Ivanhoe: A Romance
to meddle with his own concerns, and leave those of others alone?—Since
thou hast made thy choice, it remains but that thou payest down thy
ransom, and that at a short day.”
“Yet hear me,” said the Jew—“for the sake of that very wealth which
thou wouldst obtain at the expense of thy—-” Here he stopt short,
afraid of irritating the savage Norman. But Front-de-Bœuf only laughed,
and himself filled up the blank at which the Jew had hesitated.
“At the expense of my conscience, thou wouldst say, Isaac; speak it
out—I tell thee, I am reasonable. I can bear the reproaches of a loser,
even when that loser is a Jew. Thou wert not so patient, Isaac, when
thou didst invoke justice against Jacques Fitzdotterel, for calling
thee a usurious blood-sucker, when thy exactions had devoured his
patrimony.”
“I swear by the Talmud,” said the Jew, “that your valour has been
misled in that matter. Fitzdotterel drew his poniard upon me in mine
own chamber, because I craved him for mine own silver. The term of
payment was due at the Passover.”
“I care not what he did,” said Front-de-Bœuf; “the question is, when
shall I have mine own?—when shall I have the shekels, Isaac?”
“Let my daughter Rebecca go forth to York,” answered Isaac, “with your
safe conduct, noble knight, and so soon as man and horse can return,
the treasure—-” Here he groaned deeply, but added, after the pause of a
few seconds,—“The treasure shall be told down on this very floor.”
“Thy daughter!” said Front-de-Bœuf, as if surprised,—“By heavens,
Isaac, I would I had known of this. I deemed that yonder black-browed
girl had been thy concubine, and I gave her to be a handmaiden to Sir
Brian de Bois-Guilbert, after the fashion of patriarchs and heroes of
the days of old, who set us in these matters a wholesome example.”
The yell which Isaac raised at this unfeeling communication made the
very vault to ring, and astounded the two Saracens so much that they
let go their hold of the Jew. He availed himself of his enlargement to
throw himself on the pavement, and clasp the knees of Front-de-Bœuf.
“Take all that you have asked,” said he, “Sir Knight—take ten times
more—reduce me to ruin and to beggary, if thou wilt,—nay, pierce me
with thy poniard, broil me on that furnace, but spare my daughter,
deliver her in safety and honour!—As thou art born of woman, spare the
honour of a helpless maiden—She is the image of my deceased Rachel, she
is the last of six pledges of her love—Will you deprive a widowed
husband of his sole remaining comfort?—Will you reduce a father to wish
that his only living child were laid beside her dead mother, in the
tomb of our fathers?”
“I would,” said the Norman, somewhat relenting, “that I had known of
this before. I thought your race had loved nothing save their
moneybags.”
“Think not so vilely of us, Jews though we be,” said Isaac, eager to
improve the moment of apparent sympathy; “the hunted fox, the tortured
wildcat loves its young—the despised and persecuted race of Abraham
love their children!”
“Be it so,” said Front-de-Bœuf; “I will believe it in future, Isaac,
for thy very sake—but it aids us not now, I cannot help what has
happened, or what is to follow; my word is passed to my comrade in
arms, nor would I break it for ten Jews and Jewesses to boot. Besides,
why shouldst thou think evil is to come to the girl, even if she became
Bois-Guilbert’s booty?”
“There will, there must!” exclaimed Isaac, wringing his hands in agony;
“when did Templars breathe aught but cruelty to men, and dishonour to
women!”
“Dog of an infidel,” said Front-de-Bœuf, with sparkling eyes, and not
sorry, perhaps, to seize a pretext for working himself into a passion,
“blaspheme not the Holy Order of the Temple of Zion, but take thought
instead to pay me the ransom thou hast promised, or woe betide thy
Jewish throat!”
“Robber and villain!” said the Jew, retorting the insults of his
oppressor with passion, which, however impotent, he now found it
impossible to bridle, “I will pay thee nothing—not one silver penny
will I pay thee, unless my daughter is delivered to me in safety and
honour!”
“Art thou in thy senses, Israelite?” said the Norman, sternly—“has thy
flesh and blood a charm against heated iron and scalding oil?”
“I care not!” said the Jew, rendered desperate by paternal affection;
“do thy worst. My daughter is my flesh and blood, dearer to me a
thousand times than those limbs which thy cruelty threatens. No silver
will I give thee, unless I were to pour it molten down thy avaricious
throat—no, not a silver penny will I give thee, Nazarene, were it to
save thee from the deep damnation thy whole life has merited! Take my
life if thou wilt, and say, the Jew, amidst his tortures, knew how to
disappoint the Christian.”
“We shall see that,” said Front-de-Bœuf; “for by the blessed rood,
which is the abomination of thy accursed tribe, thou shalt feel the
extremities of fire and steel!—Strip him, slaves, and chain him down
upon the bars.”
In spite of the feeble struggles of the old man, the Saracens had
already torn from him his upper garment, and were proceeding totally to
disrobe him, when the sound of a bugle, twice winded without the
castle, penetrated even to the recesses of the dungeon, and immediately
after loud voices were heard calling for Sir Reginald Front-de-Bœuf.
Unwilling to be found engaged in his hellish occupation, the savage
Baron gave the slaves a signal to restore Isaac’s garment, and,
quitting the dungeon with his attendants, he left the Jew to thank God
for his own deliverance, or to lament over his daughter’s captivity,
and probable fate, as his personal or parental feelings might prove
strongest.
