CHAPTER XXII.
BERAK THE LIGHTNING AND TOAH HIS DOG
The blue midland sea, the clear blue of heaven just turning to opal, andthe glint of mother-of-pearl coming up with the gloaming! A beach, notflattened out and ribbed by the passage of daily tides, but with thesand and pebbles built steeply up by the lashing waves and the furiouswind Euroclydon.
On different planes, far out at sea, were the sails of fishing-boats,set this way and that, for all the world like butterflies in the act ofalighting. It was early spring--the spring of Roussillon, where it isnever winter. Already the purple flowers of the wild Provencal mustardstood out from the white and yellow rocks, on which was perched a littletown, flat-roofed and Moorish. Their leaves, grey-green like her ownnorthern seas, of which she had all but lost the memory, drew Claire'sattention. She bit absent-mindedly, and was immediately informed as tothe species of the plant, without any previous knowledge of botany.
She kicked a strand of the long binding sea-grass, and then, afterlooking a moment resentfully at the wild mustard, she threw the plantpettishly away. Our once sedate Claire had begun to allow herself theseebullitions with the Professor. They annoyed the Abbe John so much--andit was practice. Also, they made the Professor spoil her. He had neverwatched from so near the sweet, semi-conscious coquetry of a prettymaid. So now he studied Claire like a newly-found fragment ofDemosthenes, of which the Greek text has become a little fragmentary andwilful during the centuries.
"This will serve you better, if you must take to eating grass like anox," said the Professor of Eloquence, reaching out his hand and pluckinga sprig of sweet alison, which grew everywhere about.
Claire stretched out hers also and took the honey-scented plant, onwhich the tiny white flowers and the shining fruit were to be foundtogether.
"Buzz-uzz-uzz!" said half-a-dozen indignant bees, following the sprig.For at that dead season of the year, sweet alison was almost their onlyjoy.
"Ugh!" exclaimed Claire, letting it go. She loved none of thesting-accoutred tribe--unless it were the big, heavy, lurchingbumble-bees, which entered a room with such blundering pomp that you hadalways time to get out before they made up their mind about you.
The Professor watched her with some pride. For in the quiet of RousillonClaire had quickly recovered her peace of mind, and with it the light inthe eye and the rose-flush on the cheek.
But quite suddenly she put her hands to her face and began to sob.
If it had been the Abbe John, he might have divined the reason, but theProfessor was not a man advised upon such matters.
"What is it?" he said, stupidly enough; "are you ill?"
"Oh, no--no!" sobbed Claire; "it is so good to be here. It is sopeaceful. You are so good to me--too good--your mother--yourbrothers--what have I done to deserve it?"
"Very likely nothing," said the Professor, meaning to be consoling; "Ihave always noticed that those who deserve least, are commonly bestserved!"
"That is not at all a nice thing to say," cried Claire; "they did notteach you polite speeches at your school--or else you have forgottenthem at your dull old Sorbonne. Do you call that eloquence?"
"I only profess eloquence," said Doctor Anatole, with due meekness; "itis not required by any statute that I should also practise it!"
"Well," said Claire, "I can do without your sweet speeches. I cannotexpect a Sorbonnist to have the sugared comfits of a king's mignon!"
"Who speaks so loud of sugared comfits?" said a voice from the otherside of the weather-stained rock, beneath which the Professor and ClaireAgnew were sitting looking out over the sea.
A tall shepherd appeared, wrapped in the cloak of the true Pyreneanherdsman, brown ochre striped with red, and fringed with the bluewoollen tassels which here took the place of the silver bells of Bearn.A tiny shiver, not of distaste, but caused by some feeling of faint,instinctive aversion, ran through Claire.
Jean-aux-Choux did not notice. His eyes were far out on the sea, where,as in a vision, he seemed to see strange things. His countenance, oncetwisted and comical, now appeared somehow ennobled. A stern glory, as ofan angry ocean seen in the twilight, gloating over the destruction ithas wrought during the day, illumined his face. His bent back seemedsomehow straighter. And, though he still halted in his gait, he couldtake the hills in his stride with any man. And none could better "wearthe sheep" or call an erring ewe to heel than Jean-aux-Choux. For inthese semi-eastern lands the sheep still follow the shepherd and areknown of him.
