The White Company

  CHAPTER XXI. HOW AGOSTINO PISANO RISKED HIS HEAD.

  Even the squires' table at the Abbey of St. Andrew's at Bordeaux wason a very sumptuous scale while the prince held his court there. Herefirst, after the meagre fare of Beaulieu and the stinted board of theLady Loring, Alleyne learned the lengths to which luxury and refinementmight be pushed. Roasted peacocks, with the feathers all carefullyreplaced, so that the bird lay upon the dish even as it had strutted inlife, boars' heads with the tusks gilded and the mouth lined with silverfoil, jellies in the shape of the Twelve Apostles, and a great pastywhich formed an exact model of the king's new castle at Windsor--thesewere a few of the strange dishes which faced him. An archer had broughthim a change of clothes from the cog, and he had already, with theelasticity of youth, shaken off the troubles and fatigues of themorning. A page from the inner banqueting-hall had come with word thattheir master intended to drink wine at the lodgings of the Lord Chandosthat night, and that he desired his squires to sleep at the hotel of the"Half Moon" on the Rue des Apotres. Thither then they both set out inthe twilight after the long course of juggling tricks and glee-singingwith which the principal meal was concluded.

  A thin rain was falling as the two youths, with their cloaks over theirheads, made their way on foot through the streets of the old town,leaving their horses in the royal stables. An occasional oil lamp at thecorner of a street, or in the portico of some wealthy burgher, threw afaint glimmer over the shining cobblestones, and the varied motley crowdwho, in spite of the weather, ebbed and flowed along every highway. Inthose scattered circles of dim radiance might be seen the wholebusy panorama of life in a wealthy and martial city. Here passed theround-faced burgher, swollen with prosperity, his sweeping dark-clothedgaberdine, flat velvet cap, broad leather belt and dangling pouch allspeaking of comfort and of wealth. Behind him his serving wench, herblue whimple over her head, and one hand thrust forth to bear thelanthorn which threw a golden bar of light along her master's path.Behind them a group of swaggering, half-drunken Yorkshire dalesmen,speaking a dialect which their own southland countrymen could scarcecomprehend, their jerkins marked with the pelican, which showed thatthey had come over in the train of the north-country Stapletons. Theburgher glanced back at their fierce faces and quickened his step, whilethe girl pulled her whimple closer round her, for there was a meaning intheir wild eyes, as they stared at the purse and the maiden, whichmen of all tongues could understand. Then came archers of the guard,shrill-voiced women of the camp, English pages with their fair skins andblue wondering eyes, dark-robed friars, lounging men-at-arms, swarthyloud-tongued Gascon serving-men, seamen from the river, rude peasantsof the Medoc, and becloaked and befeathered squires of the court, alljostling and pushing in an ever-changing, many-colored stream, whileEnglish, French, Welsh, Basque, and the varied dialects of Gascony andGuienne filled the air with their babel. From time to time the throngwould be burst asunder and a lady's horse-litter would trot past towardsthe abbey, or there would come a knot of torch-bearing archers walkingin front of Gascon baron or English knight, as he sought his lodgings afterthe palace revels. Clatter of hoofs, clinking of weapons, shouts from thedrunken brawlers, and high laughter of women, they all rose up, likethe mist from a marsh, out of the crowded streets of the dim-lit city.

  One couple out of the moving throng especially engaged the attentionof the two young squires, the more so as they were going in their owndirection and immediately in front of them. They consisted of a man anda girl, the former very tall with rounded shoulders, a limp of onefoot, and a large flat object covered with dark cloth under his arm.His companion was young and straight, with a quick, elastic step andgraceful bearing, though so swathed in a black mantle that little couldbe seen of her face save a flash of dark eyes and a curve of raven hair.The tall man leaned heavily upon her to take the weight off his tenderfoot, while he held his burden betwixt himself and the wall, cuddling itjealously to his side, and thrusting forward his young companion to actas a buttress whenever the pressure of the crowd threatened to bear himaway. The evident anxiety of the man, the appearance of his attendant,and the joint care with which they defended their concealed possession,excited the interest of the two young Englishmen who walked withinhand-touch of them.

  "Courage, child!" they heard the tall man exclaim in strange hybridFrench. "If we can win another sixty paces we are safe."

  "Hold it safe, father," the other answered, in the same soft, mincingdialect. "We have no cause for fear."

