Climate speedily did its work with the lady, warfare with two of her sons, and there only remained of the family a youth of seventeen, Walter, and his sister Mabel, fourteen, who was already betrothed to the young Baron of Courtwood, then about to return to England. The treaty with Stephen and the success of young Henry of Anjou gave Sir William hopes of restitution; but just as he was about to conduct her to Jerusalem for the wedding, before going back to England, he fell sick of one of the recurring fevers of the country; and almost at the same time the castle was beleaguered by a troop of Arabs, under the command of a much-dreaded Sheik.
His constitution was already much shaken, and Sir William, after a few days of alternate torpor and delirium, passed away, without having been conscious enough to leave any counsel to his children, or any directions to Father Philip, the chaplain, or Sigbert, his English squire.
At the moment, sorrow was not disturbed by any great alarm, for the castle was well victualled, and had a good well, supplied by springs from the mountains; and Father Philip, after performing the funeral rites for his lord, undertook to make his way to Tiberias, or to Jerusalem, with tidings of their need; and it was fully anticipated that succour would arrive long before the stores in the castle had been exhausted.
But time went on, and, though food was not absolutely lacking, the spring of water which had hitherto supplied the garrison began to fail. Whether through summer heats, or whether the wily enemy had succeeded in cutting off the source, where once there had been a clear crystal pool in the rock, cold as the snow from which it came, there only dribbled a few scanty drops, caught with difficulty, and only imbibed from utter necessity, so great was the suspicion of their being poisoned by the enemy.
The wine was entirely gone, and the salted provision, which alone remained, made the misery of thirst almost unbearable.
On the cushions, richly embroidered in dainty Eastern colouring, lay Mabel de Hundberg, with dry lips half opened and panting, too weary to move, yet listening all intent.
Another moment, and in chamois leather coat, his helmet in hand, entered her brother from the turret stair, and threw himself down hopelessly, answering her gesture.
'No, no, of course no. The dust was only from another swarm of those hateful Saracens. I knew it would be so. Pah! it has made my tongue more like old boot leather than ever. Have no more drops been squeezed from the well? It's time the cup was filled!'
'It was Roger's turn. Sigbert said he should have the next,' said Mabel.
Walter uttered an imprecation upon Roger, and a still stronger one on Sigbert's meddling. But instantly the cry was, 'Where is Sigbert?'
Walter even took the trouble to shout up and down the stair for Sigbert, and to demand hotly of the weary, dejected men-at-arms where Sigbert was; but no one could tell.
'Gone over to the enemy, the old traitor,' said Walter, again dropping on the divan.
'Never! Sigbert is no traitor,' returned his sister.
'He is an English churl, and all churls are traitors,' responded Walter.
The old nurse, who was fitfully fanning Mabel with a dried palm-leaf, made a growl of utter dissent, and Mabel exclaimed, 'None was ever so faithful as good old Sigbert.'
It was a promising quarrel, but their lips were too dry to keep it up for more than a snarl or two. Walter cast himself down, and bade old Tata fan him; why should Mabel have it all to herself?
Then sounds of wrangling were heard below, and Walter roused himself to go down and interfere. The men were disputing over some miserable dregs of wine at the bottom of a skin. Walter shouted to call them to order, but they paid little heed.
'Do not meddle and make, young sir,' said a low-browed, swarthy fellow. 'There's plenty of cool drink of the right sort out there.'
'Traitor!' cried Walter; 'better die than yield.'
'If one have no mind for dying like an old crab in a rock,' said the man.
'They would think nought of making an end of us out there,' said another.
'I'd as lief be choked at once by a cord as by thirst,' was the answer.
'That you are like to be, if you talk such treason,' threatened Walter. 'Seize him, Richard-Martin.'
Richard and Martin, however, hung back, one muttering that Gil had done nothing, and the other that he might be in the right of it; and when Walter burst out in angry threats he was answered in a gruff voice that he had better take care what he said, 'There was no standing not only wasting with thirst and hunger, but besides being blustered at by a hot-headed lad, that scarce knew a hauberk from a helmet.'
Walter, in his rage, threw himself with drawn sword on the mutineer, but was seized and dragged back by half a dozen stalwart arms, such as he had no power to resist, and he was held fast amid rude laughs and brutal questions whether he should thus be carried to the Saracens, and his sister with him.
'The old Sheik would give a round sum for a fair young damsel like her!' were the words that maddened her brother into a desperate struggle, baffled with a hoarse laugh by the men-at-arms, who were keeping him down, hand and foot, when a new voice sounded: 'How now, fellows! What's this?'
In one moment Walter was released and on his feet, and the men fell back, ashamed and gloomy, as a sturdy figure, with sun-browned face, light locks worn away by the helmet, and slightly grizzled, stood among them, in a much-rubbed and soiled chamois leather garment.
Walter broke out into passionate exclamations; the men, evidently ashamed, met them with murmurs and growls. 'Bad enough, bad enough!' broke in Sigbert; 'but there's no need to make it worse. Better to waste with hunger and thirst than be a nidering fellow-rising against your lord in his distress.'
'We would never have done it if he would have kept a civil tongue.'
'Civility's hard to a tongue dried up,' returned Sigbert. 'But look you here, comrades, leave me a word with my young lord here, and I plight my faith that you shall have enow to quench your thirst within six hours at the least.'
There was an attempt at a cheer, broken by the murmur, 'We have heard enough of that! It is always six hours and six hours.'
'And the Saracen hounds outside would at least give us a draught of water ere they made away with us,' said another.
'Saracens, forsooth!' said Sigbert. 'You shall leave the Saracens far behind you. A few words first with my lord, and you shall hear. Meanwhile, you, John Cook, take all the beef remaining; make it in small fardels, such as a man may easily carry.'
'That's soon done,' muttered the cook. 'The entire weight would scarce bow a lad's shoulders.'
'The rest of you put together what you would save from the enemy, and is not too heavy to carry.' One man made some attempt at growling at a mere lad being consulted, while the stout warriors were kept in ignorance; but the spirit of discipline and confidence had returned with Sigbert, and no one heeded the murmur. Meantime, Sigbert followed the young Lord Walter up the rough winding stairs to the chamber where Mabel lay on her cushions. 'What! what!' demanded the boy, pausing to enter. Sigbert, by way of answer, quietly produced from some hidden pouch two figs. Walter snatched at one with a cry of joy. Mabel held out her hand, then, with a gasp, drew it back. 'Has Roger had one?'
Sigbert signed in the affirmative, and Mabel took a bite of the luscious fruit with a gasp of pleasure, yet paused once more to hold the remainder to her nurse.
'The Saints bless you, my sweet lamb!' exclaimed the old woman; 'finish it yourself. I could not.'
'If you don't want it, give it to me,' put in Walter.
'For shame, my lord,' Sigbert did not scruple to say, nor could the thirsty girl help finishing the refreshing morsel, while Walter, with some scanty murmur of excuse, demanded where it came from, and what Sigbert had meant by promises of safety.
'Sir,' said Sigbert, 'you may remember how some time back your honoured father threw one of the fellaheen into the dungeon for maiming old Leo.'
'The villain! I remember. I thought he was hanged.'
'No, sir. He escaped. I went to take him food, and he was gone! I then found an opening in the vault, of which I spoke to none, save your father, for fear of mischief; but I built it up with stones. Now, in our extremity, I bethought me of it, and resolved to try whether the prisoner had truly escaped, for where he went, we might go. Long and darksome is the way underground, but it opens at last through one of the old burial-places of the Jews into the thickets upon the bank of the Jordan.'
