The Infant's Skull; Or, The End of the World. A Tale of the Millennium

CHAPTER II.
YVON THE FORESTER'S HUT

Yvon – now no longer the Calf, but the Forester, since his appointment over the canton of the Fountain of the Hinds – and his family did not escape the scourge.

About five years before the famine of 1033, his beloved wife Marceline died. He still inhabited his hut, now shared with him by his son Den-Brao and the latter's wife Gervaise, together with their three children, of whom the eldest, Nominoe, was nine, the second, Julyan, seven, and the youngest, Jeannette, two years of age. Den-Brao, a serf like his father, was since his youth employed in a neighboring stone quarry. A natural taste for masonry developed itself in the lad. During his hours of leisure he loved to carve in certain not over hard stones the outlines of houses and cottages, the structure of which attracted the attention of the master mason of Compiegne. Observing Den-Brao's aptitude, the artisan taught him to hew stone, and soon confided to him the plans of buildings and the overseership in the construction of several fortified donjons that King Henry I ordered to be erected on the borders of his domains in Compiegne. Den-Brao, being of a mild and industrious disposition and resigned to servitude, had a passionate love for his trade. Often Yvon would say to him:

"My child, these redoubtable donjons, whose plans you are sketching and which you build with so much care, either serve now or will serve some day to oppress our people. The bones of our oppressed and martyrized brothers will rot in these subterraneous cells reared above one another with such an infernal art!"

"Alack! You are right, father," Den-Brao would at such times answer, "but if not I, some others will build them … my refusal to obey my master's orders would have no other consequence than to bring upon my head a beating, if not mutilation and even death."

Gervaise, Den-Brao's wife, an industrious housekeeper, adored her three children, all of whom, in turn, clung affectionately to Yvon.

The hut occupied by Yvon and his family lay in one of the most secluded parts of the forest. Until the year 1033, they had suffered less than other serf families from the devastations of the recurring famine. Occasionally Yvon brought down a stag or doe. The meat was smoked, and the provision thus laid by kept the family from want. With the beginning of the year 1033, however, one of the epidemics that often afflict the beasts of the fields attacked the wild animals of the forest of Compiegne. They grew thin, lost their strength, and their flesh that speedily decomposed, dropped from their bones. In default of venison, the family was reduced towards the end of autumn to wild roots and dried berries. They also ate up the snakes that they caught and that, fattened, crawled into their holes for the winter. As hunger pressed, Yvon killed and ate his hunting dog that he had named Deber-Trud in memory of the war-dog of his ancestor Joel. Subsequently the family was thrown upon the juice of barks, and then upon the broth of dried leaves. But the nourishment of dead leaves soon became unbearable, and likewise did the sap-wood, or second rind of young trees, such as elders and aspen trees, which they beat to a pulp between stones, have to be given up. At the time of the two previous famines, some wretched people were said to have supported themselves with a kind of fattish clay. Not far from Yvon's hut was a vein of such clay. Towards the end of December, Yvon went out for some of it. It was a greenish earth of fine paste, soft but heavy, and of insipid taste. The family thought themselves saved. All its members devoured the first meal of the clay. But on the morrow their contracted stomachs refused the nourishment that was as heavy as lead.

CHAPTER III.
ON THE BUCK'S TRACK

Thirty-six hours of fast had followed upon the meal of clay in Yvon's hut. Hunger gnawed again at the family's entrails.

During these thirty-six hours a heavy snow had fallen. Yvon went out. His family was starving within. He had death on his soul. He went towards the nets that he had spread in the hope of snaring some bird of passage during the snow storm. His expectations were deceived. A little distance from the nets lay the Fountain of the Hinds, now frozen hard. Snow covered its borders. Yvon perceived the imprint of a buck's feet. The size of the imprint on the snow announced the animal's bulk. Yvon estimated its weight by the cracks in the ice on the stream that it had just crossed, the ice being otherwise thick enough to support Yvon himself. This was the first time in many months that the forester had run across a buck's track. Could the animal, perhaps, have escaped the general mortality of its kind? Did it come from some distant forest? Yvon knew not, but he followed the fresh track with avidity. Yvon had with him his bow and arrows. To reach the animal, kill it and smoke its flesh meant the saving of the lives of his family, now on the verge of starvation. It meant their life for at least a month. Hope revivified the forester's energies; he pursued the buck; the regular impress of its steps showed that the animal was quietly following one of the beaten paths of the forest; moreover its track lay so clearly upon the snow that he could not have crossed the stream more than an hour before, else the edges of the imprint that he left behind him would have been less sharp and would have been rounded by the temperature of the air. Following its tracks, Yvon confidently expected to catch sight of the buck within an hour and bring the animal down. In the ardor of the chase, the forester forgot his hunger. He had been on the march about an hour when suddenly in the midst of the profound silence that reigned in the forest, the wind brought a confused noise to his ears. It sounded like the distant bellowing of a stag. The circumstance was extraordinary. As a rule the beasts of the woods do not cry out except at night. Thinking he might have been mistaken, Yvon put his ear to the ground… There was no more room for doubt. The buck was bellowing at about a thousand yards from where Yvon stood. Fortunately a turn of the path concealed the hunter from the game. These wild animals frequently turn back to see behind them and listen. Instead of following the path beyond the turning that concealed him, Yvon entered the copse expecting to make a short cut, head off the buck, whose gait was slow, hide behind the bushes that bordered the path, and shoot the animal when it hove in sight.