  "Verily, they are heathens and barbarians," cried the man; "mad,howling, drunken barbarians! Forty more paces, Tita mia, and I swear tothe holy Eloi, patron of all learned craftsmen, that I will never setfoot over my door again until the whole swarm are safely hived in theircamp of Dax, or wherever else they curse with their presence. Twentymore paces, my treasure! Ah, my God! how they push and brawl! Getin their way, Tita mia! Put your little elbow bravely out! Set yourshoulders squarely against them, girl! Why should you give way to thesemad islanders? Ah, cospetto! we are ruined and destroyed!"

  The crowd had thickened in front, so that the lame man and the girl hadcome to a stand. Several half-drunken English archers, attracted, asthe squires had been, by their singular appearance, were facing towardsthem, and peering at them through the dim light.

  "By the three kings!" cried one, "here is an old dotard shrew to haveso goodly a crutch! Use the leg that God hath given you, man, and do notbear so heavily upon the wench."

  "Twenty devils fly away with him!" shouted another. "What, how, man!are brave archers to go maidless while an old man uses one as awalking-staff?"

  "Come with me, my honey-bird!" cried a third, plucking at the girl'smantle.

  "Nay, with me, my heart's desire!" said the first. "By St. George! ourlife is short, and we should be merry while we may. May I never seeChester Bridge again, if she is not a right winsome lass!"

  "What hath the old toad under his arm?" cried one of the others. "Hehugs it to him as the devil hugged the pardoner."

  "Let us see, old bag of bones; let us see what it is that you haveunder your arm!" They crowded in upon him, while he, ignorant of theirlanguage, could but clutch the girl with one hand and the parcel withthe other, looking wildly about in search of help.

  "Nay, lads, nay!" cried Ford, pushing back the nearest archer. "Thisis but scurvy conduct. Keep your hands off, or it will be the worse foryou."

  "Keep your tongue still, or it will be the worse for you," shouted themost drunken of the archers. "Who are you to spoil sport?"

  "A raw squire, new landed," said another. "By St. Thomas of Kent! we areat the beck of our master, but we are not to be ordered by every babewhose mother hath sent him as far as Aquitaine."

  "Oh, gentlemen," cried the girl in broken French, "for dear Christ'ssake stand by us, and do not let these terrible men do us an injury."

  "Have no fears, lady," Alleyne answered. "We shall see that all iswell with you. Take your hand from the girl's wrist, you north-countryrogue!"

  "Hold to her, Wat!" said a great black-bearded man-at-arms, whose steelbreast-plate glimmered in the dusk. "Keep your hands from your bodkins,you two, for that was my trade before you were born, and, by God's soul!I will drive a handful of steel through you if you move a finger."

  "Thank God!" said Alleyne suddenly, as he spied in the lamp-light ashock of blazing red hair which fringed a steel cap high above the headsof the crowd. "Here is John, and Aylward, too! Help us, comrades, forthere is wrong being done to this maid and to the old man."

  "Hola, mon petit," said the old bowman, pushing his way through thecrowd, with the huge forester at his heels. "What is all this, then?By the twang of string! I think that you will have some work upon yourhands if you are to right all the wrongs that you may see upon this sideof the water. It is not to be thought that a troop of bowmen, with thewine buzzing in their ears, will be as soft-spoken as so many youngclerks in an orchard. When you have been a year with the Companyyou will think less of such matters. But what is amiss
here? Theprovost-marshal with his archers is coming this way, and some of you mayfind yourselves in the stretch-neck, if you take not heed."

  "Why, it is old Sam Aylward of the White Company!" shouted theman-at-arms. "Why, Samkin, what hath come upon thee? I can call to mindthe day when you were as roaring a blade as ever called himself a freecompanion. By my soul! from Limoges to Navarre, who was there who wouldkiss a wench or cut a throat as readily as bowman Aylward of Hawkwood'scompany?"

  "Like enough, Peter," said Aylward, "and, by my hilt! I may not havechanged so much. But it was ever a fair loose and a clear mark with me.The wench must be willing, or the man must be standing up against me,else, by these ten finger bones! either were safe enough for me."

  A glance at Aylward's resolute face, and at the huge shoulders of HordleJohn, had convinced the archers that there was little to be got byviolence. The girl and the old man began to shuffle on in the crowdwithout their tormentors venturing to stop them. Ford and Alleynefollowed slowly behind them, but Aylward caught the latter by theshoulder.

  "By my hilt! camarade," said he, "I hear that you have done great thingsat the Abbey to-day, but I pray you to have a care, for it was I whobrought you into the Company, and it would be a black day for me ifaught were to befall you."

