I waited a good long time,—all the longer because the hours go so slow in company with dead folks. At last midnight struck in the church steeple and I saw the head of a man rising beyond the low wall of the cemetery quite near the gate. Another quarter of an hour dragged along without my seeing or hearing anything but that man, who, getting tired of waiting, began to whistle a Bourbonnais tune, whereby I knew it was Joseph, who no doubt betrayed the hopes of his enemies by seeming so cool in presence of the dead.
At last, another man, who was stuck close to the wall inside the gate, and whom I hadn't seen on account of the big box-trees which hid him, popped his head quickly over the wall as if to take Joseph by surprise; but the latter did not stir, and said, laughing: "Well, Père Carnat, you are rather late; I came near going to sleep while waiting. Will you open the gate, or must I enter that 'nettle-field,' by the breach?"
"No," said Carnat, "the curate would not like it; we mustn't openly offend the church people. I will go to you."
He climbed over the wall and told Joseph he must let his head and arms be covered with a very thick canvas sack, and then walk wherever he was led.
"Very good," said Joseph in a contemptuous tone. "Go on."
I watched them from over the wall, and saw them enter the little path to the English gate; then I made a short cut to the place where I had left my comrades and found only four of them; the youngest had slipped off without a word, and I was rather afraid the others would do the same, for they found the time long and told me they had heard very queer noises, which seemed to come from under the earth.
Presently Joseph came along, with his head covered and led by Carnat. The pair got close upon us, but turned from the path about twenty feet off. Carnat made Joseph clamber down to the edge of the moat, and we thought he meant to drown him. At once we were on our legs to stop such treachery, but in a minute more we saw they were both walking in the water, which was shallow at that place, until they reached a low archway in the wall of the castle which was partly in the water of the moat. They passed through it, and this explained to me what had become of the others whom I had hunted for.
It was necessary to do as they did; which didn't seem to me very difficult, but my comrades were hard to persuade. They had heard that the vaults of the castle ran nine miles out into the country, as far as Deols, and that persons who did not know their windings had been lost in them. I was forced to declare that I knew them very well, though I had never set foot there in my life, and had no idea whether they were common wine-cellars or a subterraneous town, as my friends declared.
I walked first, without seeing where I set my feet, feeling the walls, which inclosed a narrow passage where one's head very nearly touched the roof. We advanced in this way for a short time, when a hullaballoo sounded beneath us like forty thunder-claps rolling round the devil's cave. It was so strange and alarming that I stopped short to try and find out what it meant; then I went quickly forward, not to let myself get chilled with the idea of some devil's caper, telling my companions to follow me. But the noise was so loud they did not hear me and I, thinking they were at my heels, went on and on, till, hearing nothing more, I turned to speak to them and got no answer. Not wishing to call aloud, I went back four or five steps; it was all dark. I stretched out my hands, and called cautiously; good-bye to my valiant contingent,—they had deserted me!
I thought I must be pretty near the entrance and could surely catch up with them within or without. I returned through the arch by which we had entered, and searched carefully along the little path beside the cemetery; but no! my comrades had disappeared just like the bagpipers; it seemed as if the earth had opened and swallowed them up.
I had a moment of horrid worry, thinking I must either give up the whole thing or return to those devilish caverns and take myself all alone into the traps and terrors they were preparing for Joseph. But I asked myself whether, even if the matter concerned only him, I could quietly leave him in danger. My soul answered no, and then I asked my heart if love for Thérence wasn't quite as real a thing as one's duty to one's neighbor, and the answer I received sent me back through the dark and slimy archway and along the subterranean passages—I won't say as gayly, but at any rate as quickly as if I were going to my own wedding.
While I was feeling my way forward I found, on my right, an opening to another passage, which I had not found before because I then felt to my left; and I thought to myself that my comrades in going out had probably found it and turned that way. I followed the passage, for there was no sign that the other way would bring me any nearer to the bagpipers. I did not find my comrades, but as for the bagpipers, I had not taken twenty steps before I heard their din much nearer than it sounded the first time; and presently a quivering kind of light let me see that I was entering a large round cave which had three or four exits, black as the jaws of hell.
I was surprised to see so clearly in a vault where there wasn't any light, but I presently noticed that gleams were coming from below through the ground I trod upon. I noticed that this ground seemed to swell up in the middle, and fearing it was not solid, I kept close to the wall, and getting near to a crevice, I lay down with my eye close to it and saw very plainly what was going on in another cavern just below the one I was in. It was, as I afterwards learned, a former dungeon, adjoining an oubliette or black hole, the mouth of which could still be seen thirty years ago in the upper hall of the castle. I thought as much when I saw the remains of human bones at the lower end of the cave, which the bagpipers had set up in rows to terrify the candidate, with pine torches inside their skulls. Joseph was there all alone, his eyes unbound, his arms crossed, just as cool as I was not, listened contemptuously to the uproar of eighteen bagpipes, which all brayed together, prolonging a single note into a roar. This crazy music came from an adjoining cave where the bagpipers were hidden, and where, as they doubtless knew, a curious echo multiplied the sound. I, who knew nothing about it then, fancied at first that all the bagpipes of Berry, Auvergne, and the Bourbonnais were collected together in that cave.
