Suddenly Mother Sub-Prioress dried her eyes, holding herself once more in control. It had just occurred to her that the Bishop's word could not be taken against the evidence of all their senses! On that very morning, at five o'clock the Convent call to rise had been rung from within the Prioress's cell!
So Mother Sub-Prioress dried her eyes, punished her nose for sharing in the general breakdown, and looking with belligerent eye at the Bishop, said: "If the Reverend Mother be not within her cell, perhaps it will please you, my lord, to inform the Convent who is within it!"
"That point," said the Bishop, "can speedily be settled."
He took from his girdle the Prioress's master-key, handed over to him before he left Warwick.
Fitting it into the lock, he opened the door of the cell, and entered, followed by the Sub-Prioress and a crowd of palpitating, eager nuns.
A few paces from the door the Bishop paused, signing to Mother Sub-Prioress to come forward, but restraining, with uplifted hand, those who pressed in behind her.
The chamber was very still.
The chair of the Prioress was empty.
But, before the shrine of the Madonna, there lay, stretched upon the floor, the unconscious form of the old lay-sister, Mary Antony.
CHAPTER XXXVIII
THE BISHOP KEEPS VIGIL
Old Mary Antony lay dying.
The Bishop had not allowed her to be carried from the cell of the
Prioress, to her own.
He had commanded that the Reverend Mother's couch be moved from the inner room and placed before the shrine of the Virgin. On this lay Mary Antony, while the Bishop himself kept watch beside her.
The evening light came in through the open casement, illumining the calm old face, from which the soothing hand of death was already smoothing the wrinkles.
Five hours had passed since they found her.
It had taken long to restore her to consciousness; and so soon as she awoke to her surroundings, and recognised Mother Sub-Prioress, and the many faces around her, she relapsed into silence, refusing to answer any questions, yet keeping her eyes anxiously fixed upon the door.
Seeing which, Sister Teresa slipped from the room and ran secretly to tell the Lord Bishop, who had paid but a brief visit to the Palace and was now pacing the lawn below the cloisters.
The Bishop came at once; when, seeing him enter, Mary Antony gave a cry, striving to raise herself from the pillows.
Moving to the bedside, the Bishop laid his hand upon the shaking hands, which had been clasped at sight of him.
An eager question was in the eyes lifted to his.
The Bishop bent over the couch.
"Yes," he said, and smiled.
The anxious look faded. The eyes closed. A triumphant smile illumined the dying face.
Turning, the Bishop asked a few whispered questions of the Sub-Prioress.
Mary Antony had taken a sip of wine, but seemed to find it impossible to partake of food. She had been so long without, that now nature refused it.
"Undoubtedly she is dying," said Mother Sub-Prioress, not unkindly, but in the matter-of-fact tone of one to whom the hard outline of a fact is unsoftened by the atmosphere of imagination or of sympathy.
"I know it," said the Bishop, in low tones. "Therefore am I come to confess our sister and to administer the final rites and consolations of the Church. I have with me all that is needed. You may now withdraw, and leave me to watch alone beside Sister Mary Antony."
"We sent for Father Peter," began Mother Sub-Prioress, "but she paid no heed to any of his questions, neither would she"——
The Bishop took one step toward Mother Sub-Prioress, with uplifted hand, pointing to the door.
Mother Sub-Prioress hastened out.
The Bishop followed her into the passage, where a waiting crowd of nuns created that atmosphere of excited tension, which seizes certain minds at the near approach of death.
"I bid you all to go to your cells," said the Bishop, "there to spend the next hour in earnest prayer for the passing soul of this aged nun who, during so long a time, has lived and worked in this Convent. Let every door be closed. I keep the final vigil alone. When I need help I shall ring the Convent bell."
Immovable in the passage stood the Bishop, until every figure had vanished; every door had closed.
Then he re-entered the Prioress's cell, and shut the door.
He placed the holy oil on the step, before the shrine of the Madonna, just where old Antony had knelt when she had prayed our blessèd Lady to be pleased to sharpen her old wits.
Then he drew forth a tiny flask of rare Italian workmanship, let fall a few drops from it into a spoonful of wine, and firmly poured the liquid between the old lay-sister's parted lips.
One anxious moment; then he heard her swallow.
At that, the Bishop drew the Prioress's chair to the side of the couch, and sat down to await events.
In a few moments the stertorous breathing ceased, the open mouth closed. Mary Antony sighed thrice, as a little child that has wept before sleeping sighs in its sleep.