  "Nay, Aylward, I will have a care."

  "Thrust not forward into danger too much, mon petit. In a little timeyour wrist will be stronger and your cut more shrewd. There will be someof us at the 'Rose de Guienne' to-night, which is two doors from thehotel of the 'Half Moon,' so if you would drain a cup with a few simplearchers you will be right welcome."

  Alleyne promised to be there if his duties would allow, and then,slipping through the crowd, he rejoined Ford, who was standing in talkwith the two strangers, who had now reached their own doorstep.

  "Brave young signor," cried the tall man, throwing his arms roundAlleyne, "how can we thank you enough for taking our parts against thosehorrible drunken barbarians. What should we have done without you? MyTita would have been dragged away, and my head would have been shiveredinto a thousand fragments."

  "Nay, I scarce think that they would have mishandled you so," saidAlleyne in surprise.

  "Ho, ho!" cried he with a high crowing laugh, "it is not the head uponmy shoulders that I think of. Cospetto! no. It is the head under my armwhich you have preserved."

  "Perhaps the signori would deign to come under our roof, father," saidthe maiden. "If we bide here, who knows that some fresh tumult may notbreak out."

  "Well said, Tita! Well said, my girl! I pray you, sirs, to honor myunworthy roof so far. A light, Giacomo! There are five steps up. Nowtwo more. So! Here we are at last in safety. Corpo di Bacco! I wouldnot have given ten maravedi for my head when those children of the devilwere pushing us against the wall. Tita mia, you have been a brave girl,and it was better that you should be pulled and pushed than that my headshould be broken."

  "Yes indeed, father," said she earnestly.

  "But those English! Ach! Take a Goth, a Hun, and a Vandal, mix themtogether and add a Barbary rover; then take this creature and make himdrunk--and you have an Englishman. My God! were ever such people uponearth! What place is free from them? I hear that they swarm in Italyeven as they swarm here. Everywhere you will find them, except inheaven."

  "Dear father," cried Tita, still supporting the angry old man, as helimped up the curved oaken stair. "You must not forget that these goodsignori who have preserved us are also English."

  "Ah, yes. My pardon, sirs! Come into my rooms here. There are some whomight find some pleasure in these paintings, but I learn the art of waris the only art which is held in honor in your island."

  The low-roofed, oak-panelled room into which he conducted them wasbrilliantly lit by four scented oil lamps. Against the walls, upon thetable, on the floor, and in every part of the chamber were great sheetsof glass painted in the most brilliant colors. Ford and Edricson gazedaround them in amazement, for never had they seen such magnificent worksof art.

  "You like them then," the lame artist cried, in answer to the look ofpleasure and of surprise in their faces. "There are then some of you whohave a taste for such trifling."

  "I could not have believed it," exclaimed Alleyne. "What color! Whatoutlines! See to this martyrdom of the holy Stephen, Ford. Could you notyourself pick up one of these stones which lie to the hand of the wickedmurtherers?"

  "And see this stag, Alleyne, with the cross betwixt its horns. By myfaith! I have never seen a better one at the Forest of Bere."

  "And the green of this grass--how bright and clear! Why all the paintingthat I have seen is but child's play beside this. This worthy gentlemanmust be one of those great painters of whom I have oft heard brotherBartholomew speak in the old days at Beaulieu."

  The dark mobile face of the artist shone with pleasure at the unaffecteddelight of the two young Englishmen. His daughter had thrown off hermantle and disclosed a face of the finest and most delicate Italianbeauty, which soon drew Ford's eyes from the pictures in front of him.Alleyne, however, continued with little cries of admiration and ofwonderment to turn from the walls to the table and yet again to thewalls.

  "What think you of this, young sir?" asked the painter, tearing off thecloth which concealed the flat object which he had borne beneath hisarm. It was a leaf-shaped sheet of glass bearing upon it a face with ahalo round it, so delicately outlined, and of so perfect a tint, that itmight have been indeed a human face which gazed with sad and thoughtfuleyes upon the young squire. He clapped his hands, with that thrill ofjoy which true art will ever give to a true artist.

  "It is great!" he cried. "It is wonderful! But I marvel, sir, that youshould have risked a work of such beauty and value by bearing it atnight through so unruly a crowd."

