God Wills It!: A Tale of the First Crusade

High noon in Italy. Without, a hot sun, a blue bay, a slow sea-breeze; within, a vaulted chamber, bare stone walls, a few blazoned pennons upon the pillars, here and there pictured tapestries, where one might see many a merry tourney and passage-at-arms. Very gentle were the footfalls, though the room was not empty: the whispers were so low that the droning buzz of a bee, which had stolen in at the narrow window, sounded loud as a mill wheel. There were a score of persons in the chamber: tonsured priests in white stoles, and monks in black cassocks; knights in silvered hauberks; a white-robed Moor with the eyes of a falcon and the teeth of a cat; and a young lad, Richard, son of Sir William the castellan, a shy boy of twelve, who sat upon the stone window seat, blinking his great eyes and wondering what it all might mean. No eye rested on the lad: the company had thought only for one object,—a figure that turned wearily on the velvet pillows, half raised itself, sank once more. Then came a thin voice, gentle as a woman's:—

"Abd Rahman, come: feel my wrist, and do not fear to speak the truth."

The Moor at the foot of the bed rose from the rushes whereon he had been squatting; stole noiselessly to the sick man's side. From the arch of the vault above dangled a silver ball. The Moor smote the ball, and with his eye counted the slow vibrations while his hand held the wrist. Even the vagrant bee stopped humming while the sphere swung to and fro for a long minute. Then without a word Abd Rahman crept to a low table where a lamp was heating a silver vial, and on which other vials and spoons were lying. He turned the warm red elixir into a spoon, and brought it to the dying man. There was a rush of color to the pallid cheeks, with a striving to rise from the pillow; but the Moor again held his wrist.