Then she opened her eyes, and fixed them on the Bishop.
"Reverend Father"—she began, then chuckled, gleefully. Her voice had come back, and with it a great activity of brain, though the hands upon the coverlet seemed to belong to someone else, and she hoped they would not rise up and strike her. Her feet, she could not feel at all; but, seeing that she was most comfortably lying there where she best loved to be, why should she require feet? Feet are such tired things. One rests better without them.
"Speak low," said the Bishop, bending forward. "Speak low, dear Sister Antony; partly to spare thy strength; and partly because, though I have sent all the White Ladies to their cells, our good Mother Sub-Prioress, in her natural anxiety for thy welfare, may be outside the door, even now."
Mary Antony chuckled.
"If we could but thrust a nail through into her ear," she whispered.
Then suddenly serious, she put the question which already her eyes had
asked: "Did I succeed in keeping from them the flight of the Reverend
Mother, until you arrived, Reverend Father?"
"Yes, faithful heart, wise beyond all expectation, you did."
Again Mary Antony chuckled.
"I locked them out," she said, with a knowing wink, "but I also took them in. Yea, verily, I took them in! Scores of times they called me 'Reverend Mother.' 'Open the door, I humbly pray you, Reverend Mother,' pleaded Mother Sub-Prioress at the keyhole. 'Dixi: Custodiam vias meas,' chanted Mary Antony, in a beauteous voice! . . . 'Open, open, Reverend Mother!' besought a multitude without. 'Quid multiplicati sunt gui tribulant me!' intoned Mary Antony, within. . . . 'Most dear and Reverend Mother,' crooned Sister Mary Rebecca, at midnight, 'I have something of deepest importance to say'—'Dixit insipiens,' was Mary Antony's appropriate response. Eh, and Sister Mary Rebecca, thinking none could observe her, had already been round, in the moonlight, and attempted to climb a tree. All the Reverend Mother's windows were closely curtained; but old Antony had her eye to a crack, and the sight of Sister Mary Rebecca climbing, made all the other trees to shake with laughter, but is not a sight to be described to the great Lord Bishop. . . . Nay, then!"—with a startled cry—"Why doth this knotted finger rise up and shake itself at me?"
The Bishop took the worn old hand, now stone cold, laid it back upon the quilt, and covered it with his own.
The drug he had administered had indeed revived the powers, but the over-excited brain was inclined to wander.
He recalled it with a name which he knew would act as a potent spell.
"Would you have news of the Prioress, Sister Antony?"
Instantly the eyes grew eager.
"Is she safe, Reverend Father? Is she well? Hath she taken happiness to her with both hands, not thrusting it away?"
"Happiness hath taken her by both hands," said the Bishop. "This morning I blest her union with a noble knight to whom she was betrothed before she came hither."
"I know," whispered old Antony ecstatically. "I heard it all, I and my meat chopper, hidden in there; I and my meat chopper—not willing to let the Reverend Mother face danger alone. And I did thrust the handle of the chopper between my gums, that I might not cry 'Bravely done!' when the noble Knight and his men-at-arms flung a rope over a strong bough, and hanged that clerkly fellow—somewhat lean and out at elbows. Oh, ah? It was bravely done! I heard it all! I saw it all!"
Then the joy faded; a look of shame and grief came into the old face.
"But having thus seen and heard has led me into grievous sin, Reverend Father. Alas, I have lied about holy things, sinning, I fear me, beyond forgiveness, though indeed I did it, meaning to do well. May I tell you all, Reverend Father, that you may judge whether in that which I did, I acted according to our blessèd Lady's will and intention, or whether the deceitfulness of mine own heart has led me into mortal sin?"
The Bishop looked anxiously at the sun dipping slowly in the west. The effect of the drug he had given should last an hour, if care were taken of this spurious strength. He judged a quarter of that time to have already sped.
"Tell me from the beginning, without reserve, dear Antony," he said. "But speak low, for my ear only. Remember possible listeners outside the door."
So presently the whole tale was told, with many a quaint twist of old Antony's. And the Bishop's heart melted to tenderness as she whispered the story, and he realised the greatness of the devotion which had gone forward, without a thought of self, in the bold endeavour to bring happiness to the Prioress she loved, yet the anxious conscience, which now trembled at the thought of that which the fearless heart had done.