When they had had enough of growling with their instruments, they began to squeal and squall themselves, and the walls echoed them, till you would have fancied they were a great troop of furious animals of all kinds. But Joseph, who was really an unusual kind of man among our peasantry,—indeed, I hardly ever knew his like,—merely shrugged his shoulders and yawned, as if tired with such fool's play. His courage passed into me, and I began to think of laughing at the farce, when a little noise at my back made me turn my head. There I saw, at the entrance of the passage by which I had come, a figure which froze my senses.
It was that of a lord of the olden time, carrying a lance and wearing an iron breastplate and leathern garments of a style no longer seen. But the most awful part of him was his face, which was actually like a death's head.
I partly recovered myself, thinking it was only a disguise some of the enemy had put on to frighten Joseph; but on reflection I saw the danger was really mine, because, finding me on the watch, he would surely do me some damage. However, though he saw me as plain as I could see him, he did not stir, but remained stock-still like a ghost, half in shadow, and half in the light that came up from below; and as this light flickered according as it was moved about, there were moments when, not seeing him, I thought he was a notion of my own brain,—until suddenly he would reappear, all but his legs, which remained in darkness behind a sort of step or barrier, which made me fancy he was as it were floating on a cloud.
I don't know how long I was tortured with this vision, which made me forget to watch Joseph, and scared me lest I was going mad in trying to do more than it was in me to perform. I recollected that I had seen in the hall of the castle an old picture which they said was the portrait of a wicked warrior whom a lord of the castle in the olden time, who was the warrior's brother, had flung into the dungeon. The garments of leather and iron which I saw before me on that skeleton figure, were certainly like those in the picture, and the notion came into my head that here was a ghost in pain, watching the desecration of his sepulchre, and waiting to show his displeasure in some way or other.
What made this idea the more probable was that the ghost said nothing to me, and evidently took no notice of my presence,—apparently aware that I had no evil intentions against his poor carcass.
At last a noise different from all others attracted my eyes away from him. I looked back into the cave below me, where stood Joseph, and something near him very ugly and very strange.
Joseph stood boldly in front of an abominable creature, dressed in the skin of a dog, with horns sticking out of his tangled hair, and a red face, and claws and tail; the which beast was jumping about and making faces like one possessed of the devil. It was vile to see, and yet I wasn't the dupe of it very long, for though the creature tried to disguise his voice I thought I recognized that of Doré-Fratin, the bagpiper of Pouligny, one of the strongest and most quarrelsome men in our neighborhood.
"You may sneer as you please," he was saying to Joseph, "at me and at hell, but I am the king of all musicians, and you shall not play your instrument without my permission unless you sell me your soul."
Joseph answered, "What can such a fool of a devil as you do with the soul of a musician? You have no use for it."
"Mind what you say," returned the other. "Don't you know that down here you must either give yourself to the devil or prove that you are stronger than he?"
"Yes, yes, I know the proverb," said Joseph: "'Kill the devil or the devil will kill you.'"
As he spoke, I saw Huriel and his father come from a dark opening into the vault and go up to the devil as if to speak to him; but they were pulled back by the other bagpipers who now showed themselves, and Carnat the elder addressed Joseph.
"You have proved," he said, "that you don't fear witchcraft, and we will let you go free if you will now conform to the usual custom, which is to fight the devil, in proof that you, a Christian man, refuse to submit to him."
"If the devil wants to be well thrashed," replied Joseph, "let me go at him at once, and we'll see if his skin is any tougher than mine. What weapons?"
"None but your fists," replied Carnat.
"It is fair play, I hope," said the Head-Woodsman.
Joseph took no time to inquire; his temper was up. Enraged by the tricks that were played on him, he sprang on the devil, tore off his horns and head-dress, and caught him so resolutely round the body that he brought him to earth and fell on top of him.
But he instantly got up, and I fancied he gave a cry of surprise and pain; but the bagpipers all began to play, except Huriel and his father, who stood watching the encounter with an expression of doubt and uneasiness.
Joseph, meantime, was tumbling the devil about and seeming to get the better of him; but his rage seemed to me unnatural, and I feared he might put himself in the wrong through too much violence. The bagpipers seemed to help him, for instead of rescuing their comrade, who was knocked down three times, they marched round and round the fight, piping loudly, and beating with their feet to excite him.
