II
THE APPOINTMENT FOR RAINBARROW
HAVING MADE a meal worthy of the occasion, Sir Jasper and his squire, declining the assistance offered, set forth in a grey summer morning to reconnoitre the haunts of the enemy and, if possible, encounter him.
Chance willed that they discovered signs within three miles of the hamlet, for immense impressions of the Lavender Dragon’s feet suddenly stared up from a marshy bottom, and while George dismounted and measured these vast tridents stamped into the damp soil, out of willow brakes not above a quarter of a mile distant, the mighty creature himself sprang into the air. The sun had now broken through the mists of morning and his roseal beam struck upon the outstretched pinions of the dragon so that they appeared to be wrought of precious stones. They flapped with slow and solemn strokes and propelled the radiant body of the monster at speed not swifter than a heron’s flight. Slowly, lazily he rose, until he shrank to the size of a little morning cloud, then diminished until he appeared no greater than a golden pheasant speeding to the comfort of the distant forest.
Sir Jasper’s blue eyes were rolling and his tanned cheek flushed with excitement.
“Can such things be!” he cried.
“Evidently,” answered George Pipkin, but without enthusiasm.
“Did you observe that he was carrying a human being between his gigantic jaws?”
“I did, Sir Jasper. A big man he bore away; yet the unhappy wretch looked no larger than a hawthorn berry in the beak of a blackbird. But it is true: he is an old—a very old dragon. IBs flight proclaimed him.”
“Old in sin—if indeed a dragon can sin,” answered Sir Jasper.
They proceeded to the spot whence the monster had risen and found a clearing in a withy bed. The air was fragrant with the scent of lavender and willow wrens made music. The evidences of a victim did not lack, for beside a bundle of withy wands, freshly cut, they saw a frail, wherein the vanished swain had brought his mid-day meal, and a jerkin of leather, which he had evidently thrown off while at work. A dog also, that had fled before the onset of the dragon, slunk out of the willows and crept to them with his tail between his shaking legs.
Instantly knight and squire set their horses’ heads in the direction of the monster’s flight, and George expressed a hope that the event of the morning, while unfortunate enough for the day labourer, might yet prove satisfactory from the view-point of their own hopes.
“He has now gone to devour his prey,” said Pipkin, “and following the meal, after the manner of all such reptiles, he will seek to slumber. His scent is strong and happily not unpleasant. We may presently get upon it and then, tethering our horses, if fortune be with us, creep to him and destroy him under well-directed blows at the junction of the left wing and the shoulder. Only so will such an enormous creature succumb to us. Open fighting would be impossible. His head is adamant and his tail unapproachable, so long as he shall be wide awake. Indeed, though many a knight has ignored the fact to his detriment, the danger centre and point of highest peril is a dragon’s tail; and while engaged with his beak and claws, not a few daring spirits have received their quietus from the back blow, which sweeps a man off his horse, stuns him, and renders him impotent and easy game.”
“Should you regard this as a large dragon?” asked the younger.
“Quite the largest I have ever seen, or wish to see,” replied his squire.
“Let us talk of other things for a while,” responded Sir Jasper. “I am disagreeably conscious of having eaten a little too much of the excellent cold beef we enjoyed for breakfast.”
“A groaning table often makes a groaning stomach,” admitted George; “but think nothing of it. We shall not be called upon to exert ourselves for some hours at the earliest.”
Indeed Pipkin was right, and ere they reached the Woods of Blore, Sir Jasper was hungry again. They had brought with them another ample meal, and having discussed it, made cautious sallies round about the forest in search of scent. To the east lay the Red Rocks, a favourite resting place of the dragon; but the sun had long passed the meridian before they found themselves within sight of this rugged and sequestered gorge. For many miles along the confines of the great wood they had ridden and admired the grandeur of such timber as neither remembered to have seen. Gigantic conifers towered above them, with stems that seemed fashioned of bright, pure silver; and overhead their boughs were dark as night, throwing down a dense shadow upon the flower-lit turf beneath.
It was evening before they reached the Valley of the Red Rocks, and the peaks and pinnacles of this impressive spot already glowed as though red hot under a fine sunset. The place was arid, yet beautiful, and the boulders and crags burned in wondrous and dazzling hues of orange and scarlet, amethyst and rose. It seemed that gems studded these precipices and ragged scarps, for they flashed with rainbow colours and answered the signals of the sinking sun. No herb or shrub appeared to adorn the region, yet, as they proceeded, suddenly beneath them extended a wondrous patch of pale, purple inflorescence and the fragrance of lavender rose to their nostrils.
George started with suspicion, and Sir Jasper inhaled the warning odour. Their steeds also sniffed the scent and pawed the earth.
“It comes from an extensive patch of natural flowers yonder,” declared the knight, but Pipkin better appreciated the situation.
“Murrain on your flowers,” he whispered. “It is the dragon himself!”
And, looking again, both recognised, in the mass of colour spread beneath them, the outlines of the slumbering saurian.
“It is as I hoped,” said George. “He is sleeping the sleep of repletion, and we have fortunately come up the wind to him.”