"I lied about holy things; I put words into our blessèd Lady's mouth; I said she moved her hand. But you did tell me, Reverend Father, that the Reverend Mother was so made that unless there was a vision or revelation from our Lady, she would thrust away her happiness with both hands. And there would not have been a vision if old Antony had not contrived one. Yet I fear me, for the sin of that contriving, I shall never find forgiveness; my soul must ever stay in torment."
Tears coursed down the wrinkled cheeks.
The Bishop kneeled beside the bed.
"Dear Antony," he said. "Listen to me. 'Perfect love casteth out fear, because fear hath torment.' You have loved with a perfect love. You need have no fear. Trust in the love of God, in the precious blood of the Redeemer, which cleanseth from all sin, in the understanding tenderness of our Lady, who knoweth a woman's heart. You meant to do right; and if, honestly intending to do well, you used the wrong means, Divine love, judging you by your intention, will pardon the mistake. 'If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.' Think no more of yourself, in this. Dwell solely on our Lord. Silence your own fears, by repeating: 'He is faithful and just.'"
"Think you, Reverend Father," quavered the pathetic voice, "that They will sometimes let old Antony out of hell for an hour, to sit on her jasper seat and see the Reverend Mother walk up the golden stairs, with the splendid Knight on one side and the great Lord Bishop on the other?"
"Sister Mary Antony," said the Bishop, clearly and solemnly, "there is no place in hell for so faithful and so loving a heart. You shall go straight to your jasper seat; and because, with the Lord, one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day, your eyes will scarce have time to grow used to the great glory, before you see the Reverend Mother coming, walking between the two who have faithfully loved her; and you, who have also loved her faithfully, will also mount the golden stair, and together we all shall kneel before the throne of God, and understand at last the full meaning of those words of wonder: GOD IS LOVE."
A look of ineffable joy lit up the dying face.
"Straight to my jasper seat," she said, "to watch—to wait"——
Then came the sudden fading of the spurious strength. The Bishop put out his hand and reached for the holy oil.
* * * * * *
The golden sunset light flooded the chamber with radiance.
The Bishop still watched beside the couch.
Having rallied sufficiently to make her last confession, short and simple as a child's; having received absolution and the last sacred rites of the Church, Mary Antony had slipped into a peaceful slumber.
The Bishop had to bend over and listen, to make sure that she still breathed.
Suddenly she opened her eyes and looked full into his.
"Did you wed the Reverend Mother to the splendid Knight?" she asked, and her voice was strong again and natural, with the little chuckle of curiosity and humour in it, as of old.
"This morning," answered the Bishop, "I wedded them."
"Did he kiss her?" asked old Antony, with an indescribable twinkle of gleeful enjoyment, though those twinkling eyes seemed the only living thing in the old face.
"Nay," said the Bishop. "They who truly kiss, kiss not in public."
"Ah," whispered Mary Antony. "Yea, verily! I know that to be true."
She lifted wandering fingers and, after much groping, touched her forehead, with a happy smile.
Not knowing what else the action could mean, the Bishop leaned forward and made the sign of the cross on her brow.
Mary Antony gave that peculiar little chuckle of enjoyment, which had always marked her pleasure when the very learned made mistakes. It gave her so great a sense of cleverness.
After this the light faded from the old eyes, and the Bishop had begun to think they would not again open upon this world, when a strange thing happened.
There was a flick of wings, and in, through the open window, flew the robin.
First he perched on the marble hand of the Madonna. Then, with a joyful chirp, dropped straight to the couch on which lay Mary Antony.
At sound of that chirp, Mary Antony opened her eyes, and saw her much loved little bird hopping gaily on the coverlet.
"Hey, thou little vain man!" she said. "Ah, naughty Master Pieman! Art come to look upon old Antony in her bed? The great Lord Bishop will have thee hanged."
The robin hopped nearer, and pecked gently at the hand which so oft had fed him, now lying helpless on the quilt.
A look of exquisite delight came into the old woman's eyes.
"Ah, my little Knight of the Bloody Vest," she whispered, "dost want thy cheese? Wait a minute, while old Antony searches in her wallet."
She sat up suddenly, as if to reach for something.
Then a startled look came into her face. She stretched out appealing hands to the Bishop.
Instantly he caught them in his.
"Fear not, dear Antony," he said. "All is well."
The robin, spreading his wings, flew out at the window. And the loving spirit of Mary Antony went with him.
The Bishop laid the worn-out body gently back upon the couch, closed the eyes, and folded the hands upon the breast.
