Count Ulrich of Lindburg | Page 4

number for very large sums. In the war between France and Spain, every Spanish soldier who was killed or taken prisoner was found to have a relic round his neck with a certificate from the priest who had sold it, that it would render his body invulnerable to the bullets or swords of the enemy. There is a very considerable sale of such articles, even to the present day, in Roman Catholic countries. Eric was therefore well aware of the value his mother would attach to the one she desired to bestow on him, yet he had already imbibed too large a portion of truth from the writings of Dr Luther and others, and the portions of Scripture he had read, not to look on the imposition with the contempt it deserved; still he was too dutiful a son to treat his mother's offer with disrespect. He thought a minute or more, and then replied slowly--
"I will not take your relic, mother, for I am already provided with a protection which will be sufficient for all the dangers I am likely to encounter. I will say nothing now as to the relic. When I have been to Wittemburg I may be able to tell you something more of its actual value."
Nothing that Dame Margaret could say would induce him to take the article. On repeating the conversation with her son to Father Nicholas, she expressed a hope that Eric was not possessed of an evil spirit, which had induced him so pertinaciously to refuse the proffered gift.
Father Nicholas bit his lip, frowned, said he could not say, it might possibly be an embryo one, such as had clearly entered into Dr Martin and many other persons at that time. It would certainly be safe to exorcise him, but the difficulty would be to get so obstinate a young man as Eric to submit to the operation. He would think about it, and try and devise some means by which the ceremony might be performed without the patient having the power to resist.
This promise afforded a considerable amount of comfort to Dame Margaret, who had felt very uneasy ever since the idea had seized her, for she could not otherwise account for her son's refusing so inestimable a gift.
The last night Eric slept at home he had a dream, at least he was not quite certain whether he was awake or dreaming. He opened his eyes and saw a light in the room, and his mother and Father Nicholas, and his sister Laneta, and his father's old henchman, Hans Bosch, who had often carried him in his arms, when he was a child, and still looked on him in the light of one, standing round his bed. His mother held a basin, and Hans a book, and the priest a censer, which he was swinging to and fro, and muttering words, in very doggerel Latin, while ever and anon, he sprinkled him with water from the basin. What Laneta was about, he could not exactly make out, but he thought that she had a box in her hands, which she held open. Had he not been very sleepy and tired he would have jumped up and ascertained whether what he saw was a vision or a reality; but, shutting his eyes, he went off soundly to sleep again, and sometime afterwards, when he awoke, the room was in darkness and he was alone.
His mother, the next morning, regarded him with much more contented looks than her countenance had worn for the last day or two.
It may as well be here mentioned that Eric discovered during his journey the precious relic, which he had declined taking, fastened into the collar of his cloak. He sighed and said to himself--
"Then, poor mother, let it be; should I take it out and should any misfortune happen to me she will say it was for want of the relic; if it remains and I receive damage I may the better prove to her the worthlessness of the thing. No wonder the sheep go astray when they have so ignorant a pastor as Father Nicholas."
CHAPTER TWO.
Eric, on the morning of his departure from home, had a private leave-taking with his father. The Knight, though an old soldier, was a peaceably-disposed man, yet in spite of all he could do he had foes and troubles. A certain Baron Schenk, of Schweinsburg, unjustly claimed rights over a portion of the Knight's property. It was clearly impossible for the Knight to accede to the Count's demands, for had he done so fresh ones would instantly have been made until the Count might have claimed possession of Lindburg itself. The Count had often threatened to come and insist on his claims at the point of the sword, but the Knight