Noémi. Baring-Gould Sabine
is he! What can he do? There is no time to be lost to save the men."
The Bishop squeezed his head. "I am unable to do anything. A hundred livres of Bergerac – that is a large sum. If it had been livres of Tours, it would have been better. Here!" – he signed to his treasurer – "How much have I? Is there anything in my store?"
"Nothing," answered the official. "Monseigneur has had to pay the garrison of La Roque, and all the money is out."
"You hear what he says," said the Bishop dispiritedly. "I have nothing!"
"Then the seven men must be mutilated."
"It is too horrible! And the poor wives and children! Ah! we are in terrible times. I pray the Lord daily to take me out of it into the Rest there remains for the people of God; or, better still, to translate me to another see."
"Yes, Monseigneur; but whilst we are here we must do what we can for our fellows, and to save them from further miseries."
"That is true, boy, very true. I wish I had money. But it comes in in trickles and goes out in floods. I will tell you what to do. Go to the Saint Suaire at Cadouin and pray that the Holy Napkin may help."
"I am afraid the help may come too late! The Napkin, I hear, is slow in answering prayer."
"Not if you threaten it with the Saint Suaire at Cahors. Those two Holy Napkins are so near that they are as jealous of each other as two handsome girls; and if they met would tear each other as cats. Tell the Saint Suaire at Cadouin that if you are not helped at once you will apply to her sister at Cahors."
"I have been told that it costs money to make the Saint Suaire listen to one's addresses, and I want to receive and not to pay."
"Not much, not much!" protested the Bishop.
"Besides, Monseigneur," said the youth, "there might be delay while the two Holy Napkins were fighting out the question which was to help us. And then – to have such a squabble might not be conducive to religion."
"There is something in that," said the Bishop. "Oh, my head! my poor head!" He considered a while, and then with a sigh said – "I'll indulge butter. I will!"
"I do not understand, my lord."
"I'll allow the faithful to eat butter in Lent, if they will pay a few sols for the privilege. That will raise a good sum."
"Yes, but Lent is six months hence, and the men will be mutilated in twelve days."
"Besides, I want the butter money for the cathedral, which is a shabby building! What a world of woe we live in!"
"Monseigneur, can you not help me? Must seven homes be rendered desolate for lack of a hundred livres?"
"Oh, my head! it will burst! I have no money, but I will do all in my power to assist you. Ogier del' Peyra is a good man, and good men are few. Go to Levi in the Market Place. He is the only man in Sarlat who grows rich in the general impoverishment. He must help you. Tell him that I will guarantee the sum. If he will give you the money, then he shall make me pay a denier every time I light my fire and warm my old bones at it. He can see my chimney from his house, and whenever he notices smoke rise from it, let him come in and demand his denier."
"It will take a hundred years like that to clear off the principal and meet the interest."
The Bishop raised his hands and clasped them despairingly. "I have done my utmost!"
"Then I am to carry the tidings to seven wives that the Church cannot help them?"
"No – no! Try Levi with the butter-money. I did desire to have a beautiful tower to my cathedral, but seven poor homes is better than fine carving, and I will promise him the butter-money. Try him with that – if that fails, then I am helpless. My head! my head! It will never rest till laid in the grave. O sacred Napkins of Cadouin and Cahors! Take care of yourselves and be more indulgent to us miserable creatures, or I will publish a mandment recommending the Napkin of Compiègne, or that of Besançon, and then where will you be?"
CHAPTER VI.
THE JEW
Jean del' Peyra left the Bishop's castle, which stood on rising ground above the town, and was well fortified against attack, and entered the city to find Levi. The Jew lived in the little square before the cathedral.
The Bishop might well say that his episcopal seat was shabby, for the minster was small and rude in structure, a building of the Romanesque period such as delighted the monks to erect, and of which many superb examples exist in Guyenne. The monastic body at Sarlat had not been rich enough or sufficiently skilled in building to give themselves as stately a church as Souillac, Moissac, or Cadouin. It consisted, like nearly every other sacred dwelling of the period, of an oblong domed building, consisting of three squares raised on arches surmounted by Oriental cupolas, with an unfinished tower at the west end. The visitor to Sarlat at the present day will see a cathedral erected a century and more after the date of our story, in a debased but not unpicturesque style.
The Jew was not at home. His wife informed Jean that he had gone to La Roque to gather in a few sols that were owing to him there for money advanced to needy personages, and that she did not expect him home till the morrow. Christians were ready enough to come to her husband for loans, but were very reluctant to pay interest, and it cost Levi much pains and vexation to extract what was his due from those whom he had obliged. Accordingly Jean remounted his horse, and rode over the hills due south, in the direction of the Dordogne.
About halfway between Sarlat and La Roque, at the highest point of the road, where the soil is too thin even to sustain a growth of oak coppice, and produces only juniper, Jean passed a singular congeries of stones; it consisted of several blocks set on end, forming an oblong chamber, and covered by an immense slab, in which were numerous cup-like holes, formed by the weather, or whence lumps of flint had been extracted. It was a prehistoric tomb – a dolmen, and went by the name of the Devil's Table. To the present day, the women coming to the market at Sarlat from La Roque rest on it, and if they put their fish which they have to sell into the cups on the table, are sure of selling them at a good price. Yet such action is not thought to bring a blessing with it, and the money got by the sale of the fish thus placed in the Devil's cups rarely does good to those who receive it. The monument is now in almost total ruin: the supports have been removed or are fallen, but at the time of this tale it was intact.
Jean did not pay it any attention, but rode forwards as hastily as he could on his somewhat fatigued horse.
On reaching the little town of La Roque, Jean was constrained to put up his horse outside the gates. There was not a street in the place along which a horse could go. The inhabitants partook of the nature of goats, they scrambled from one house to another when visiting their neighbours. Only by the river-side was there a level space, and this was occupied by strong walls as a protection against assault from the water.
Jean inquired whether the Jew had been seen, and where, and was told that he had been to several houses, and was now in that of the Tardes. The family of Tarde was one of some consequence in the little place, and had its scutcheon over the door. It was noble – about three other families in the place had the same pretensions, or, to be more exact, right. Jean, without scruple, went to the house of the Tardes and asked for admission, and was at once ushered into the little hall.
The Jew was there along with Jean and Jacques Tarde, and they were counting money. To Del' Peyra's surprise, Noémi was also present and looking on.
Jean del' Peyra gave his name, and asked leave to have a word with the Jew. He stated the circumstances openly. There was no need for concealment. Le Gros Guillem had fallen on Ste. Soure, and after committing the usual depredations, had carried off seven men, and held them to ransom. The sum demanded was a hundred Bergerac livres. Unless that sum was produced immediately, the men would be mutilated – hamstrung.
As Jean spoke, with bitterness welling up in his heart, he looked straight in the eyes of Noémi. She winced, changed colour, but resolved not to show that she felt what was said, and returned Jean's look with equal steadiness.
"And you want the money?" said the Jew. "On what security?"
"The