, thou knowest not what thou sayest.”

  “No one knows better! See, Friedel, wouldst thou have me all that theold Adlersteinen were, and worse too? then wilt thou leave me and hidethine head in some priestly cowl. Maybe thou thinkest to pray my soulinto safety at the last moment as a favour to thine own abundantsanctity; but I tell thee, Friedel, that’s no manly way to salvation. Ifthou follow’st that track, I’ll take care to get past the border-linewithin which prayer can help.”

  Friedel crossed himself, and uttered an imploring exclamation of horrorat these wild words.

  “Stay,” said Ebbo; “I said not I meant any such thing—so long as thouwilt be with me. My purpose is to be a good man and true, a guard to theweak, a defence against the Turk, a good lord to my vassals, and, if itmay not be otherwise, I will take my oath to the Kaiser, and keep it. Isthat enough for thee, Friedel, or wouldst thou see me a monk at once?”

  “Oh, Ebbo, this is what we ever planned. I only dreamed of the otherwhen—when thou didst seem to be on the other track.”

  “Well, what can I do more than turn back? I’ll get absolution on Sunday,and tell Father Norbert that I will do any penance he pleases; and warnJobst that, if he sets any more traps in the river, I will drown himthere next! Only get this priestly fancy away, Friedel, once and forever!”

  “Never, never could I think of what would sever us,” cried Friedel,“save—when—” he added, hesitating, unwilling to harp on the formerstring. Ebbo broke in imperiously,

  “Friedmund von Adlerstein, give me thy solemn word that I never againhear of this freak of turning priest or hermit. What! art slow to speak?Thinkest me too bad for thee?”

  “No, Ebbo. Heaven knows thou art stronger, more resolute than I. I ammore likely to be too bad for thee. But so long as we can be true,faithful God-fearing Junkern together, Heaven forbid that we shouldpart!”

  “It is our bond!” said Ebbo; “nought shall part us.”

  “Nought but death,” said Friedmund, solemnly.

  “For my part,” said Ebbo, with perfect seriousness, “I do not believethat one of us can live or die without the other. But, hark! there’s anoutcry at the castle! They have found out that they are locked in! Ha!ho! hilloa, Hatto, how like you playing prisoner?”

  Ebbo would have amused himself with the dismay of his garrison a littlelonger, had not Friedel reminded him that their mother might be sufferingfor their delay, and this suggestion made him march in hastily. He foundher standing drooping under the pitiless storm which Frau Kunigunde waspouring out at the highest pitch of her cracked, trembling voice, onehand uplifted and clenched, the other grasping the back of a chair, whileher whole frame shook with rage too mighty for her strength.

  “Grandame,” said Ebbo, striding up to the scene of action, “cease.Remember my words yestereve.”

  “She has stolen th
e keys! She has tampered with the servants! She hasreleased the prisoner—thy prisoner, Ebbo! She has cheated us as she didwith Wildschloss! False burgherinn! I trow she wanted another suitor!Bane—pest of Adlerstein!”

  Friedmund threw a supporting arm round his mother, but Ebbo confrontedthe old lady. “Grandmother,” he said, “I freed the captive. I stole thekeys—I and Friedel! No one else knew my purpose. He was my captive, andI released him because he was foully taken. I have chosen my lot inlife,” he added; and, standing in the middle of the hall, he took off hiscap, and spoke gravely:—“I will not be a treacherous robber-outlaw, but,so help me God, a faithful, loyal, godly nobleman.”

  His mother and Friedel breathed an “Amen” with all their hearts; and hecontinued,

  “And thou, grandame, peace! Such reverence shalt thou have as befits myfather’s mother; but henceforth mine own lady-mother is the mistress ofthis castle, and whoever speaks a rude word to her offends the Freiherrvon Adlerstein.”

  [Picture: “‘Henceforth mine own lady-mother is the mistress of this castle, and whoever speaks a rude word to her offends the Freiherr von Adlerstein’”—Page 126]

  That last day’s work had made a great step in Ebbo’s life, and there hestood, grave and firm, ready for the assault; for, in effect, he and allbesides expected that the old lady would fly at him or at his mother likea wild cat, as she would assuredly have done in a like case a yearearlier; but she took them all by surprise by collapsing into her chairand sobbing piteously. Ebbo, much distressed, tried to make herunderstand that she was to have all care and honour; but she mutteredsomething about ingratitude, and continued to exhaust herself withweeping, spurning away all who approached her; and thenceforth she livedin a gloomy, sullen acquiescence in her deposition.

  Christina inclined to the opinion that she must have had some slightstroke in the night, for she was never the same woman again; her vigourhad passed away, and she would sit spinning, or rocking herself in herchair, scarcely alive to what passed, or scolding and fretting like ashadow of her old violence. Nothing pleased her but the attentions ofher grandsons, and happily she soon ceased to know them apart, and gaveEbbo credit for all that was done for her by Friedel, whose separateexistence she seemed to have forgotten.

  As long as her old spirit remained she would not suffer the approach ofher daughter-in-law, and Christina could only make suggestions for hercomfort to be acted on by Ursel; and though the reins of government fastdropped from the aged hands, they were but gradually and cautiouslyassumed by the younger Baroness.

  Only Elsie remained of the rude, demoralized girls whom she had found inthe castle, and their successors, though dull and uncouth, were meek andmanageable; the men of the castle had all, except Mätz, been alwaysdevoted to the Frau Christina; and Mätz, to her great relief, ran away sosoon as he found that decency and honesty were to be the rule. OldHatto, humpbacked Hans, and Heinz the Schneiderlein, were the whole maleestablishment, and had at least the merit of attachment to herself andher sons; and in time there was a shade of greater civilization about thecastle, though impeded both by dire poverty and the doggedness of the oldretainers. At least the court was cleared of the swine, and, withindoors, the table was spread with dainty linen out of the parcels fromUlm, and the meals served with orderliness that annoyed the boys atfirst, but soon became a subject of pride and pleasure.

  Frau Kunigunde lingered long, with increasing infirmities. After thewinter day, when, running down at a sudden noise, Friedel picked her upfrom the hearthstone, scorched, bruised, almost senseless, she acceptedChristina’s care with nothing worse than a snarl, and gradually seemed toforget the identity of her nurse with the interloping burgher girl.Thanks or courtesy had been no part of her nature, least of all towardsher own sex, and she did little but grumble, fret, and revile herattendant; but she soon depended so much on Christina’s care, that it washardly possible to leave her. At her best and strongest, her talk wasmaundering abuse of her son’s low-born wife; but at times her wanderingsshowed black gulfs of iniquity and coarseness of soul that would make thegentle listener tremble, and be thankful that her sons were out ofhearing. And thus did Christina von Adlerstein requite fifteen years ofpersecution.

  The old lady’s first failure had been in the summer of 1488; it was theAdvent season of 1489, when the snow was at the deepest, and the frost atthe hardest, that the two hardy mountaineer grandsons fetched over thepass Father Norbert, and a still sturdier, stronger monk, to the dyingwoman.

  “Are we in time, mother?” asked Ebbo, from the door of the upper chamber,where the Adlersteins began and ended life, shaking the snow from hismufflings. Ruddy with exertion in the sharp wind, what a contrast he wasto all within the room!

  “Who is that?” said a thin, feeble voice.

  “It is Ebbo. It is the Baron,” said Christina. “Come in, Ebbo. She issomewhat revived.”

  “Will she be able to speak to the priest?” asked Ebbo.

  “Priest!” feebly screamed the old woman. “No priest for me! My lorddied unshriven, unassoilzied. Where he is, there will I be. Let apriest approach me at his peril!”

  Stony insensibility ensued; nor did she speak again, though life lastedmany hours longer. The priests did their office; for, impenitent as thelife and frantic as the words had been, the opinions of the time deemedthat their rites might yet give the departing soul a chance, though thebody was unconscious.

  When all was over, snow was again falling, shifting and drifting, so thatit was impossible to leave the castle, and the two monks were kept therefor a full fortnight, during which Christmas solemnities were observed inthe chapel, for the first time since the days of Friedmund the Good. Thecorpse of Kunigunde, preserved—we must say the word—salted, was placed ina coffin, and laid in that chapel to await the melting of the snows, whenthe vault at the Hermitage could be opened. And this could not beeffected till Easter had nearly come round again, and it was within aweek of their sixteenth birthday that the two young Barons stood togetherat the coffin’s head, serious indeed, but more with the thought of lifethan of death.