“Daughters of Eve! your mother did not well: ...
The man was not deceived, nor yet could stand:
He chose to lose for love of her, his throne,—
With her could die, but could not live alone.”
“Daughters of Eve! it was for your dear sake
The world’s first hero died an uncrowned king:
But God’s great pity touched the great mistake
And made his married love a sacred thing;
For yet his nobler sons, if aught be true,
Find the lost Eden in their love of you.”
—Jean Ingelow.
 
For many days Sir Charleroy lay wounded at the house of the Patriarch Harrimai, and she for whom he had periled his life was his constant attendant. He sorely needed her services, and all Gerash, the priest included, conceded the fitness of Rizpah’s rendering the aid she was able to render. The maiden was all willing to minister, and as she ministered her interest in the man deepened. When she began to look up to him as her teacher before the battle with Mamelukes, she began a sort of worship; when she saw him fighting to the death in her behalf, her worship became an engrossing adoration. If there had been any thing more required in order to[183] enlist all the affection of which her being was capable, these opportunities of administering to her suffering lover furnished it. As God loves because He has helped a needy one, so a woman’s heart easily flows out toward the object for whom she has performed pious services. On the other hand, Sir Charleroy was more and more enchanted, for there is life and charm beyond all description to the touch of the queen of a man’s heart when he is in trouble or pain.
 
Rizpah, in woman’s most queenly garb, the one appointed her at her creation, that of “help-mate,” was beautiful indeed, and queenly indeed, to the man whose heart had enthroned her. When alone, they treated each other with the frank, earnest tenderness, fitting as well as natural, to the betrothed. Though they did not admit it even to themselves, they had fully determined to be one, at all peril, in spite of any opposition, reason approving or disapproving. They often said to one another, “Our betrothal taking place at the very gates of death was therefore a very solemn one that nothing on earth can annul.” The sentiment was perfect and very agreeable; and with them a beautiful and agreeable sentiment became as controlling as if it were a revelation from heaven. In this, they were perfectly human. They even persuaded themselves of God’s favor, thanking Him for what they were pleased to call His Providence, namely the peril and long sickness leading to the betrothal and days of love-life together. They were right in conceding that God’s hand was in the battle; but they were impious in interpreting His Providence to be fully in accord with their desires. In this, too, they were very human. But there were shadows about them; for while at times they[184] drifted along on prismatic tides of Lethean delights, there were other times when they remembered that there was to come a day of explanation, with probable following storms. Both were glad and sorry at once, in view of each day’s improvement of the knight’s physical condition. Convalescent, they both realized, meant a great change in their relationship; perhaps a long separation. Their anxiety was deepened by a change in the demeanor of Rizpah’s father. His eyes no longer questioningly followed the young people; but his words, uttered in tones of steelly coldness and very deliberately, bespoke discovery, conviction, conclusion and determination. One sentence often addressed to the lovers, was to them like the rumblings of an approaching, gathering storm. “Our friend is improving, and I’m very glad that he will be able soon to go to his own dear people.” The lovers discerned a peculiar emphasis on the words “I’m glad” and “his own dear people.” The politic priest, having read, as from an open book, the heart-secret of the young people, was awaiting with self-confidence an opportunity to confound them utterly. The crisis came one Sabbath morning, just after the morning meal of the convalescent. Harrimai had paid his usual visit and uttered his steelly sentences. This time the words seemed especially cruel to Rizpah, for she was nervous, indeed ill; the prolonged services and anxieties she had experienced of late were telling on her strength. As Harrimai departed, she gave way to a flood of tears. Rizpah was not wont to weep, nor was Sir Charleroy skilled in comforting; but both he and she were lovers, hence it seemed very natural to her frankly to pillow her head on the knight’s shoulder, and very natural to[185] him to seek to comfort with a tenderness all new to him. Had one asked Rizpah if she were going back to babyishness, or forward toward heaven, she could not have answered. Had one asked the knight if he were becoming motherly, or turning priest, he could not have answered. He felt very tender, and his work of comforting seemed like an act of high piety. Both were glad of the tears which brought the joy of comforting and being comforted, then, there and that way. They were passing into a superb mood when quite unexpectedly to them, but quite expectedly to himself, Harrimai suddenly re-entered the apartment. He expected to surprise them and he did so, thoroughly. The scene following was exciting, dramatic and decisive.
 