Suddenly the Head-Woodsman separated the combatants by levelling a blow with his stick on the devil's paws, and threatening to strike harder the second time if he was not listened to. Huriel ran to his father's side, raising his stick also, while all the others stopped walking round and round and piping; and a moment's silence and stillness fell on all.
Then I saw that Joseph, overcome with pain, was wiping his torn hands and his face, which was covered with blood, and that he would have fainted if Huriel had not caught him in his arms, while Doré-Fratin merely threw aside his trappings, panting with heat, and wiping the sweat from his forehead with a grin.
"What does this mean?" cried Carnat, coming up to the Plead-Woodsman with a threatening air, "Are you a traitor to the guild? By what right do you interfere with the tests?"
"I interfere at my own risk and to your shame," replied the Head-Woodsman. "I am not a traitor, and you are evil-doers, both treacherous and cruel. I suspected that you were tricking us to lead this young man here and wound him, perhaps dangerously. You hate him because you know that every one will prefer him to you, and that wherever he is heard no one will listen to your music. You have not dared to refuse him admission to the guild, because the whole country would blame you for such a crying injustice; but you are trying to frighten him from playing in the parishes you have taken possession of, and you have put him through hard and dangerous tests which none of you could have borne as long as he."
"I don't know what you mean," said the old dean, Pailloux de Verneuil; "and the blame you cast upon us here, in presence of a candidate, is unheard-of insolence. We don't know how you practise initiation in your part of the country, but here we are following our customs and shall not allow you to interfere."
"I shall interfere," said Huriel, who was sopping Joseph's blood with his handkerchief, and had brought him back to consciousness, as he held him on his knee. "I neither can nor will tell of your conduct away from here, because I belong to the brotherhood, but at least I will tell you to your faces that you are brutes. In our country we fight with the devil in jest, taking care to do no one any harm. Here you choose the strongest among you and furnish him with hidden weapons, with which he endeavors to put out the eyes and stab the veins of your victims. See! this young man is exhausted, and in the rage which your wickedness excited in him, he would have let you kill him if we had not stopped the fight. And then what would you have done? You would have flung his body into that vault, where so many other unfortunates have perished, whose bones ought to rise and condemn you for being as cruel as your former lords."
These words reminded me of the apparition I had forgotten, and I turned round to see if it was still there. I could not see it, and then I bethought me of finding my way to the lower cave, where, as I began to think, I might be useful to my friends. I found the stairway at once and went down to the entrance of the vault, not trying to conceal myself, for such disputing and confusion were going on that no one paid any attention to me.
The Head-Woodsman had picked up the devil's skin-coat and showed that it was covered with spikes like a comb for currying oxen; and also the mittens which the sham devil wore on his hands, in which strong nails were fastened with the points outside. The bagpipers were furious. "Here's a pretty fuss about a few scratches," cried Carnat. "Isn't it in the order of things that a devil should have claws? And this young fool, who attacked him so imprudently, why didn't he know how far he could play at that game without getting his snout scraped? Come, come, don't pity him so much; it's a mere nothing; and since he has had enough of it, let him confess he can't play at our games, and is not fit to belong to our guild in any way."
"I shall belong to it!" cried Joseph, wrenching himself from Huriel's arms and showing as he did so his torn shirt and bleeding breast. "I shall belong to it in spite of you! I insist that the fight shall go on, and one of us be left in this cavern."
"I forbid it!" said the Head-Woodsman, "and I insist that this young man shall be proclaimed victor, or I swear to bring into this place a company of bagpipers who shall teach you how to behave, and who will see justice done."
"You?" said Doré-Fratin, drawing a sort of boar-knife from his belt. "You can do so if you choose, but you shall carry with you some marks on your body, so that people may believe your reports."
The Head-Woodsman and Huriel put themselves in an attitude of defence. Joseph flung himself upon Fratin to get away his knife, and I made one bound in amongst them. But before any of us could strike a blow the figure that startled me so in the upper cavern appeared at the opening of the lower one, stretched forth his lance, and slowly advanced in a way to strike terror to the minds of the evil-doers. Then, as they all paused, dumbfounded with fear and amazement, a piteous voice was heard from the depths of the dungeon, reciting the prayers for the dead.
This routed the whole brotherhood. One of the pipers cried out: "The dead! the dead are rising!" and they all fled, pell-mell, yelling and pushing through the various openings except that to the dungeon, where stood another figure wrapped in a winding-sheet, chanting the most dismal sing-song that anybody ever heard. A minute later all our enemies had disappeared, and the warrior flinging off his helmet and mask, we beheld the jovial face of Benoît, while the monk, getting out of his winding sheet, was holding his sides in convulsions of laughter.
