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Updated: May 6, 2025
Count Bertrich hung back until the last, and then, as he passed the new Count of Burg Arras, he hissed at him, with a look of rage, the single word, "Blacksmith!" The Count of Burg Arras, stirred to sudden anger, and forgetting in whose presence he stood, swung his huge sledge-hammer round his head, and brought it down on the armoured back of Count Bertrich, roaring the word "ANVIL!"
The armour splintered like crushed ice, and Count Bertrich fell prone on his face and lay there. There was instant cry of "Treason! Treason!" and shouts of "No man may draw arms in the Emperor's presence." "My Lord Emperor," cried the Count of Burg Arras, "I crave pardon if I have done amiss. A man does not forget the tricks of his old calling when he takes on new honours.
They left the road before they arrived at Alf; for they were now approaching the great road between Coblentz and the south, and might come upon bodies of troops upon the march, or halting; and might be asked troublesome questions. They therefore struck upon a country lane and, keeping among the hills, crossed the main road between Bertrich and Wittlech; and slept in a copse, near Dudeldf.
The blacksmith rose slowly to his feet, bowed lowly to the Emperor, and backed to the place where he had formerly stood, again resting his hands on the handle of his sledge-hammer. The look of exultation faded from the face of Count Bertrich, and was replaced by an expression of dismay, for he had been until that moment, himself first Lord of the Alf-thal, with none second.
The Count, cursing the absent Archbishop and his present guests with equal impartiality, sat slowly down again, and flinging his empty flagon at an attendant, demanded that it should be refilled. The others likewise resumed their seats; and the Count cried out, but with less of truculence in his tone: "What message sent the Archbishop to Castle Bertrich?"
"Sabina Mellot, and a Sultana I thought her of The Nation, and would have offered my hand on the spot: but Madame Mellot says she is a Gentile." "Gone? And you have seen them! Where?" "To Bertrich. They had luncheon with my mother, and then started by private post." "I must follow." "Ach lieber? But it will be dark in an hour." "What matter?"
Never before had such an honour been bestowed upon a common man, and though the peasants were jubilant that one of their caste should be thus singled out to receive the favour of the famous Archbishop, and meet not only great nobles, but even the Emperor himself, still, it was gossiped that the Barons grumbled at this distinction being placed upon a serf like the blacksmith Arras, and none were so loud in their complaints as Count Bertrich, who had remained drinking in the castle while the blacksmith fought for the land.
The Emperor replied calmly: "Again I support the appeal of Count Bertrich." There was this time no applause from the surrounding nobles, for many of them had some smattering idea of what was next to happen, though the muddled brain of Count Bertrich gave him no intimation of it. "Count Arras," said the Archbishop, "I promised you a gift when last I left you at your smithy door.
And he never leaped on shore more joyfully than he did at Alf that afternoon, to jump into a carriage, and trundle up the gorge of the Issbach some six lonely weary miles, till he turned at last into the wooded caldron of the Romer-kessel, and saw the little chapel crowning the central knoll, with the white high-roofed houses of Bertrich nestling at its foot.
There a hundred men could hold the infidels in check; but you breed a scurvy set of nobles in the Alf-thal, for Count Bertrich disdains the command of his over-lord to rise at the head of his men and stay the progress of the invader until the Archbishop can come to his assistance." "Now, out upon the drunken Count for a base coward!" cried the armourer in anger.
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