The Return of Fursey Page 10

  On the little stretch of grass before the great church the Master of Novices walked up and down, giving his pupils the most excellent moral precepts. A final touch of innocence was added to the peaceful scene by three or four rabbits, who sported on the sward at the foot of one of the round towers.

  Brother Patrick, the most diminutive laybrother in the settlement, had been sent to collect watercress in a moist ditch some distance from the monastery. He had nearly filled his bucket when the sound of running footsteps made him raise his head. To his great horror and affrightment he beheld a small man in armour and wearing the horned helmet of a Viking, scuttling down the hillside straight towards him. The stranger held a weighty battleaxe with both hands over one shoulder. Even as Brother Patrick stared at him, the long sword which the Viking wore caught between his legs and he pitched headlong. But he was on his feet again in a moment and burst through the hedge to where Brother Patrick was scrambling madly to escape.

  “Don’t you know me?” gasped the Norseman. “I’m Fursey.”

  Brother Patrick paused neither for thought nor for discussion, but, seizing his bucket, he brought it down with all his force on the Viking’s head, driving the latter’s helmet well down below his nose. Then he turned and bolted madly back towards the monastery, raising the echoes from the surrounding hills with cries of “The Danes! The Danes!”

  The monks working in the fields heard his cries and looking up beheld an unmistakable Viking on the hillside running around in circles as he sought with both hands to wrench his helmet from over his eyes. With one accord they turned and fled towards the monastery. The Master of Novices at once assumed command. By his direction the gold plate and ornaments and the most precious manuscripts were conveyed into the stronger of the round towers. The monks were fortunate in having time to convey into this refuge nearly everything portable which was of value. The round towers were permanently equipped with the means of defence, so that nought remained to do but quieten the affrighted community and allot each one his task. From the narrow windows the monks watched with horror the long dragonship come creeping around the bend of the river and touch the grassy edge below the monastery. Immediately a horde of fierce warriors swarmed ashore and made uphill towards the settlement. Simultaneously a line of Vikings came into sight on the hillside to the south and ran towards the monastery brandishing battleaxes and emitting shrill and terrible cries. A sudden shout of anguish came from both round towers: “Father Crustaceous!”

  He came doddering around the corner of the farm buildings, where he had been inspecting the beehives. He paused and looked about him, evidently astonished at finding the settlement deserted. Then he heard fifty voices shouting his name, and, raising his head, he suddenly saw the Norsemen closing in on the settlement. Then started an amazing race for safety. Father Crustaceous, sucking hard at his naked gums, made what speed he could with his two sticks. He had not hobbled as quickly for twenty years, and the effort nearly killed him. His face was covered with sweat as he reached the nearest round tower, and willing hands dragged him up the ladder to safety. The ladder was withdrawn and the door slammed as the first Vikings hacked their way through the palisade.

  Meanwhile the hapless Fursey had succeeded in wrenching his helmet from over his eyes. The first thing he beheld was a horde of savage warriors rushing by him with uplifted weapons and hideous cries. Fursey immediately joined them, as he thought that it was the safest thing to do. When he reached the settlement he ran around several buildings waving his battleaxe in the hope of convincing his companions that he was intent on the destruction of the entire community and would not be satisfied with less. At last he paused out of breath at the door of the poultry house. There was no sign of Snorro, but at that moment Sigurd the Skull Splitter came running around the corner. It was borne in powerfully upon Fursey that it was expedient for him to show himself a man of ferocious and bloodthirsty disposition, so he kicked in the door of the poultry house and started laying about him with his battleaxe in all directions. Sigurd dashed in after him. They were immediately involved in a chaos of flying wings and indignant screeching and cackling.

  “Curse of Thor on you!” snarled Sigurd as he strove to remove a desperately struggling cockerel from beneath his corselet. “I thought you were leading me into the treasury.”