They made a detour and presently approached the monster. Taking cover behind great boulders strewed upon the valley bottom, they brought their horses nearer and still nearer, then drew up, dismounted and took stock of the insensible giant. He slept profoundly, and his great sides rose and fell three feet at every breath. From his open nostrils rumbled a not unmusical snoring, somewhat suggestive of the French horn, and round about him wild creatures gambolled without fear. Half a dozen rabbits leapt and danced between his huge front paws, lizards ran over him and birds hopped along the serrated summit of his vast back, lofty as the ridge-tiles of a mansion. There were indications of great age about him, for though of a sweet and wholesome appearance, he was thin and the elaborate architecture of massy ribs that supported his circumference appeared through his integument and coat of mail. His wings were furled, and his enormous eyes covered by heavy and wrinkled lids. Pipkin, in the greatest excitement, directed Sir Jasper how to proceed.
“Lose not a moment,” he said, “but draw off to the left, mount your charger, then couch your lance and let him have it, striking where the pinion lies over the shoulder. With weight of man and horse behind the blow, you shall reach his heart and destroy him instantly.”
Then, to his indignation and confusion, the knight made chilling answer.
“Not so, friend,” he replied. “It shall never be said that Sir Jasper de Pomeroy slew a sleeping foe. No glory attaches to the act of an assassin.”
“Odds bodikins!” hissed George. “This is a dragon, and when was it ever heard that a dragon demanded to be treated with the rules of chivalry? Would he have wakened you had the case been reversed? Providence has given the tormentor into your hands, and to ask him to fight fair is little better than self-destruction. He couldn’t even if he wanted to.”
Sir Jasper was, however, obdurate.
“No created thing shall perish in his sleep by hand of mine,” he answered. Then he struck his mailed glove upon his shield, lifted his voice and raised such a volume of sound among the echoing cliffs that the Lavender Dragon awoke. Like curtains his eye-lids ascended and revealed two enormous eyes, glorious as fire opals and large as the rose windows in some great cathedral.
“Bless my life!” cried the dragon in good, nervous English. “What have we here?”
“Death, vile reptile!” shouted Sir Jasper, and laying his lance in rest and drawing down his beevor, he spurred his piebald war-horse forward. But the mighty lizard heaved himself on to his feet and so placed his assailant at a great disadvantage. Now horse and man came only to the monster’s knees.
“Wait! Wait! Wait!” he said, lifting one gigantic paw. “Let us understand one another. I appreciate your courtesy in rousing me before you laid on. It was done like a true knight and indicates a courage probably only equalled by your mastery of arms. But I, too, am not devoid of fine feeling in these matters. The sun has already set, and as our encounter is likely to be of some duration, I must point out that, in the gloaming, I shall enjoy unfair advantage that I am loath to take. For I can see in the dark by the light of my own eye-balls—a gift denied to you. We may or may not be evenly matched by daylight, but, with the oncoming of darkness, there can be no question that you would suffer a severe handicap, and this must not be.”
Struck dumb to hear a primeval dragon speak after so gentlemanly a fashion, the knight and squire reined in their horses and stared upward with open mouths upon the enemy.
“I am perfectly willing to encounter you, if in your judgment the greatest good to the greatest number will be gained thereby,” continued the huge creature quietly, “but you, who have proved yourself the flower of chivalry, must not suffer greater disabilities than myself. I am an old dragon now and I never fought for pleasure even in my palmy days; but I still possess prodigious physical powers, and should little like to exercise them, save under conditions as fair to my opponent as myself.”
“This is a dark scheme to evade his doom,” whispered George Pipkin. “Parley not a moment, but advance upon him. He doesn’t want to fight! The man from the withy bed may have upset him.”
Sir Jasper, however, hesitated to take this course, and the enemy again addressed them.
“If I may suggest,” he said, “let us meet on Rainbarrow an hour after sunrise to-morrow. There you shall find a smooth, broad plateau whereon you and your squire will be able to manoeuvre your gallant steeds; and the spot also affords an ample theatre for your friends to sustain and support you.”
“You would seem to be a reasonable adversary,” replied Sir Jasper in doubtful tones. “As for me, my purpose has ever been to play the game with every foe, and I like to believe an enemy is inspired by similar principles; but it is beyond belief that a foul, pestiferous and man-eating dragon should thus seek, even in the jaws of death, to make an honest bargain.”
“Why?” asked the monster. “Why suppose that I am acting contrary to my steadfast ideals in this affair?”
“Your ‘ideals,’ foul cockatrice!” cried George. “Have we not this morning seen you fly away with an innocent peasant from the withy beds? Are you not engaged in digesting him at this moment?”
“What credentials and evidence of good faith can you possibly put before me?” continued Sir Jasper. “Consider my position in this matter as well as your own. If I return to the inhabitants of Pongley-in-the-Marsh and inform them that you are engaged to meet me at sunrise on Rainbarrow, what are they likely to say about it? Surely they will flout me and drive me forth with scorn, judging me such another as Sir Rollo Malherbe, who aforetime came among them, learned particulars of your dimensions and recollected an engagement elsewhere. The natives of this district are no fools—indeed, no Yorkshire-man is ever a fool. You see my predicament if I return with what must seem a fable to the Portreeve of Pongley and his neighbours.”