  "I have indeed been rash," said the artist. "Some wine, Tita, from theFlorence flask! Had it not been for you, I tremble to think of whatmight have come of it. See to the skin tint: it is not to be replaced,for paint as you will, it is not once in a hundred times that it is noteither burned too brown in the furnace or else the color will not hold,and you get but a sickly white. There you can see the very veins and thethrob of the blood. Yes, diavolo! if it had broken, my heart would havebroken too. It is for the choir window in the church of St. Remi, andwe had gone, my little helper and I, to see if it was indeed of the sizefor the stonework. Night had fallen ere we finished, and what could wedo save carry it home as best we might? But you, young sir, you speak asif you too knew something of the art."

  "So little that I scarce dare speak of it in your presence," Alleyneanswered. "I have been cloister-bred, and it was no very great matter tohandle the brush better than my brother novices."

  "There are pigments, brush, and paper," said the old artist. "I do notgive you glass, for that is another matter, and takes much skill in themixing of colors. Now I pray you to show me a touch of your art. I thankyou, Tita! The Venetian glasses, cara mia, and fill them to the brim. Aseat, signor!"

  While Ford, in his English-French, was conversing with Tita in herItalian-French, the old man was carefully examining his precious head tosee that no scratch had been left upon its surface. When he glanced upagain, Alleyne had, with a few bold strokes of the brush, tinted in awoman's face and neck upon the white sheet in front of him.

  "Diavolo!" exclaimed the old artist, standing with his head on one side,"you have power; yes, cospetto! you have power, it is the face of anangel!"

  "It is the face of the Lady Maude Loring!" cried Ford, even moreastonished.

  "Why, on my faith, it is not unlike her!" said Alleyne, in someconfusion.

  "Ah! a portrait! So much the better. Young man, I am Agostino Pisano,the son of Andrea Pisano, and I say again that you have power. Further,I say, that, if you will stay with me, I will teach you all the secretsof the glass-stainers' mystery: the pigments and their thickening,which will fuse into the glass and which will not, the furnace and theglazing--every trick and method you shall know."

  "I would
be right glad to study under such a master," said Alleyne; "butI am sworn to follow my lord whilst this war lasts."

  "War! war!" cried the old Italian. "Ever this talk of war. And the menthat you hold to be great--what are they? Have I not heard their names?Soldiers, butchers, destroyers! Ah, per Bacco! we have men in Italy whoare in very truth great. You pull down, you despoil; but they build up,they restore. Ah, if you could but see my own dear Pisa, the Duomo, thecloisters of Campo Santo, the high Campanile, with the mellow throb ofher bells upon the warm Italian air! Those are the works of great men.And I have seen them with my own eyes, these very eyes which look uponyou. I have seen Andrea Orcagna, Taddeo Gaddi, Giottino, Stefano, SimoneMemmi--men whose very colors I am not worthy to mix. And I have seen theaged Giotto, and he in turn was pupil to Cimabue, before whom there wasno art in Italy, for the Greeks were brought to paint the chapel of theGondi at Florence. Ah, signori, there are the real great men whose nameswill be held in honor when your soldiers are shown to have been theenemies of humankind."

  "Faith, sir," said Ford, "there is something to say for the soldiersalso, for, unless they be defended, how are all these gentlemen whom youhave mentioned to preserve the pictures which they have painted?"

  "And all these!" said Alleyne. "Have you indeed done them all?--andwhere are they to go?"

  "Yes, signor, they are all from my hand. Some are, as you see, upon onesheet, and some are in many pieces which may fasten together. There aresome who do but paint upon the glass, and then, by placing another sheetof glass upon the top and fastening it, they keep the air from theirpainting. Yet I hold that the true art of my craft lies as much in thefurnace as in the brush. See this rose window, which is from the modelof the Church of the Holy Trinity at Vendome, and this other of the'Finding of the Grail,' which is for the apse of the Abbey church. Timewas when none but my countrymen could do these things; but there isClement of Chartres and others in France who are very worthy workmen.But, ah! there is that ever shrieking brazen tongue which will not letus forget for one short hour that it is the arm of the savage, and notthe hand of the master, which rules over the world."

  A stern, clear bugle call had sounded close at hand to summon somefollowing together for the night.

  "It is a sign to us as well," said Ford. "I would fain stay here foreveramid all these beautiful things--" staring hard at the blushing Tita ashe spoke--"but we must be back at our lord's hostel ere he reach it."Amid renewed thanks and with promises to come again, the two squiresbade their leave of the old Italian glass-stainer and his daughter. Thestreets were clearer now, and the rain had stopped, so they made theirway quickly from the Rue du Roi, in which their new friends dwelt, tothe Rue des Apotres, where the hostel of the "Half Moon" was situated.