Ivanhoe Walter Scott (best desktop ebook reader .TXT) 📖

is time thou shouldst leave us, Sir Maurice,” said the Templar to De Bracy, “in order to prepare the second part of thy mystery. Thou art next, thou knowest, to act the Knight Deliverer.”

“I have thought better of it,” said De Bracy; “I will not leave thee till the prize is fairly deposited in Front-de-Boeuf’s castle. There will I appear before the Lady Rowena in mine own shape, and trust that she will set down to the vehemence of my passion the violence of which I have been guilty.”

“And what has made thee change thy plan, De Bracy?” replied the Knight Templar.

“That concerns thee nothing,” answered his companion.

“I would hope, however, Sir Knight,” said the Templar, “that this alteration of measures arises from no suspicion of my honourable meaning, such as Fitzurse endeavoured to instil into thee?”

“My thoughts are my own,” answered De Bracy; “the fiend laughs, they say, when one thief robs another; and we know, that were he to spit fire and brimstone instead, it would never prevent a Templar from following his bent.”

“Or the leader of a Free Company,” answered the Templar, “from dreading at the hands of a comrade and friend, the injustice he does to all mankind.”

“This is unprofitable and perilous recrimination,” answered De Bracy; “suffice it to say, I know the morals of the Temple-Order, and I will not give thee the power of cheating me out of the fair prey for which I have run such risks.”

“Psha,” replied the Templar, “what hast thou to fear?⁠—Thou knowest the vows of our order.”

“Right well,” said De Bracy, “and also how they are kept. Come, Sir Templar, the laws of gallantry have a liberal interpretation in Palestine, and this is a case in which I will trust nothing to your conscience.”

“Hear the truth, then,” said the Templar; “I care not for your blue-eyed beauty. There is in that train one who will make me a better mate.”

“What! wouldst thou stoop to the waiting damsel?” said De Bracy.

“No, Sir Knight,” said the Templar, haughtily. “To the waiting-woman will I not stoop. I have a prize among the captives as lovely as thine own.”

“By the mass, thou meanest the fair Jewess!” said De Bracy.

“And if I do,” said Bois-Guilbert, “who shall gainsay me?”

“No one that I know,” said De Bracy, “unless it be your vow of celibacy, or a check of conscience for an intrigue with a Jewess.”

“For my vow,” said the Templar, “our Grand Master hath granted me a dispensation. And for my conscience, a man that has slain three hundred Saracens, need not reckon up every little failing, like a village girl at her first confession upon Good Friday eve.”

“Thou knowest best thine own privileges,” said De Bracy. “Yet, I would have sworn thy thought had been more on the old usurer’s money bags, than on the black eyes of the daughter.”

“I can admire both,” answered the Templar; “besides, the old Jew is but half-prize. I must share his spoils with Front-de-Boeuf, who will not lend us the use of his castle for nothing. I must have something that I can term exclusively my own by this foray of ours, and I have fixed on the lovely Jewess as my peculiar prize. But, now thou knowest my drift, thou wilt resume thine own original plan, wilt thou not?⁠—Thou hast nothing, thou seest, to fear from my interference.”

“No,” replied De Bracy, “I will remain beside my prize. What thou sayst is passing true, but I like not the privileges acquired by the dispensation of the Grand Master, and the merit acquired by the slaughter of three hundred Saracens. You have too good a right to a free pardon, to render you very scrupulous about peccadilloes.”

While this dialogue was proceeding, Cedric was endeavouring to wring out of those who guarded him an avowal of their character and purpose. “You should be Englishmen,” said he; “and yet, sacred Heaven! you prey upon your countrymen as if you were very Normans. You should be my neighbours, and, if so, my friends; for which of my English neighbours have reason to be otherwise? I tell ye, yeomen, that even those among ye who have been branded with outlawry have had from me protection; for I have pitied their miseries, and curst the oppression of their tyrannic nobles. What, then, would you have of me? or in what can this violence serve ye?⁠—Ye are worse than brute beasts in your actions, and will you imitate them in their very dumbness?”

It was in vain that Cedric expostulated with his guards, who had too many good reasons for their silence to be induced to break it either by his wrath or his expostulations. They continued to hurry him along, travelling at a very rapid rate, until, at the end of an avenue of huge trees, arose Torquilstone, now the hoary and ancient castle of Reginald Front-de-Boeuf. It was a fortress of no great size, consisting of a donjon, or large and high square tower, surrounded by buildings of inferior height, which were encircled by an inner courtyard. Around the exterior wall was a deep moat, supplied with water from a neighbouring rivulet. Front-de-Boeuf, whose character placed him often at feud with his enemies, had made considerable additions to the strength of his castle, by building towers upon the outward wall, so as to flank it at every angle. The access, as usual in castles of the period, lay through an arched barbican, or outwork, which was terminated and defended by a small turret at each corner.

Cedric no sooner saw the turrets of Front-de-Boeuf’s castle raise their grey and moss-grown battlements, glimmering in the morning sun above the wood by which they were surrounded, than he instantly augured more truly concerning the cause of his misfortune.

“I did injustice,” he said, “to the thieves and outlaws of these woods, when I supposed such banditti to belong to their bands; I might as justly have confounded the foxes of these brakes with the ravening wolves