The Lavender Dragon lifted an enormous paw to his low but broad forehead.
“A genuine difficulty,” he admitted, “though I might summon witnesses—but no. You must, I fear, trust me to keep my word. I attach the utmost importance to truth-telling. Your squire will report the same tale and, if need be, you may exaggerate a trifle without overstepping strict veracity. Behold how night spreads her purple mantle upon the gorge, robbing the rocks and crags of their ruddy splendour; observe how my eyes now shine like glowing meteors and cast a ray of brilliance down the glen. They were far brighter once. But tell the Pongley people how you surprised me on the edge of twilight and that the day was too far spent for our encounter. Do not hesitate to assure them that you credit me; even indicate that I showed a measure of reason, little to have been expected from such a being. Inform Pongley that I shall be upon Rainbarrow at the appointed time, and pray, pray believe me yourself when I tell you so.”
Sir Jasper looked up at the huge head from which these words proceeded in a sonorous but educated voice.
Then the dragon, tired of standing, sat down.
“Do you understand the nature of an oath?” inquired the knight.
“I do,” replied the monster. “I am not unfamiliar with humanity and have had relations with them quite other than those recorded, to my disfavour, by Pongley and more important places. I appreciate the significance of an oath and am perfectly willing to take one, if that will content you.”
“You are no ordinary dragon,” declared Sir Jasper. “Such as I have already heard about, conducted themselves in very different fashion, fought with abandon, spewed fire, hit below the belt and pursued their defensive and offensive operations without self-control, civil conversation, or any sense of honour. They have risen from the slime, they have been horrible, formidable and utterly repulsive in every way. Mankind is accustomed to believe that the only possible dragon is a dead one; yet here you sit, within reach of my unconquerable lance, and discourse as fluently and grammatically as myself. Even an oath appears to be within your experience. You are courteous, self-contained, intelligent. Your natural weapons are terrific, and no doubt you know exceedingly well how to use them; but, as you confess, you are no longer young, and, if I mistake not, your hinder claws show evidences of gout.”
“Once it was acute,” explained the Lavender Dragon. “Now alas! it threatens to become chronic. With acute gout, one throws it off and has good times between the attacks; but once the ailment assumes a chronic form, we are forced much to modify our activities. Do not think, however, that I advance these facts as a reason for evading your attack. Far from it. I am still in the possession of very great activity and may give you at least a run for your money.”
Like lamps fed by a rainbow the Lavender Dragon’s eyes burned steadily above them.
“It is as though we talked to a lighthouse,” murmured George Pipkin.
“In the name of your Maker, then—your Maker and my own—you swear to be on Rainbarrow to-morrow morning, wet or fine,” said Sir Jasper; and the dragon lowered his prodigious head with becoming reverence and shut his eyes. The action plunged the party into darkness.
“I will—so help me,” declared the great creature. It was a strange interview, even for the Dark Ages, and Sir Jasper began to believe that all must be a dream from which he would presently awaken.
“Have you ever fought with a belted knight before?” inquired the squire, and the dragon confessed that he had.
“Once, and once only,” he admitted.
“And seeing that you still live, I suppose—?”
The Lavender Dragon indicated a slight scar among the blue scales on his off fore leg.
“He pricked me and no more. I was younger and far more agile of body in those days than at present. The battle lasted exactly thirty-five seconds.”
“No. I gave him a good thumping and told him not to do it again. He never did.”
“His name?” inquired George briefly.
“Sir Claude Pontifex Fortescue,” replied the dragon.
“What befell him?” asked Sir Jasper. “He was before my time, and it is many a long year since he was at court, or in company. There is, however, still some speculation among his own generation as to what became of Sir Claude.”
“Little need to inquire farther,” growled George Pipkin. “A knight who has been thumped by a dragon, and told not to do it again, would scarcely show his face in the society of his peers.”
“That’s another story—too long to tell you now,” declared the huge creature. “Until to-morrow, then, on Rain-barrow?”
“I trust you—chiefly because I must,” replied Sir Jasper. “Do not disgrace yourself, or you will disgrace me. Observe that I treat you as an equal.”
“I do, and am flattered accordingly,” replied the other. “Fear nothing: I shall be there. And now draw off your steeds, and give me room to spread my wings. I thank you.”
He rose upon his four feet, towered above them, resembling, if anything, a cyclopean sofa, and slowly opened his pinions. They creaked a little and he sighed.
“Rheumatism,” he said, then sprang aloft with a roar, like a sixty-knot gale of wind, soared away and vanished under the stars.
“And that’s the last you’ll see of him,” prophesied the squire, relief and bitterness strangely mingled in his remark.
“Think better of the fellow,” urged Sir Jasper; but George refused to be comforted.
“You have spurned the gifts of Fortune,” he answered, “and can hope for no more of her favours.”