XVII
THE ROSE OF THE WORLD
A tumult of applause went up as Rainouart entered the lists, riding a black charger given him by Esclaramonde, and glittering in arms, while his handsome head, still unhelmeted, inclined to right and left in recognition of his greeting. For though Rainouart was too newly come to Athens to be very generally known of the populace, and though report, ever busy with tale-bearing from great places, had whispered something sneering of his bookish ways and his distaste for light ladies, he had endeared himself with the fickle Athenian public by his deeds on the preceding day of the tourney, when he had ridden from victory to victory. At the close of the first day there had been a general assault or mêlée between five-and-twenty Frankish knights, champions chosen by Duke Baldwin, and five-and-twenty of the picked chieftains of the Catalan Grand Company. The struggle was as fierce as brief. It seemed at first as if the Moorish-looking warriors from Spain were destined to gain the day under the angry eyes of Duke Baldwin, but Rainouart's individual deeds of prowess and the gallant manner in which he rallied the French force at the last redeemed the honor of Athens, and forced the Catalans from the field. Duke Baldwin's joy had been unbounded, and he had expressed it as exuberantly as he could to the young man who always listened so gravely when he spoke, and while he listened thought upon his mother's wrongs.
Now the heralds cried the challenge of the Prince of Athens, and as they did so, Rainouart, gripping his horse with limbs of steel, felt as if the brisk wind of battle blowing in his face drove from his senses something of that lethargy under which they had lain supine. His tormenting, denying, mysterious memories troubled him for the moment no more; he was just for that moment a good knight on a good horse, with a good lance in hand ready to do battle with all the world for the sake of a woman. Scarcely did he recall the familiar features of Esclaramonde; in his mind, as in his challenge, he was fighting for the rose of the world, but the rose was the rose of the lovely legend, the unfound flower.
Now knight after knight came forth from his pavilion and mounted his horse to do battle, and knight after knight went down before the conquering lance of young Athens. Guy de Hainault, Jaufre de Brabant, Ambrose of Blois, Gaston of Nîmes, Raymond of Provence, Demetrius of Epirus, and Andronicus Palæologus, each had his own fair lady, star of his life or star of the hour, to tilt for, and each in turn sustained defeat, and Rainouart remained invincible. The populace huzzaed, courtiers applauded demonstratively, Duke Baldwin grinned like a pleased hyena, the ladies of the discomfited tried to smile through tears, and the face of Esclaramonde shone with pride, for she had snared a rare mate. As for Rainouart, he thought not of her; his thoughts were only of the joy of strife and the delight of victory. He was fighting for an ideal; he could not give it name, but it seemed to fill the air with the scent and the color of roses.
Brimmed with the wine of exultation, he waited at his end of the lists after the overthrow of Andronicus Palæologus to see if any other champion would stand against his challenge. There was only one knight left of all the chivalry then in Athens who could hope to contend against him. That knight was Fernand Ximenes, and Rainouart hoped to see him advance. But Fernand Ximenes kept his tent, for he had his own thoughts and purposes concerning the Duchess of Thebes, and he wished to whisper later in her ear that he could not for the life of him challenge her supremacy. So Rainouart waited for a little in his place, a splendid image of steel upon a splendid horse, unquestioned master of the lists. All the spectators, gentle and simple, believed that the day was over, the field fought and won. Rainouart, thinking as they thought, was about to ride forward to receive the wreath of golden violets from the hand of Duke Baldwin when a great shout from the crowd without the barriers, and a murmur that ran along the galleries, stayed his purpose. Then he, with all the rest, became aware of the presence of a new challenger in the lists. A knight in gilded armor, with an acorn for his device, had emerged from a pavilion at the farthest end of the field, and after mounting a white horse which was held in waiting by a burly squire, had ridden slowly to the challenging station. The new-comer's visor was raised, and the spectators beheld a little of a young and beautiful face, very noble in an unfamiliar fairness of feature, of a pale favor delicately colored. But what most won all were the stranger's eyes of lively blue, which made many a woman wish to see her own countenance mirrored in them.
Duke Baldwin leaned forward on his throne in some surprise at the sudden presence; his rugged, bull face flushed with wonder. Count Ernault, after reading the new-comer's shield, whispered to a herald, and the herald proclaimed that the Prince of Eleusis desired to break a lance with the Prince of Athens on the question of his challenge. At this unexpected announcement Esclaramonde, who had bent forward to look at the new-comer and noted how slight he seemed, and youthful, leaned back again with a disdainful smile, though her ready senses quickened at the sight of the youth's beauty. Sympathetic smiles rippled all along the galleries, and many in the crowd beyond laughed derisively, though none that could see the stranger's face denied its marvellous grace. Duke Baldwin called to Count Ernault, who approached his throne.
"Who is this strange knight?" he said. "I have not heard of any Prince of Eleusis."