The sky was overcast; the wind was rising; with deep concern Yvon noticed several snow flakes floating down. Should the snow fall heavily before the buck was shot, the animal's tracks would be covered, and if opportunity failed to dart an arrow at it from the forester's ambuscade, he could not then expect to be able to trace the buck any further. Yvon's fears proved correct. The wind soon changed into a howling storm surcharged with thick snow. The forester quitted the thicket and struck for the path beyond the turning and at about a hundred paces from the clearing. The buck was nowhere to be seen. The animal had probably caught wind of its pursuer and jumped for safety into the thicket that bordered the path. It was impossible to determine the direction that it had taken. Its tracks vanished under the falling snow, that lay in ever thicker layers.

A prey to insane rage, Yvon threw himself upon the ground and rolled in the snow uttering furious cries. His hunger, recently forgotten in the ardor of the hunt, tore at his entrails. He bit one of his arms and the pain thus felt recalled him to his senses. Almost delirious, he rose with the fixed intent of retracing the buck, killing the animal, spreading himself beside its carcass, devouring it raw, and not rising again so long as a shred of meat remained on its bones. At that moment, Yvon would have defended his prey with his knife against even his own son. Possessed by the fixed and delirious idea of retracing the buck, Yvon went hither and thither at hap-hazard, not knowing in what direction he walked. He beat about a long time, and night began to approach, when a strange incident came to his aid and dissipated his mental aberration.

CHAPTER IV.
GREGORY THE HOLLOW-BELLIED

Driven by the gale, the snow continued to fall, when suddenly Yvon's nostrils were struck by the exhalations emitted by frying meat. The odor chimed in with the devouring appetite that was troubling his senses, and at least bestowed back upon him the instinct of seeking to satisfy his hunger. He stood still, whiffed the air hither and thither like a wolf that from afar scents carrion, and looked about in order to ascertain by the last glimmerings of the daylight where he was. Yvon was at the crossing of a path in the forest that led from the little village of Ormesson. The road ran before a tavern where travelers usually put up for the night. It was kept by a serf of the abbey of St. Maximim named Gregory, and surnamed the Hollow-bellied, because, according to him, nothing could satisfy his insatiable appetite. An otherwise kind-hearted and cheerful man, the serf often, before these distressful times, and when Yvon carried his tithe of game to the castle, had accommodatedly offered him a pot of hydromel. A prey now to the lashings of hunger and exasperated by the odor of fried meat which escaped from the tavern, Yvon carefully approached the closed door. In order to allow the smoke to escape, Gregory had thrown the window half open without fear of being seen. By the light of a large fire that burned in the hearth, Yvon saw Gregory seated on a stool placidly surveying the broiling of a large piece of meat whose odor had so violently assailed the nostrils of the famishing forester.

To Yvon's great surprise, the tavern-keeper's appearance had greatly changed. He was no longer the lean and wiry fellow of before. Now his girth was broad, his cheeks were full, wore a thick black beard and tinkled with the warm color of life and health. Within reach of the tavern-keeper lay a cutlass, a pike and an ax – all red with blood. At his feet an enormous mastiff picked a bone well covered with meat. The spectacle angered the forester. He and his family could have lived a whole day upon the remnants left by the dog; moreover, how did the tavern-keeper manage to procure so large a loin? Cattle had become so dear that only the seigneurs and the ecclesiastics could afford to purchase any; beef cost a hundred gold sous, sheep a hundred silver sous! A sense of hate rose in Yvon's breast against Gregory whom he had until then looked upon very much as a friend. The forester could not take his eyes from the meat, thinking of the joy of his family if he were to return home loaded with such a booty. For a moment Yvon was tempted to knock at the door of the serf and demand a share, at least the chunks thrown at the dog. But judging the tavern-keeper by himself, and noticing, moreover, that the former was well armed, he reflected that in days like those bread and meat were more precious than gold and silver; to request Gregory the Hollow-bellied to yield a part of his supper was folly; he would surely refuse, and if force was attempted he would kill the intruder. These thoughts rapidly succeeded one another in Yvon's troubled brain. To add to his dilemma, his presence was scented by the mastiff who, at first, growled angrily without, however, dropping his bone, and then began to bark.

