CHAPTER XLII
BURNING OF OAKMEDE
While Oliver Icingla was exerting himself so strenuously against theFrench who garrisoned the castles of Sussex, and while ballads in hispraise were sung in the streets of London, and in the very hearing ofthe invaders, Dame Isabel was passing her time sadly in the old halls ofOakmede.
The life of a Norman dame of the thirteenth century was, no doubt,somewhat monotonous; but it was not solitary, and generally could not bevery dull. In fact, the castle of almost every Norman baron was a schoolof chivalry, where young men of noble birth, first as pages, andafterwards as squires, served an apprenticeship to arms, and were taught“to serve God and the ladies,” as Oliver had been in the household ofthe Earl of Salisbury and Hela Devereux, his pious countess. Moreover,the spouse of every powerful noble had a number of damsels inattendance, whom she instructed in the art of needlework and embroidery,as also how to make salve, and bind up wounds, in the event of a siege,and in some very homely domestic duties connected with the larder andthe dairy, the dame working in their company, setting them their tasks,and at times reading to them from some holy book or romance of chivalry.
Dame Isabel Icingla’s position, of course, was very different in manyrespects from that of the wife or widow of a Norman baron, and herhousehold much more limited. Moreover, she could not seclude herself asthey could do--in fact, as her husband had been known among the Saxonsas Hlaford, which signified the bread-giver, so she as his wife wasknown as Hleafdian, which signified the server of bread; and she wasfain to avoid the charge of being denounced as “niddering” by conformingto the system of lavish hospitality and free intercourse with humbleneighbours which the Icinglas, as Saxon thanes, had everpractised--their door having always stood open, from morning to evening,to all comers, and their cheer, such as it was, having been dispensedwith open hand.
All this, of course, was very homely and primitive, and perhaps DameIsabel did not relish it. But while enacting her part as a Hleafdian,she never for a moment forgot that she was a Moreville, and never reallydescended from what she deemed the dignity of a noble lady. Born aNorman, and heiress to vast possessions, her pride was naturally high;and though she was perhaps unconscious of the fact, her original prideas Moreville and Norman had been much increased by her marriage with anIcingla, and all that she heard of their vague and indefinitepretensions; for, having little of their old grandeur left, save theirpride, the Icinglas made the most of it in season, or out of season, andregarded their own strength in battle and wisdom in council as nothingcompared with the lustre which they borrowed from ancestors who had heldprincely rank, and headed great armies in England, before the Danishkings turned England upside down.
For various reasons, therefore, Dame Isabel Icingla entertained a veryhigh opinion of her own importance; and even in going through the dutiesof hospitality which devolved upon her as Hleafdian, she was grave andstately almost to affectation. In the evening, however, she was in thehabit of unbending so far as either to converse with her three maidenson domestic affairs, or--being a woman of notable piety--to read to themsome passage from the lives of the saints, albeit she may have beenaware that these damsels would have much preferred a little lighterliterature. But however that might have been, Dame Isabel, dressed inher russet gown, and wearing the wimple which concealed her grey hairsand gave a conventual appearance to her face, was seated in her chair ofstate, and thus occupied, with her three maidens around her, when astrange murmur ran through the house, and a spaniel which lay at herfeet started up and uttered a low growl, and then barked, and, as thedog barked, Wolf, the son of Styr, rushed in with terror on hiscountenance.
“Oh, noble lady,” cried he, so agitated that he could scarcelyarticulate, “fly! They are coming; they are here!”
“Who are coming?” asked the dame, bending her brows somewhat sternly onthe intruder. “Who are here?”
“The outlandish men,” answered Wolf, excitedly, “who spare neither sexnor age; for, as my father Styr says, the French soldiers are the refuseand scum of the kingdom.”
A few words will suffice to explain how the son of Styr, knowing thatDame Isabel was such a stickler for ceremony, deemed himself justifiedin rushing unbidden to his lady’s presence.
It was a gusty Monday evening, about the beginning of March, and Wolf,having paid his last visit for the day to Ayoub and Muradel, wasloitering about the stable-yard, and, boy-like, watching eagerly themovements of two young game cocks which he expected would win applausein the Barnet cock-pit and do honour to the training of Oakmede on themorrow, which happened to be Shrove-Tuesday, when his ear was arrestedby the “steady whisper on the breeze and horsemen’s heavy tread” whichintimates the approach of cavalry.