  Fursey was too frightened to reply, but wielded his battleaxe all the more formidably to demonstrate his courage. The entire population of birds made their escape through the open door except for one hen, who hadn’t enough intelligence to consult her own safety. The unhappy fowl thought that her last hour had come, and fluttered from one corner to another squawking desperately.

  Meanwhile the ill-humour of the Norsemen was growing. They were finding nothing of value in the churches or cells, and they ran with torches hither and thither setting fire to the thatched roofs of the settlement. From one of the round towers Father Sampson hurled opprobrious epithets at them. Sampson was a man of warm temper, who had been a professional wrestler before his entry into the cloister. His muscles knotted and unknotted as he beheld the senseless destruction on all sides of him. At last when he saw a torch being applied to the roof of the monastery brewery, he could contain himself no longer. He emitted a howl of anguish and, tearing open the door of the round tower, sprang down the fourteen feet to the ground. The high cross over the grave of King Flann stood to hand. He wrenched it from its foundations and rushing at the nearest Viking, who happened to be Snorro, he discharged his ill-humour upon him by hitting him with it over the head. Sampson was a powerful man, and the high cross was a formidable weapon. Snorro was immediately telescoped. The upper half of his body disappeared from view altogether, and the remarkable sight was witnessed of a pair of legs running around by themselves for a few moments before they collapsed. Several Vikings closed on Father Sampson, seeking with their battleaxes to hew asunder his backbone, but so politic was he in his defence, and he laid about their shoulders, ribs and other appurtenances to such good effect that the senses and vital spirits of many of them ceased to perform their usual offices. At last Sampson heeded the urgent commands of the Novice Master and returned to the round tower. The ladder was quickly lowered and he was dragged to safety.

  Sigurd was more angry than he had ever been in his life; and, rallying his men, he ordered an assault on the round tower. The Norsemen clambered on each other’s shoulders so as to reach the door fourteen feet above the ground. No sooner had the two warriors on top begun to attack the wooden door with their battleaxes than thick streams of blazing fat and pitch descended from the narrow windows, followed by a shower of stones. The Vikings fled screaming. Father Crustaceous’ head appeared in an upper window, his face wreathed in a beatific, if toothless, smile. Sigurd retreated black-browed and counted his casualties. Half-a-dozen of his hardiest warriors sat round on the grass suffering from scalp wounds and shock, while three others lay wallowing in their death agonies, imploring someone to take a last message home to their mothers. Six other forms lay prone and still. A pair of legs leaning against the wall was all that was left of Snorro. The skald was sitting upon a piece of timber sorrowfully composing a poem about the adventure. Father Sampson, who had an eye for strategy, now began to direct a fusilade of stones at the beehives beyond the farmyard wall. A few moments later an angry swarm descended upon the Norsemen and, before they knew what was happening, myriads were inside their corselets and greaves. But what finally broke their morale was the sudden appearance of a small, swarthy creature in the doorway of the library. The Censor, in the dark depths within, had been quite unaware of what was happening outside. He had been hot on the track of an improper innuendo and had been chasing it from page to page, never for a moment losing the scent, until he had finally trapped it at the end of the chapter disguised as a moral platitude. With a sigh of satisfaction he closed the tome and placed it carefully in the fire. Then he noticed that the library was empty, and that from outside came the acrid smell of smoke and the crackling of flames
. He walked to the door and beheld with surprise that the greater part of the settlement was on fire.

  The Vikings were already sufficiently shaken by their grim experiences, but when a little, dark creature with a twitching nose and a permanent smile on its face suddenly manifested itself in the midst of the smoke they were gripped by a sudden fear. They knew that monks were powerful magicians in their own way, and when they beheld the sub-human visage and the two eyes rolling at them independently of one another, they did not for a moment doubt but that they were confronted by a hard-featured demon of the trickier sort. Sigurd, realising that his men were on the point of taking to flight, spoke first.

  “It’s been a dismal catastrophe,” he said. “Our fortunes are confounded. Suspend your sorrows, my men, and return to the ship.”

