Part 50

Faustina chuckled maliciously.

"If she be a witch, it will take a deal of fire to frighten the devil out of her."

Soft-haired, soft-eyed Yolande gave a little, delicate shiver, for she was sensitive and fastidious.

"I hope she will not make a great noise," she said.

Faustina reassured her.

"I do not think so; they say the smoke will soon choke her."

Yolande gave a sigh of relief and settled herself down for entertainment. Over in the royal enclosure the archbishop of Syracuse turned with an obeisance to the image of the King.

"Shall we begin, sire?" he asked, and the seeming King answered him.

"Is all ready?"

"All, sire," the archbishop answered.

"Let them begin," the royal figure commanded. The archbishop bent to where Sigurd Olafson stood, below the royal enclosure.

"The King waits," he said. Sigurd instantly gave the order for the prisoner to be brought forth. There was a brief pause, then a new flourish of trumpets, and from the dark archway, that yawned like a wolf's mouth in the side of the amphitheatre, Perpetua was brought in, chained and guarded, and led in front of the royal throne. "She looked very pale," wrote an old Norman chronicler, "and very fair, and as brave as a sainted martyr."

The archbishop of Syracuse rose and addressed her.

"Woman, you are charged by the King's sainted majesty with working by witchcraft against his sovereign person, delivering him to his lips enchantment in a draught of seeming water, to the hurt of his body and the peril of his soul. If you are guilty and will confess yourself, we need not waste some precious moments in a vain contest for your sinful flesh."

Perpetua answered very quietly and very clearly, and all men in Syracuse heard what she had to say that day.

"I am not guilty. My soul is as clean of sin as on the day my mother gave me birth. I pray Heaven's forgiveness for the King."

The archbishop flushed angrily.

"Do not blaspheme," he commanded. "Then you persist in your appeal to the ordeal of battle?"

"I do appeal," Perpetua answered, firmly, "hoping that Heaven will strengthen the hand that is lifted to-day in my cause, which is God's."

The archbishop frowned.

"You are perverse and stubborn, but the law is plain and must be obeyed. Call the King's challenger."

Sigurd, raising his voice, called loudly:

"In the King's name I call on the King's challenger to appear." Rang out a great rattle of trumpets, voices hummed in expectation, and all heads turned in the direction of another archway in the amphitheatre, from which it was known that the challenger and the champion would appear.

Out of the darkness, into the bright light of the arena stepped a figure all in armor, with the visor of his helmet down, so that none could see his face. The armor was plain; the shield bore no device, but it was buzzed about in all directions that this was the Lord Hildebrand, and any doubts were answered by the assertion, patently true, that the Lord Hildebrand did not make one of the glittering group about the King. The archbishop addressed the new-comer.

"Proclaim your purpose," he commanded.

The challenger, still with his visor lowered, said in a low voice:

"In the King's name I accuse this woman of witchcraft, and will maintain that charge with my sword, if any be found bold to challenge it."

The archbishop again rose and asked: