Red Axe by Samuel Rutherford Crockett (books to read for self improvement TXT) 📕

I came to this place, no--nor my wife neither. She has been dead these ten years, praises to the pyx! Ah, would you?" (The torch threatened to go out, so he held it downward in his hand till the pitch melted and caught again, and meanwhile we stood blinded in the smoke and glare which the strong draught forced in our faces.)
At last came the door, a low, iron-spiked grating, like any other of the hundred we had passed.
"Key-metal is not often weared on this cell," the man chuckled. "Those stay not long above ground that bide here."
The door swung back on its creaking hinges. I slipped the fellow another gold piece.
"I must come in with you," he said; "you might do the wench an ill turn which would cheat the Duke of his show and me of my head to-morrow."
I slipped him another piece of gold, and then three together.
"Risk it, man," I said. "Have I not the Duke's own pass? I will do her no harm."
"Well," he said, "pray remember I am a man with five poor motherless children. My wife died of falling down a flight of steps ten years agone--praise the Lord for His mercies. For He is ever mindful of us, the sinful children of men."
The sound of his voice died away as the door closed. I turned, and was alone with the Beloved. The jailer had stuck the cresset in its niche behind the door, and its glow filled the little cell.
At first I could not see the Little Playmate--only a rough pallet bed and something white at the head of it. But as the cresset burned up more clearly, and my eyes became accustomed to the bleared and streaky light, I saw Helene, my love, kneeling at her bed's head.
I stood still and waited. Was she asleep? Was she--was she dead? I almost hoped that she might be. Then the Duke's vengeance would be balked indeed.
"Helene!" I said, softly, as one speaks to the dying--"Helene, dear, dear Helene!"
Slowly she looked up. Her face dawned on me as one day the face of the blessed angel will shine when he calls me out of purgatory.
"My love--my love!" she said, sweetly, like the first note of a hymn when the choir breathes the sweet music rather than sings it.
Ah, Lord of Innocence, that pure loving face, the purple deepness in the eyes, the flush on the cheek as on that of a little child asleep, the soft curled hair which crisped in the hollow of the neck--the throat itself--Eternal God, that I should be alive to think of the horror!
But time was passing swiftly. The minutes were slipping by like men running for their lives.
I raised Helene from her knees, and she nestled her head on my shoulder.
"You have come to me! I knew you would come. I saw you on the day--the day when they condemned me to die."
I broke into an angry, desperate, protesting cry, so that I heard my own voice ring strangely through that dumb, horrible place. And it was I who sobbed in her arms with my head on her shoulder.
"Hush, dear love," she said, clasping her arms caressingly about my head; "do not fear for me. God will keep your little one. God has told me that He will bring me bravely through. Hush thee, then; do not so, Hugo, great playmate! This I cannot bear. Help me to be good. It will not be long nor painful. Do not weep for your little girl! I think, somehow, it is for our love that I suffer, and that will make it sweet!"
But still I sobbed like a child. For how--how could I tell her?
Presently the power returned slowly to me, seeing her smiling so bravely up at me, and rising on tiptoe to kiss my wet face.
Then I told her all--in what words I hardly remember now.
"Love of mine," I said, "I have but an hour or less to speak with you--and ah! such terrible things, such inconceivable things, to say; a horror to reveal such as never lover had to tell his love before."
She drew one of my hands down and softly patted her breast with it.
"Fear not," she said; "tell it Helene. If it be true that love conquers all, your little lass can bear it!"
"I came," said I, "with purpose to see you, and by treachery (it skills not to ask whose) I was taken at my dead father's bedside."
"Our father dead?" she cried, going a step away to look at me, but coming back again immediately; "then there are but you and me in the world, Hugo!"
"Aye," said I, "but how can I tell you the rest? My father died like a man, and then they took me, still holding the dead in my arms. I was confronted with a fiend of hell in the likeness of Duke Otho."
As I mentioned the Duke's name I could feel her shudder on my neck.
"And--But I cannot tell you what he has bidden me do, under penalties too fearful to conceive or speak of."
She put her hands up, and gently, timidly, lovingly stroked my cheek.
"Dear love, tell me! Tell the Little Playmate!" she said, as simply and sweetly as if she had been coaxing me to whisper to her some lightest childish secret of our plays together in the old Red Tower.
I was silent for a space, and then, spurred by the thought of the swiftly passing time, the words were wrenched out of me.