Rumour had recently brought to Oakmede some terrible reports of thehavoc wrought by the invaders, and the inmates had often instinctivelyfelt alarmed and drawn closer together as tales of ravaging and pillagewere told by pilgrims and pedlars around the winter fire of wood. Butsomehow or other, from the home of the Icinglas having stood through somany civil turmoils without being scathed or attacked, they neverrealised the idea of armed foemen appearing at the gate.
Wolf, however, as he listened, began to suspect that this confidence wasto meet with a rude shock, and, as he rushed out of the stable-yard, andlooked up the long glade that served for avenue, his worst suspicionswere confirmed by the sight of a band of horsemen whose aspect wouldhave left no doubt that they were foreigners and coming on no friendlyerrand, even if his keen eyes had not recognised in their guide hisancient enemy Clem the Bold Rider, mounted on one of Sir AnthonyWaledger’s horses, and pointing out the way with vindictive intent. Nota moment did he then lose in performing what he deemed his two greatduties under the circumstances. The first was to give the alarm to DameIsabel; the second to fly back to free Ayoub and Muradel from theirstalls, to lead them to the rear of the buildings, and to drive themthrough the orchard into the woodland, confident that they, atleast--thanks to their aversion to strangers and their swiftness--wouldescape the hands of the marauders.
When this was done--and it was but the work of a minute--Wolf deemed ithigh time to think of his own safety, and pondered the propriety ofescaping to his father’s cottage, to which foreign invaders were notlikely to find their way. But his anxiety was so intense that he couldnot, for the life of him, muster resolution enough to leave theneighbourhood of the danger, and making such a circuit among the treesas kept him out of the way of the enemy, he drew as near to the front ofthe old house as he could without the risk of detection, and enteringthe hollow of an old pollard, peered cautiously out on the armed band.
Meanwhile, guided by Clem, the Count de Perche--for he it was--haltedbefore the great wooden gate, sounded trumpet, and demanded admittance.No answer being returned to his summons, the count grew wroth, andordered his men to shoot. His order was promptly obeyed; but the flightof arrows produced no effect, and the count became red with rage.
“Mort Dieu!” exclaimed he, turning round, “are we to be kept here allnight by these stinking swineherds? Break open the gates.”
Several men sprang over the moat, and soon their hammers and axes wereapplied with such vigour and energy, that the time-worn gate gave waybefore the heavy blows aimed at it. At the same time the drawbridge waslowered.
“Now,” said the count with a significant gesture and in a decisive tone,“enter, and do your duty.”
As he spoke, such of his men as had dismounted passed the drawbridge,rushed through the courtyard, and with little difficulty forced theirway into the house; but, to their surprise, nobody appeared either toyield or resist. The place was deserted, and they roamed from chamber tochamber without meeting with a human being. It seemed by theirejaculations, and by their searching and re-searching, that the Frenchsoldiers were disappointed at the absence of flesh and blood. However,they laid hold of everything as spoil that was not too heavy to bearaway, and returned to the count to report the result of their adventure;and he, afte
r muttering a few oaths, gave his final order.
“Set fire to this den without loss of time,” said he sharply, “and dallynot, for we have far to ride. Mort Dieu! if this Icingla should thinkfit to visit his house this night, I will provide him with lightsufficient to guide him on his way through the woods.”
The count’s order was speedily obeyed. His men, indeed, seemed to relishthe duty. Having ransacked the barns and the cow-houses, and killed theold cowherd, who, unluckily for him, arrived at that moment from theneighbouring hamlet, the soldiers brought wood and straw, and proceeded,with business-like precision, to the work of destruction, and the house,being chiefly constructed of timber--and that timber old and dry--wassoon in a blaze.
“Now mount, every man, and let us begone,” said the count triumphantly.“By the bones of John the Baptist! we have made an example of thisIcingla, and done enough to deter others from setting themselves againstour good Lord Louis. Ride on;” and as the count spoke he turned hishorse’s head, and, followed by his band of ruffians, rode leisurely bythe twilight, up the glade by which he had come on his errand ofdevastation.