"Who speaks of sugared comfits?" demanded Jean-aux-Choux for the secondtime.
"I did," said Claire, a little tremulously. "I only wished I had some,Jean, to while away the time. For this law-learned Professor will saynothing but rude things to me!"
Jean looked from one to the other, to make sure that the girl wasjesting. His brow cleared. Then again a gleam of fierce joy passedmomently over his face.
"_He_ had comfits in his hand in a silver box," he said, "jeweller'swork of a cunning artificer. And he entered among us like the Lord ofAll. But it was given to me--to me, Jean-aux-Choux, to bring low thehaughty head. 'Guise, the good Guise!' Ha! ha! But I sent him to Hattil,the place of an howling for sin--he that had thought to walk in Ahara,the sweet savouring meadows!"
"I hated Guise and all his works," said the Professor, looking at theex-fool boldly, "yet will I never call his death aught but a murder mostfoul."
"It may be--it may be," said Jean-aux-Choux indifferently; "I did myLord's work for an unworthy master. I would as soon have set the steelto the throat of Henry of Valois himself. He and that mother of his, nowalso gone to the Place of Howling to hob-nob with her friend ofGuise--they planned the killing. I did it. I give thanks! Michaeiah--whois like the Lord? Jedaiah--the hand of the Lord hath wrought it.Jehoash-Berak--the fire of the Lord falls in the thunderbolt! Amen!"
The Professor started to his feet.
"What is that you say? The Queen-Mother dead? And you----?"
He looked at the long dagger Jean-aux-Choux carried at his side, which,every time he shifted his cloak, drew the unwilling gaze of Claire Agnewlike a fascination.
"The Mother of Witchcrafts is indeed dead," said Jean-aux-Choux. "Butthat the world owes not to me. The hand of God, and not mine, sent herto her own place. Yet I saw in a vision the Woman drunken with the bloodof saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus."
Then he, who had once been called the King's fool, became, as it were,transported. His eyes, directed at something unseen across the blue andsleeping sea, were terrible to behold. Faint greyish flecks of foamappeared on his lips. He cast his cloak on the ground and trod upon it,crying, "Even thus is it to-day with Great Babylon, the mystery, themother of the abominations of the earth."
After a moment's pause he took up his prophecy.
"There was One who came and bade me listen, and I gave him no heed, forhe blessed when I would have cursed; he cried 'Preserve' when I cried'Cut off'; he cried 'Plant' when I would have burned up, root andbranch. But when I heard that Catherine of the Medici was indeed dead, Ishouted for joy; I said, 'She was arrayed in purple and scarlet, andgilded with gold and precious stones and pearls! I saw her glory. Butnow Babylon the Great is fallen--is fallen. And they that worshipped herthrow dust on their heads--all they that have thriven on the abundanceof her pleasures. For in one hour her judgment is come!'"
Then, all in a moment, he came down from the height of his vision. Thelight of satisfied vengeance faded from his face.
"But I forget--I must go to the herd. It is my duty--till the God, whosearm of flesh I am, finds fitter work for me to do. Then will I do it. Icare not whether the reward be heaven or hell, so that the work be done.The cripple and the fool is not like other men. He is not holden byhuman laws or codes of honour, nor by the lust of land, nor wealth, norpower, nor the love of woman. He is free--free--free as Berak, thelightning of God is free--to strike where he wills--to fall where he issent!"
The two watched him, and listened, marvelling.
And the Professor muttered to himself, "Before I lecture again, I mustread that Genevan book of his. Our poor Vulgate is to that torrent asthe waters of Siloah that flow softly!"
The voice of Jean-aux-Choux had ceased. That is, his lips moved withoutwords. But presently he turned to Claire and said, almost in his oldtones, "I am a fool. I fright you, that are but a child. I do greatwrong. But now I will go to the flock. They await me. I am, you say, acareless shepherd to have left them so long. Not so! I have a dog in athousand--Toah the dart. And, indeed, I myself am no hireling--noIscariot. For your good cousin, Don Raphael Llorient, of Collioure, hathas yet paid me no wages--neither gold Ferdinand nor silver Philip of theIndies. A good day to you, Professor! Sleep in peace, little ClaireAgnew! For the sake of one Francis, late my master, we will watch overyou--even I, Berak the lightning, and Toah my dog!"