"He says that I, even I, Hugo Gottfried, my father's son, being now hereditary Red Axe of the Wolfmark, must strike off the head of the one I love. And if I will not, then to the vilest of devils for vilest ends he will deliver her. Ah, God, and he would do it too! I saw the very flame of hell's fire in his eyes."
Then I that write saw a strange appearance on the face that looked up in mine. As on a dark April day, with a lowering sky, you have seen the wind suddenly stir high in the heavens, and the sun look through on the dripping green of the young trees and the gay bourgeoning of the flowers, so, looking on my love's face as she took in my words, there awakened a kind of springtime joy. Nay, wherefore need I say a kind of joy only. It was more. It was great, overleaping, sudden-springing gladness. Her eyes swam in lustrous beauty. She smiled up at me as I had never seen her smile before.
"Oh, I am glad, Hugo--so glad! I love you, Hugo! It will be hard for you, my love. And yet you will be brave and help me. I had far rather die at your hand than live to be the bride of the greatest man in all the world. Do that which will save me from, shame; do it gladly, Hugo. I fear it. I saw it in the eyes of that man Otho von Reuss. But _only_ to die will be easy, with you near by. For I love you, Hugo. And I could just say a prayer, and then--well, and then--Do not cry, Hugo--why, then you would put me to sleep, even as of old you did in the Red Tower!
"Nay, nay, dear love! You must not do so. This is not like my Hugo. See, _I_ do not cry. Do you remember when you took me up and laid me on your bed, and our father came and looked? You said I was your little wife. So I was, even though I denied it, and now I can trust you, my husband. I have never been aught else but your little wife, you see--not in my heart, not in my heart of hearts!
"I have been proud with you, Hugo--spoken unkind things. For love, you know, is like that. It hurts that which it would die for. But now you will know, once for all, that I love you. For death tests all. And you _will_ help me. You will not cry then, Hugo--not then, when we walk, you and I, by the shores of the great sea. You will only send me a little voyage by myself, as you used to make me go to the well in the court-yard, to teach me not to be frightened!
"And then you will be with me when I go. You will watch me; soon, soon you will come after me. Yes, I am glad, Hugo--so glad. For--bend down your ear, Hugo--I will confess. Your little girl is such a coward. She is afraid of the dark. But it will not be dark--and it will not be long, and it will be sure. If my love stand by, I shall not fear. And, after all, it is but a little thing to do for my love, when I love him so."
What I said, or what I did, I know not. But when I came a little to myself, I found my head on my knees, and Helene soothing and petting me, as if I had been a child that had fallen down and hurt itself.
"I would have been a good wife to you, Hugo; I had thought it all out. At first I would have been such an ignorant little house-keeper, and you would have needed--oh, such great patience with me! But so willing, so ready, Hugo! And how I should have listened for your foot! Do you know, I used to know it as it came across the court-yard at Plassenburg. But I could not run and meet you then. I could only slip behind the window-lattice and throw you a kiss. But when I was indeed your wife, how I should have flown to meet you!"
I think I cried out here for very agony.
"Hush, Hugo!" she said. "Hush, lad, and listen. There are stairs up aloft--I saw them in a dream. I saw the angels and the redeemed ascending and descending as I prayed, even when you came in to call me back. I shall ask God to let me wait at the stair-head a little while for you--till it should be time for you to come, my dear, my dear. You would not be very long, and I could wait. I would listen for your feet upon the stair, dear love. And when at last you came, I should know your footfall; yes, I should know it ever so far away. You would not be thinking of me just then. And when you came to the top of the golden stairs, there--there, all so suddenly, would be your little lass, with her arms ready to welcome you!"
The door of the cell creaked open.
The jailer appeared. "It is time!" he said, curtly, and stood waiting. We stood up, and I looked in her eyes. She was smiling, dry-eyed, but I--the water was running down my face.
"You will be brave, Hugo, for my sake. Next to life with you--to die by your dear hand, knowing that you love me, is the best gift they could have given me. They thought to hurt, but instead they have made me so happy. Till we meet again, dear love--till we meet soon again!"
And she accompanied me to the door, and kissed me as I went out, standing smilingly on tiptoe to do it, even as of old she was wont to do in the Red Tower.
And the last thing I saw of her, as the door closed upon the darkness of the cell, was my love standing smiling up at me, her eyes filled with the splendors of the love that casteth out fear.


CHAPTER LI
THE NIGHT BEFORE