Rizpah, with a slight scream, disengaged herself from Sir Charleroy’s embrace, and hid her face in her hands. The eyes of the knight and priest met; neither quailed; both remained for a few moments silent; but their fixed gaze said plainly enough, each to each, “We must have a settlement here and now!” Harrimai spoke first, addressing himself to his daughter: “Young woman, this conduct is immodest and disgraceful! In a Hebrew maiden, heaven defying! I’ll speak to thee further of this presently. Now, begone, and leave me to deal with this man!” Harrimai made arrogant by his profession and the implicit obedience he had been wont to receive from his followers, expected to fill the young people with dismay by the suddenness of his assault. But Rizpah, though young, was no tongue-tied spring, and Sir Charleroy of Gerash was still Sir Charleroy of Acre.
 
The words “dishonorable,” “immodest,” stung the[186] maiden; sullenly, defiantly almost, she settled back in her seat and leaned toward the knight, as if to say, “I cast my lot with this man.” Her eyes plainly, angrily said to the man whom all her life hitherto she had reverently obeyed, “Now do thy worst.” It was impious, passionate, love going headlong from filial duty and religious instruction to the shrine of Astarte. The parent was chagrined at this unexpected repulse, but with his usual adroitness pretending not to notice it, he turned to the knight. “Stranger, this outrage excuses abruptness on my part; who art thou?”
 
Sir Charleroy arose from his hammock, the excitement and shock of the rencounter finishing his recovery, by rousing all the machineries of his system into normal activities.
 
“Sir Priest, I’ve nothing to conceal. I love the truth and this maiden too well to lie—I am a Christian knight.”
 
“I knew it; but thy confession shortens our parley. Now, ‘Christian knight,’ tell me why thou didst attempt to allure to thyself the affections of a mere girl; a Jewish maiden whom thou canst never hope to wed? Dost thou so pay our hospitality; setting at defiance parental authority and our Jewish laws? Dost thou under the favors of this house intrigue to quench all its light?”
 
“Thou brandst that girl and me with the epithet ‘dishonorable;’ and thou a priest! Men of thy holy calling should never slander, especially not their own kin and strangers.” The knight was livid, but not with fear.
 
“Can an Israelite slander Crusaders? these professors of high religion, these followers of an impostor,[187] these enemies of my people, these practicers of intrigues, races, jousts, gluttonies and drunkenness; men whose sole serious business is murderous war? Tell me?”
 
The knight’s face flushed a little, but with complete self-control he replied:
 
“Some of my comrades have been unworthy men, ’tis true; but some Jews have fallen to every crime and violence. Have all fallen? Thou hast not, perhaps! Shall all be maligned for the few? What says Harrimai?”
 
“Thou art of those, who come to thrust us out of our land and thrust in here a hated creed!”
 
“I am of those who live to serve the needy and erring.”
 
“To the proof; I’ve heard from thy clans only of bloodshed.”
 
“Our order sprung up four hundred years ago, under the stirring appeals of religionists as pious and humane as thou; or any of thy kind since Aaron. We were begotten in a time when grim famine made the well-fed wondrous kind. Those hours that make men universally akin.”
 
“Go on; ‘Christian knight,’ I’d like a lesson of that sort.”
 
“Then remember Noah’s covenant of peace. On our banners often we have our spirit expressed by a dove flying toward a tempest-tossed ark; in the messenger’s beak an olive branch; around the whole the bow of promise.”
 
“Well what of all this?”
 
“The ark is the world; the rest is plain.”
 
“Oh, a charming theory,” sarcastically responded Harrimai.
 
[188]
 
“I wear it next my heart;” so saying the knight threw aside his cloak and drew from around his body a banner he had hitherto concealed. “See here, ‘chastity,’ ‘temperance,’ ‘courtesy.’ Our mottoes in peace or war! Women, children and pilgrims, in a word the needy the world around, are the wards of all true Christian knights!”
 
“Mottoes! words! Oh, yes, words! But then the Crusaders have used swords! Their words I’ll meet with words to their confounding, nor while I live will I forget their ............