  They picked up their wounded and their dead, and retired slowly to the river, pursued by catcalls and hoots from the defenders of the round towers. The Censor, being a man of quick understanding, only delayed to cast one glance at the raging fires which threatened the whole settlement; then he returned and set fire to the library. He emerged a few moments later, his permanent smile a little broader than usual as he prepared a speech of sympathy for delivery to the Librarian.

  Meanwhile Fursey, peering round the door of the poultry house, watched the Norsemen slowly and sternly making their way towards the river. He told himself that it was high time that he too departed, but in the opposite direction. He knew that he would get short shrift if he fell into the hands of either party; so creeping from his refuge he quickly slipped through a gap in the burning palisade and was soon scampering up the hillside towards the shelter of the trees. At first he was of a mind to shed his incriminating armour and weapons, and proceed on his way in the homely russet which he wore underneath; but remembering that the countryside was greatly annoyed by wild beasts, he deemed it wiser to retain his fighting kit and only rid himself of the long sword, which was more of an encumbrance than anything else. He doubted his ability to wield the heavy battleaxe to any effect, but its possession gave him confidence. His objective, The Gap in the Knockmealdown Mountains, was twenty miles beyond Cashel; and he knew Cashel to be at least three days’ journey on foot. He was afraid to take to the road, but as long as daylight lasted he kept it in sight, carefully skirting the scattered clumps of sally trees which grew along the edges of the swamps. As he made his way over the uneven ground, he reflected how difficult it was to live a life of iniquity. His first act on landing on his native soil had been a good one—he had saved Clonmacnoise from spoliation and its inhabitants from slaughter.

  His reflections were interrupted by a sight which concerned him far more immediately. He had come upon a heap of gnawed bones, the souvenirs of some late lamented person. Fursey turned and made straight for the road. It was the hour of sunset, and he knew that with the onset of darkness there would be little danger of meeting individual wayfarers. He realised, of course, that he was not altogether safe on the road either. It was not unusual to espy by the roadside a speckled wolf gnawing the mangled joints of some traveller; still he felt it was safer to be on the road than in the vicinity of trees, from the overhanging branches of which a wildcat might at any moment spring and tear the scalp off him. With the imminent approach of night his fears increased. The countryside through which the thin road wound seemed to him to be of a very dubious character. It was littered with great rocks and occasional trees, and on each side there was the incessant trickling of water. He had no doubt but that the neighbourhood abounded fearfully in wolves, otters, badgers, kites and eagles. As the last glimmer faded from the sky in the west a lonely howling in the distance sounded dismally on his ears. He saw in his mind’s eye some accursed spot in which stood a magician summoning the dead to converse with him, and he remembered, too, that the distress of dogs or wolves at nightfall indicated the proximity of vampires. He looked anxiously around for signs of local fog, which he knew to be a sure sign of their presence. He saw nothing however but the deepening shadows between the trees. As the distant howling rose to a most lamentable, mournful note, he tried to persuade himself that it was no more than the obscene caterwauling of some lonely cat avid for the company of its kind. When he came to a place where the trees overhung the road, creating an inky blackness ahead, he stopped, his heart hammering with fright. He knew that in such spots one might well encounter anything. He nerved himself to go on. Beneath the trees the air was greasy. He fixed his eyes on the dark blue patch of sky in the far distance beyond the trees and began to run, fully expecting that before he reached it he would find a tomb in the bowels of some unfriendly beast. But he passed safely from beneath the trees and relaxed into a quick walk, breathing heavily as he stumbled over the loose stones on the uneven track. And so hour followed hour while he forced himself onwards, his way lit only by the indifferent stars.