Then he walked over to the window, and stood looking at the golden ramparts of that sunset city, glowing against the delicate azure of the evening sky.
Great loneliness of soul came to the Bishop, standing thus in the empty cell.
The Prioress had gone; the robin had gone; Mary Antony had gone; and the Bishop greatly wished that he might go, also.
Presently he turned to the Prioress's table. She had sent to the Palace the copy she had made, and the copy she had mended, of the Pope's mandate. But she had left upon the table the strips of parchment upon which she had inscribed, on the night of her vigil, copies and translations of ancient prayers from the Sacramentaries. The Bishop gathered these up, reading them as he stood. Two he slipped into his sash, but the third he took to the couch and placed beneath the folded hands.
"Take this with thee to thy jasper seat, dear faithful heart," he said; "for truly it was given unto thee to perceive and know what things thou oughtest to do, and also to have grace and power faithfully to fulfil the same."
The peaceful face, growing beautiful with that solemn look of eternal youth which death brings, even to the aged, seemed to smile, as the precious parchment passed into the keeping of those folded hands.
The Bishop knelt long in prayer and thanksgiving. At length, with uplifted face, he said: "And grant, O my God, that I too may be faithful, unto the very end."
Then he rose, and rang the Convent bell.
CHAPTER XXXIX
THE "SPLENDID KNIGHT"
On the steps of Warwick Castle stood the Knight and his bride.
Their eyes still lingered on the archway through which the noble figure of Symon, Bishop of Worcester, mounted upon his black mare, Shulamite, had just disappeared from view.
The marriage had taken place in the Castle chapel, half an hour before, with an astonishing amount of pomp and ceremony. Priests and acolytes had appeared from unexpected places. Madonna lilies, on graceful stem, gleamed white in the shadows of the sacred place. Solemn music rose and fell; the deep roll of the Gregorian chants, beginning with a low hum as of giant bees in a vast field of clover; swelling, in full-throated unison, a majestic volume of sound which rang against the rafters, waking echoes in the clerestory; then rumbling back into silence.
Standing beneath the sacred canopy, the bridal pair lifted their eyes to the high altar and saw, amid a cloud of incense, the Bishop, in gorgeous vestments, descending the steps and coming toward them.
To Mora, at the time, and afterwards in most thankful remembrance, the wonder of that which followed lay in the fact that where she had dreaded an inevitable sense of sacrilege in giving to another that which had been already consecrated to God, the Bishop so worded the service as to make her feel that she could still be spiritually the bride of Christ, even while fulfilling her troth to Hugh; also that, in accepting the call to this new Vocation, she was not falling from her old estate, but rather rising above it.
As the words were spoken which made her a wife, it seemed as if the Bishop gently wrapped her about with a fresh mantle of dignity—that dignity which had fallen from her in those moments of humiliation when, at Hugh's bidding she laid herself down upon the stretcher.
The Bishop voiced the Church with a pomp and power which could not be withstood; and when, in obedience to his command Hugh grasped her right hand with his right hand, and the Bishop laid his own on either side of their clasped hands, and pronounced them man and wife, it seemed indeed as if a Divine touch united them, as if a Divine voice ratified their vows and sanctified their union.
Mora had never before seen the man so completely merged in his high office.
And, when all was over, even as he mounted Shulamite and rode away, he rode out of the courtyard with the air of a Knight Templar riding forth-to do battle in a Holy War.
It seemed to Mora that she had bidden farewell to her old friend of the kindly smile, the merry eye, and the ready jest, in the early hours of that morning, as together they left the arbour of the golden roses.
There remained therefore but one man to be considered: the "splendid Knight" of old Antony's vision; the lover who had pursued her into her Nunnery; wooed her in her own cell, unabashed by the dignity of her office; mastered her will; forced her numbed heart to awaken, disturbed by the thrill of an unwilling tenderness; moved her to passion by the poignant anguish of a parting, which she regarded as inevitably final; won the Bishop over, to his side, and, through him, the Pope; and finally, by the persistence of his pleadings, moved our blessèd Lady to vouchsafe a vision on his behalf.
This was the "splendid Knight" against whom the stars in their courses had most certainly not fought. Principalities and powers had all been for him; against him, just a woman and her conscience, and—he had won.
When, at their first interview in her cell, in reply to her demand: "Why are you not with your wife?" he had answered: "I am with my wife; the only wife I have ever wanted, the only woman I shall ever wed, is here"—she stood ready to strike with ivory and steel, at the first attempt upon her inviolable chastity, and could afford to smile, in pitying derision, at so empty a boast.