"Sire," the lord-marshal answered, "this is a young stripling of Greece who claims descent from an ancient Grecian line. For my own part, I know little or nothing of the race which it pleases your grace to rule, yet because he seemed of gentle blood and carried himself so fairly, I saw no reason to deny him a presence in the lists. Your grace, however, who, knowing all things, doubtless knows intimately the genealogy of every Greek his vassal, will be able to set me right if I have erred in this instance, but for myself I thought it better to stretch a point rather than perchance in denying to attain undoubted gentility."
Duke Baldwin frowned. His son was thus far the victor; the Lady Esclaramonde thus far proclaimed peerless. One never could tell what might come of an unexpected challenge. Yet Duke Baldwin, who, in spite of the omniscience attributed to him by his flattering marshal, was well aware in his heart that he knew nothing whatever about the people whom he held subject by an iron hand, was very unwilling to infringe courteous chivalry in the case of one who might be a gentleman of old descent. So with the ferocious distortion of countenance which was Duke Baldwin's conception of a smile, he approved the lord-marshal's action.
"It were shame," he declared, "if ever noble gentleman were denied to ride in lists opened by me. But here I think decision must rest with our son. If he elect to meet this stranger knight, your Prince of Eleusis has our willing leave to joust in this tourney. But tell our son that as he has fought to-day only with knights of known lineage and bearings, he is free if it please him to deny this Grecian, and to remain the unquestioned victor of the day."
The lord-marshal hastened to where Rainouart waited, and made him aware of the conditions under which a new player had come into the game, and of Duke Baldwin's decision in the matter. Rainouart answered instantly that he was in no way breathed or weakened by what had gone, that it would be strange, indeed, for him to deny any challenger, and that he would take the stranger's word for his gentility. Straightway Count Ernault sped to where Argathona waited, mounted on her white horse, and, after acquainting her with the cause of the delay, made her free of the duke's permission to tilt.
Nobody in all that vast concourse had watched these parleyings with more interest than the Duchess Esclaramonde of Thebes. Her heart had been dancing all manner of joyous measures at the success of her betrothed. As knight after knight went down before Rainouart, her eyes brightened and her spirits sang, for all was in her honor, and she knew, rejoicing in her knowledge, that every woman present envied her. The sudden apparition of an unexpected challenger could not affect her triumph. The cavalier who had so triumphantly overcome seven of the gallantest knights in Duke Baldwin's gallant court was scarcely like to have his supremacy menaced by a stripling of Greece. Yet in spite of herself, this apparition of this unexpected challenger, unknown to her, unknown to Athens, unknown to Athens's duke, seemed mysteriously to threaten her confidence, and her cheek burned with anger against the fair-faced stranger as she watched the preliminaries of the combat.
The trumpets sounded, and instantly the opposing knights rushed one against the other, swift as warring winds. In full centre of the tilt-yard the white horse and the black horse came wellnigh head to head. Rainouart's spear was aimed a thought too high as it seemed, and slid over the shoulder of his opponent while the lance of Eleusis struck fair and square at the breast-plate of the Athenian prince, and the next moment the black horse was sweeping riderless down the lists, and Duke Baldwin's son was lying on the grass. While a great groan came from all beholders at this fall, the Knight of Eleusis, galloping to the end of the lists, turned at the barrier and rode back again to draw rein with visor exalted in front of the royal pavilion.
When Duke Baldwin saw his son fall, he gripped his sceptre in both hands so fiercely that it bent in his fingers as if it had been a waxen candle, and his whole soul groaned in travail because he could think of no oath horrible enough with which to express his mortification. Esclaramonde for her part hid her burning face behind her fan and dreamed incredible tortures for the victor. However, there was nothing for it but acceptance of the result of the combat, and, while assiduous squires helped the fallen prince to his feet, Duke Baldwin took from the cushion held by a page at his side the golden wreath, and extended it to the Knight of Eleusis, who received it on the point of the lance. Hardly articulate, Duke Baldwin gasped out that the wreath was the victor's, and that his was the privilege to crown whom so he pleased in that presence queen of the day. Immediately the stranger, shifting a little in the saddle, extended the lance dexterously poised so that the golden wreath swung just in front of the face of Esclaramonde. A little sob of joy came from the duchess's lips.
"Why, this is better than best," she murmured, and with something almost too eager in her action she caught at the golden wreath and placed it on her head, while the whole arena now rang with applause at the chivalrous act of the victor. The moment the duchess had taken the wreath, Argathona turned her horse's head in the direction of her pavilion. Duke Baldwin rose in a towering fury from his throne. "This comes of the reading of books," he muttered to himself, and, quitting the gallery, he entered the lists to make inquiry as to the condition of his fallen son.
Argathona, slowly riding down the field on her white horse, was yet some distance from her pavilion, when a page, running breathlessly to her side, informed her that the lord-marshal desired speech with her. Immediately reining her horse, Argathona turned round and advanced to meet Count Ernault, who told her that the Duchess Esclaramonde earnestly entreated the favor of some speech with the victor who had crowned her queen of beauty.