Nor had the French in any degree failed in the work which they came todo. When Wolf, seeing that the coast was clear, emerged from hishiding-place, and came into the open space to gaze on the burning house,night had already fallen, and the sight was terrible to behold, and allthe more so to him that he feared the inmates had fallen victims. Thefire, indeed, was raging, and devouring its prey like a fiend, andcoiling, as the serpent does, round its victim. In some places it hadreached the roof, and was leaping towards the sky, on which thereflection of the flames was red as blood, and there was every prospectof the flames meeting in such a way as to reduce the old house to a heapof ashes and ruins. Driven by the wind, the fire reached theoutbuildings, and stables, barns, brewhouse, and cow-houses, andpigeon-houses were involved in one general conflagration. Only thelittle chapel dedicated to St. Dunstan, from the fact of its standingapart from the other buildings, and in the quarter opposite to thattowards which the wind was blowing, had a chance of escape.
At this stage, and while all but one wing of the house was enveloped inflame and smoke, Styr the Anglo-Saxon, having accidentally learned thatsome catastrophe had occurred, joined his son in the darkness, and hedid not come a moment too soon. Scarcely had Wolf, in hurried accents,explained what had happened, when shouts and screams of agony reachedtheir ears, and, listening to ascertain the direction from which thecries came, they, by the lurid light which the fire threw around,descried, at the casement of an upper chamber in the wing stillunscathed, faces of men and women in mortal terror of the most terribleof deaths. Styr guessed all: the inhabitants of Oakmede had fled to thehiding-hole to escape the hands of the foreign soldiery, and, ignorantthat the house was on fire, had remained in concealment till the flameshad seized the stairs, and their means of escape had been cut off. Theirposition was now truly awful; and the old man shuddered at the sight.
Nevertheless, Styr’s presence of mind did not desert him. He rememberedthat in the orchard was a ladder, and he hoped that it might be longenough to enable them to descend. Thither, as if he had suddenly shakenoff twenty years of his age, he rushed, Wolf, in keeping pace with him,much marvelling at his father’s swiftness of foot. But when the ladderwas brought, and when, to the joy of those who were imperilled, it wasplaced against the wall, their joy was suddenly turned into sorrow, anda simultaneous cry of despair rose from their lips as they perceivedthat it was too short to serve the purpose of saving them.
But Styr did not despair: it was not his way in life. Calmly he ascendedthe ladder step by step, till he was almost on the highest, while Wolfheld it below to keep it steady. And much had the domestics to rejoicethat the veteran’s stature was tall, and his shoulder strong. One by onehe caught them in his iron arms--first the women, then the men--anddescended with them on his shoulders, and all this he did calmly and insolemn silence, like a man who felt his responsibility, and wasdetermined to acquit himself of it with credit. But when the last of thedomestics was saved--and by that time the moon had risen--he turnedround and gazed on them with the air of a person who wishes to ask aquestion, but dreads to receive the answer.
“Where,” said he at length, struggling to find words--“where, in thename of St. Dunstan and St. Edward, is the Hleafdian?”
Men and maids alike stared at each other, but for a time returned noanswer.
“Marry, we know not,” at last said the steward.
Styr the Anglo-Saxon raised his shaggy eyebrows, and darted on thecircle a look of reproach, such as, even seen by moonlight, none ofthose present ever forgot during their lives, and then hid his face inhis hands, as if praying.
“Now,” said he, after a moment, “let everybody who would be saved bearback and away, for danger cannot be far distant.”
“Move away,” repeated Wolf, setting the example; and everybody withprecipitation got out of reach of the tottering walls.
The prescience of the old man was speedily vindicated. All was soonover, and flames rushed from every casement, including even that bywhich the domestics had made their narrow escape. Then the roof gaveway, a cloud of vapour darkened the sky, a pillar of fire rose high, andthe old walls tottered and fell with a crash.
Next morning, when tidings of the catastrophe spread through homesteadsand hamlets, and when the peasantry flocked to see what was to be seen,the old hall of the Icinglas was a heap of blackened ruins. But what hadbefallen Dame Isabel was the question which everybody asked, and thequestion which nobody could answer.