  When the moon came sidling into the sky from behind the far-off hills it shed its light fitfully, obscured from time to time by shredded cloud. With the increased light, Fursey’s fear of wild beasts lessened, for he could see further in every direction. He made up his mind that if he saw a pair of yellow eyes looking at him, he would run for the nearest tree. He assured himself that if he could succeed in clambering up in time he would be able with his battleaxe to keep at bay any wildcats which he might encounter in the foliage. Every few minutes he glanced fearfully over his shoulder to assure himself that nothing was stalking him from behind. But if the opaque moonlight, softening the outlines of rock and tree, had lessened his fear of wolves, it served to increase his dread of the possible materialisation of some unsavoury citizen of the spirit world. He heard the bell of a distant church sorrowfully striking the hour of midnight, and he knew that between the hours of twelve and one in the night, in ghostly moonlight on a lonely road, one is apt to encounter presences that are dangerous. He distrusted the empty wind, which made no sound in the trees, but which he could feel from time to time against his face. He turned a corner and came to a stretch of vacant road along which the trees were spaced like soldiers. He experienced a sudden fright as he saw a few yards from him a raven perched on a gatepost. It cocked its glossy head and looked at him wickedly. Fursey passed by trembling and entered the avenue of trees. The shadows lay in grey bars across the road. He became conscious of a fluttering movement in the air above him. He stopped and glanced up. Innumerable bats were fluttering up and down between the trees. As Fursey watched, one of them, larger than the others, fluttered down and, alighting on the road ten paces ahead of him, resolved itself into a gentleman wrapped in a black cloak.

  Fursey’s heart stopped beating altogether, then it tried to jump out through his throat. He was conscious of a wave of dizziness; but it passed at once, and he found himself clutching his battleaxe with trembling hands as he and the vampire gazed across at one another.

  “It’s really a beautiful night,” said the vampire at last.

  Fursey opened his mouth and with his tongue, which felt like a piece of wood, tried to moisten his parched lips.

  “Is it?” he gasped.

  “You have nothing to fear from me,” said the vampire persuasively. “Don’t you know that my kind are only dangerous to humans in a state of insensibility, either through sleep or fright? You never heard of a vampire so ill-bred as to seek to achieve his purpose by violence?”

  Fursey gathered together his quivering wits and told himself, as from a long way off, that this was true. Nevertheless he tightened his grip on the battleaxe. He knew well that, being unaccustomed to the use of the weapon, a sudden cut at the vampire if it approached him would probably only result in his hewing off one of his own legs, with no inconvenience to the phantom whatever. All the same, possession of the weapon seemed to give him courage.

  “In any case,” continued the stranger, “I am replete as I have just come from visiting a plump archdeacon.” The vampire smiled slightly. “An estimable man. He is just beginning to realise that he is suffering from anaemia, but he wil
l last another couple of weeks. I may add,” he continued somewhat stiffly, “in case you still doubt me, that I am not one who ravens promiscuously about the countryside. I select good class clients, and I stick to them.”

  “I’m not doubting your word, sir,” said Fursey.

  “In that case,” replied the vampire, “you will have no objection to my joining you. Our ways seem to lie in the same direction. I reside some miles from here in a churchyard adjacent to the road, and there is nothing I enjoy as much as a walk on a fragrant night such as this with an intelligent companion. Now that my night’s work is done I feel that I can allow myself that little relaxation.”

  Fursey could see no way out of his predicament. The last thing that he wanted to do was to offend the sallow stranger. While he found it hard to believe that a vampire’s purposes could be other than malevolent, the gentleman’s account of his call on the archdeacon seemed plausible enough; and while Fursey felt that he could not approve of such dissolute conduct, he was glad that the vampire had already paid a visit that night. His only alternative seemed to be to retrace his steps along the road which he had come, and that was out of the question. He threw a quick look at the visage, gaunt, pale and bewrinkled, in the hope of reading there whether or not the vampire had it in his mind to do him a mischief. He observed that the stranger, for all his pale looks, was very iron-visaged, a fact which impressed Fursey very painfully. He felt that if the vampire had set his mind on a walk with an intelligent companion, it would be the height of unwisdom to deny him.