At that moment Gregory was removing the meat from the spit. "What's the matter, Fillot? Be brave, old boy! We shall defend our supper. You are furnished with good strong jaws and fangs, I with weapons. Fear not. No one will venture to enter. So be still, Fillot! Lie down and keep quiet!" But so far from lying down and keeping quiet, the mastiff dropped his bone, stood up, and approaching the window where Yvon stood, barked louder still. "Oh, oh!" remarked the tavern-keeper depositing the meat in a large wooden platter on the table. "Fillot drops a bone to bark … there must be someone outside." Yvon stepped quickly back, and from the dark that concealed him he saw Gregory seize his pike, throw the window wide open and leaning out call with a threatening voice: "Who is there? If any one is in search of death, he can find it here." The deed almost running ahead of the thought, Yvon raised his bow, adjusted an arrow and, invisible to Gregory, thanks to the darkness without, took straight aim at the tavern-keeper's breast. The arrow whizzed; Gregory emitted a cry followed by a prolonged groan; his head and bust fell over the window-sill, and his pike dropped on the snow-covered ground. Yvon quickly seized the weapon. It was done none too soon. The furious mastiff leaped out of the window over his dead master's shoulders and made a bound at the forester. A thrust of the pike nailed the faithful brute to the ground. Yvon had committed the murder with the ferocity of a famished wolf. He appeased his hunger. The dizziness that had assailed his head vanished, his reason returned, and he found himself alone in the tavern with a still large piece of meat beside him, – more than half of the original chunk.

Feeling as if he just woke from a dream, Yvon looked around and felt frozen to the marrow. The light emitted by the hearth enabled him to see distinctly among the bloody remnants near where the mastiff had been gnawing his bone, a human hand and the trunk of a human arm. Horrified as he was, Yvon approached the bleeding members.

There was no doubt. Before him lay the remains of a human body. The surprising girth that Gregory the Hollow-bellied had suddenly developed came to his mind. The mystery was explained. Nourished by human flesh, the monster had been feeding on the travelers who stopped at his place. The roast that had just been hungrily swallowed by Yvon proceeded from a recent murder. The forester's hair stood on end; he dare not look towards the table where still lay the remains of his cannibal supper. He wondered how his mouth did not reject the food. But that first and cultivated sense of horror being over, the forester could not but admit to himself that the meat he had just gulped down differed little from beef. The thought started a poignant reflection: "My son, his wife and children are at this very hour undergoing the tortures of hunger; mine has been satisfied by this food; however abominable it may be, I shall carry off the rest; the same as I was at first ignorant of what it was that I ate, my family shall not know the nature of the dish… I shall at least have saved them for a day!" The reasoning matured into resolution.

As Yvon was about to quit the tavern with his load of human flesh, the gale that had been howling without and now found entrance through the window, violently threw open the door of a closet connecting with the room he was in. The odor of a charnel house immediately assailed the forester's nostrils. He ran to the hearth, picked up a flaming brand, and looked into the closet. Its naked walls were bespattered with blood; in a corner lay a heap of dried twigs and leaves used for kindling a fire and from beneath them protruded a foot and part of a leg. Yvon scattered the heap of kindling material with his feet … they hid a recently mutilated corpse. The penetrating smell obviously escaped from a lower vault. Yvon noticed a trap door. Raising it, there rose so putrid an odor that he staggered back; but driven despite himself to carry his investigation to the end, he approached the flaming brand to the opening and discovered below a cavern that was almost filled with bones, heads and other human members, the bloody remnants of the travelers whom Gregory the Hollow-bellied had lived upon. In order to put an end to the horrible spectacle, Yvon hurled his flaming brand into the mortuary cellar; it was immediately extinguished; for a moment the forester remained in the dark; he then stepped back into the main room; and overcoming a fresh assault of human scruple, darted out with the remains of the roast in his bag, thinking only of his famishing family.

Without, the gale blew violently; its rage seemed to increase. The moon, then at its fullest, cast enough light, despite the whirls of snow, to guide Yvon's steps. He struck the road to the Fountain of the Hinds in haste, moving with firm though rapid strides. The infernal food he had just partaken of returned to him his pristine strength. About two leagues from his hut, he stopped, struck with a sudden thought. The mastiff he had killed was enormous, fleshy and fat. It could furnish his family with food for at least three or four days. Why had he forgotten to bring it along? Yvon turned back to the tavern, long though the road was. As he approached the house of Gregory he noticed a great brilliancy from afar and across the falling snow. The light proceeded from the door and window of the tavern. Only two hours before when he left, the hearth was extinct and the place dark. Could someone have gone in afterwards and rekindled the fire? Yvon crept near the house hoping to carry off the dog without attracting notice, but voices reached him saying:

"Friends, let us wait till the dog is well roasted."

"I'm hungry! Devilish hungry!"

"So am I … but I have more patience than you, who would have eaten the dainty raw… Pheu! What a smell comes from that charnel room! And yet the door and window are open!"

"Never mind the smell!.. I'm hungry!"

"So, then, Master Gregory the Hollow-bellied slaughtered the travelers to rob them, I suppose… One of them must have been beforehand with him and killed him… But the devil take the tavern-keeper! His dog is now roasted. Let's eat!"

"Let's eat!"