CHAPTER XXIII
Nay, if the gentle spirit of moving words
Can no way change you to a milder form,
I’ll woo you, like a soldier, at arms’ end,
And love you ’gainst the nature of love, force you.
TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA
The apartment to which the Lady Rowena had been introduced was fitted
up with some rude attempts at ornament and magnificence, and her being
placed there might be considered as a peculiar mark of respect not
offered to the other prisoners. But the wife of Front-de-Bœuf, for whom
it had been originally furnished, was long dead, and decay and neglect
had impaired the few ornaments with which her taste had adorned it. The
tapestry hung down from the walls in many places, and in others was
tarnished and faded under the effects of the sun, or tattered and
decayed by age. Desolate, however, as it was, this was the apartment of
the castle which had been judged most fitting for the accommodation of
the Saxon heiress; and here she was left to meditate upon her fate,
until the actors in this nefarious drama had arranged the several parts
which each of them was to perform. This had been settled in a council
held by Front-de-Bœuf, De Bracy, and the Templar, in which, after a
long and warm debate concerning the several advantages which each
insisted upon deriving from his peculiar share in this audacious
enterprise, they had at length determined the fate of their unhappy
prisoners.
It was about the hour of noon, therefore, when De Bracy, for whose
advantage the expedition had been first planned, appeared to prosecute
his views upon the hand and possessions of the Lady Rowena.
The interval had not entirely been bestowed in holding council with his
confederates, for De Bracy had found leisure to decorate his person
with all the foppery of the times. His green cassock and vizard were
now flung aside. His long luxuriant hair was trained to flow in quaint
tresses down his richly furred cloak. His beard was closely shaved, his
doublet reached to the middle of his leg, and the girdle which secured
it, and at the same time supported his ponderous sword, was embroidered
and embossed with gold work. We have already noticed the extravagant
fashion of the shoes at this period, and the points of Maurice de
Bracy’s might have challenged the prize of extravagance with the
gayest, being turned up and twisted like the horns of a ram. Such was
the dress of a gallant of the period; and, in the present instance,
that effect was aided by the handsome person and good demeanour of the
wearer, whose manners partook alike of the grace of a courtier, and the
frankness of a soldier.
He saluted Rowena by doffing his velvet bonnet, garnished with a golden
broach, representing St Michael trampling down the Prince of Evil. With
this, he gently motioned the lady to a seat; and, as she still retained
her standing posture, the knight ungloved his right hand, and motioned
to conduct her thither. But Rowena declined, by her gesture, the
proffered compliment, and replied, “If I be in the presence of my
jailor, Sir Knight—nor will circumstances allow me to think
otherwise—it best becomes his prisoner to remain standing till she
learns her doom.”
“Alas! fair Rowena,” returned De Bracy, “you are in presence of your
captive, not your jailor; and it is from your fair eyes that De Bracy
must receive that doom which you fondly expect from him.”
“I know you not, sir,” said the lady, drawing herself up with all the
pride of offended rank and beauty; “I know you not—and the insolent
familiarity with which you apply to me the jargon of a troubadour,
forms no apology for the violence of a robber.”
“To thyself, fair maid,” answered De Bracy, in his former tone—“to
thine own charms be ascribed whate’er I have done which passed the
respect due to her, whom I have chosen queen of my heart, and lodestar
of my eyes.”
“I repeat to you, Sir Knight, that I know you not, and that no man
wearing chain and spurs ought thus to intrude himself upon the presence
of an unprotected lady.”
“That I am unknown to you,” said De Bracy, “is indeed my misfortune;
yet let me hope that De Bracy’s name has not been always unspoken, when
minstrels or heralds have praised deeds of chivalry, whether in the
lists or in the battle-field.”
“To heralds and to minstrels, then, leave thy praise, Sir Knight,”
replied Rowena, “more suiting for their mouths than for thine own; and
tell me which of them shall record in song, or in book of tourney, the
memorable conquest of this night, a conquest obtained over an old man,
followed by a few timid hinds; and its booty, an unfortunate maiden,
transported against her will to the castle of a robber?”
“You are unjust, Lady Rowena,” said the knight, biting his lips in some
confusion, and speaking in a tone more natural to him than that of
affected gallantry, which he had at first adopted; “yourself free from
passion, you can allow no excuse for the frenzy of another, although
caused by your own beauty.”
“I pray you, Sir Knight,” said Rowena, “to cease a language so commonly
used by strolling minstrels, that it becomes not the mouth of knights
or nobles. Certes, you constrain me to sit down, since you enter upon
such commonplace terms, of which each vile crowder hath a stock that
might last from hence to Christmas.”
“Proud damsel,” said De Bracy, incensed at finding his gallant style
procured him nothing but contempt—“proud damsel, thou shalt be as
proudly encountered. Know then, that I have supported my pretensions to
your hand in the way that best suited thy character. It is meeter for
thy humour to be wooed with bow and bill, than in set terms, and in
courtly language.”
“Courtesy of tongue,” said Rowena, “when it is used to veil
churlishness of deed, is but a knight’s girdle around the breast of a
base clown. I wonder not that the restraint appears to gall you—more it
were for your honour to have retained the dress and language of an
outlaw, than to veil the deeds of one under an affectation of gentle
language and demeanour.”
“You counsel well, lady,” said the Norman; “and in the bold language