"May God forgive me for masquerading," he said. "I did it with the best intentions; those rascals deserve a good lesson, if it is only to teach them not to laugh at the devil, of whom they are really more afraid than those whom they threaten with him."
"For my part, I felt quite certain," said Benoît, "that our comedy would put an end to theirs." Then, noticing Joseph's wounds, he grew very uneasy, and showed such feeling for him that all this, together with the succor he had brought in so timely a manner, proved to my mind his regard for his step-son, and his good heart, which I had hitherto doubted.
While we examined Joseph and convinced ourselves he was not very seriously hurt, the monk told us how the butler at the castle had once said to him that he allowed the bagpipers and other societies to hold their secret meetings in the cellars of the castle. Those in which we found ourselves were too far from the inhabited parts of the castle to disturb the lady mistress of Saint-Chartier, and, indeed, if it had, she would only have laughed, not imagining that any mischief could come of it. But Benoît, who suspected some evil intent, had got the same butler to give him a key to the cellars, and a disguise; and that was how it was that he got these in time to avert all danger.
"Well," said the Head-Woodsman, addressing him, "thank you for your assistance; but I rather regret you came, for those fellows are capable of declaring that I asked you to do so and consequently that I betrayed the secrets of the guild. If you will take my advice we had better get away noiselessly, at once, and leave them to think you were really ghosts."
"All the more," added Benoît, "that their wrath may deprive me of their custom, which is no slight matter. I hope they did not recognize Tiennet—but how the devil was it that Tiennet got here in the nick of time?"
"Didn't you bring him?" asked Huriel.
"That he didn't," said I. "I came on my own account, because of the stories they tell of your deviltries. I was curious to see them; but I swear to you those fellows were too scared and the sight of their eyes was too wide of the mark ever to have recognized me."
We were about to leave when the sound of angry voices and an uproar like that of a fight was heard.
"Dear, dear!" cried the monk, "what's that now? I think they are coming back and we have not yet done with them. Quick, let's get back into our disguises!"
"No," said Benoît, listening, "I know what it is. I met, as I came along through the castle cellars, four or five young fellows, one of whom is known to me; and that is Leonard, your Bourbonnais wood-chopper, Père Bastien. These lads were there from curiosity no doubt; but they had got bewildered in the caverns, and I lent them my lantern, telling them to wait for me. The bagpipers must have met them and they are giving chase."
"It is more likely that they are being chased themselves if there are not more than five of them," said Huriel. "Let us go and see."
We were just starting when the noise and the footsteps approached, and Carnat, Doré-Fratin, and eight others returned to the cave, having, in fact, exchanged a few blows with our comrades, and finding that they had to do with real flesh and blood instead of spectres, were ashamed of their cowardice and so came back again. They reproached the Huriels for having betrayed them and driven them into an ambush. The Head-Woodsman defended himself, and the monk tried to secure peace by taking it all upon himself, telling the bagpipers to repent of their sins. But they felt themselves in good force, for others kept coming back to their support; and when they found their numbers nearly complete they raised their voices to a roar, and went from reproaches to threats and from threats to blows. Seeing there was no way to avoid an encounter, all the more because they had drunk a good deal of brandy while the tests were going on and were more or less intoxicated, we put ourselves in an attitude of defence, pressing one against the other, and showing front to the enemy on all sides, like oxen when a troop of wolves attack them at pasture. The monk, having already lost his morality and his Latin, now lost his patience also, and seizing the pipe of an instrument which had got broken in the scrimmage, he laid about him as hard as a man well could, in defence of his own skin.
Unluckily, Joseph was weakened by the loss of blood, and Huriel, who bore upon his heart the recollection of Malzac's death, was more fearful of giving blows than of receiving them. Anxious to protect his father, who sprang into the fray like an old lion, he put himself in great danger. Benoît fought very well for a man who was just out of an illness; but the truth is we were only six against fifteen or sixteen, and as the blood rose anger came, and I saw our enemies opening their knives. I had only time to fling myself before the Head-Woodsman, who, still unwilling to draw his blade, was the object of their bitterest anger. I received a wound in the arm, which I hardly felt at the moment, but which hindered my fighting on, and I thought the day was lost, when, by great good luck, my four comrades decided to come and see what the noise was about. The reinforcement was sufficient, and together we put to flight, for the second time and the last, our exhausted enemies, taken in the rear and ignorant how many were upon them.
I saw that victory was ours and that none of my friends were much hurt; then, suddenly perceiving that I had got more than I wanted, I fell like a log and neither knew nor felt another thing.