But now? If he said: "My wife is here," and chose to seize her with possessive grasp, she must meekly fold her hands upon her breast, and say: "Even so, my lord. I am yours. Deal with me as you will."
As the Bishop's purple cloak and the hind quarters of his noble black mare, disappeared from view, the crowd which hitherto had surrounded the bridal pair, also vanished, as if at the wave of a magic wand. Thus for the first time, since those tense moments in the Cathedral crypt, Mora found herself alone with Hugh.
She was not young enough to be embarrassed; but she was old enough to be afraid; afraid of him, and afraid of herself; afraid of his masterful nature and imperious will, which had always inclined to break rather than bend anything which stood in his way; and afraid of something in herself which leapt up in response to this fierce strength in him, yearning to be mastered, hungry to yield, wishful to obey; yet which, if yielded to, would lay her spirit in the dust, and turn the awakened tenderness in her heart to scorn of herself, and anger against him.
So she feared as she stood in the sunshine, watching the now empty archway through which her sole remaining link with Convent life had vanished; conscious, without looking round, that Debbie, who had been curtseying behind her, was there no longer; that Martin Goodfellow, who had held Shulamite's bridle while the Bishop mounted, had disappeared in one direction, the rest of the men in another; intensely conscious that she and Hugh were now alone; and fearing, she shivered again, as she had shivered in the crypt; then, of a sudden, knew that she had done so, and, with a swift impulse of shame and contrition, turned and looked at Hugh.
He was indeed the "splendid Knight" of Mary Antony's vision! He had donned for his bridal the dress of white and silver, which he had last put on when he supped at the Palace with the Bishop. This set off, with striking effect, his dark head and the noble beauty of his countenance; and Mora, who chiefly remembered him as a handsome youth, graceful and gay, realised for the first time his splendour as a man, and the change wrought in him by all he had faced, endured, and overcome.
In the crypt, the day before, and during the hours which followed, she had scarce let herself look at him; and he, though always close beside her, had kept out of her immediate range of vision.
Since that infolding clasp in the crypt when he had flung the cloak about her, not once had he touched her, until the Church just now bade him, with authority, to take her right hand, with his.
Her mind flew back to the happenings of the previous day. With the lightning rapidity of retrospective thought, she passed again through each experience from the moment when the call of the blackbird sounded in the crypt. The helpless horror of being lifted by unseen hands; the slow, swinging progress, to the accompaniment of the measured tread of the men-at-arms; the stifling darkness, air and light shut out by the heavy cloak, and yet the clear consciousness of the moment when the stretcher passed from the Cathedral into the sunshine without; the sudden pause, as the Bishop met the stretcher, and then—as she lay helpless between them—Symon's question and Hugh's reply, with their subtlety of hidden meaning, which filled her with impotent anger, shewing as it did the completeness of the Bishop's connivance at Hugh's conspiracy. Then Hugh's request, and the Bishop's hand laid upon her, the Bishop's voice uplifted in blessing. Then once again the measured tramp, tramp, and the steady swing of the stretcher; but now the men's heels rang on cobbles, and voices seemed everywhere; cheery greetings, snatches of song, chance words concerning a bargain or a meeting, a light jest, a coarse oath; and, all the while, the steady, tramp, tramp, and the ring of Hugh's spurs.
She grew faint and it seemed to her she was about to die beneath the cloak, and that when at length Hugh removed it, it would prove a pall beneath which he would find a dead bride.
"Dead bride! Dead bride!" sounded the tramping footsteps. And all the way she was haunted by the belief, assailing her confused senses in the darkness, that the spirit of Father Gervaise had met the stretcher; that his was the voice which murmured low and tenderly; "Be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed. Go in peace."
With this had come a horror of the outer world, a wild desire for the safety and shelter of the Cloister, and an absolute physical dread of the moment when the covering cloak should be removed, and she would find herself alone with her lover; and, on rising from the stretcher, be seized by his arms.
Yet when, having been tilted up steps, she was conscious of the silence of passages and soon the even more complete quiet of a room; when the stretcher was set down, and the bearers' feet died away, Hugh's deep voice said gently: "Change thy garments quickly, my belovèd. There is no time to lose." But he laid no hand upon the cloak, and his footsteps, also, died away.
Then pushing back the heavy folds and sitting up, she had found herself alone in a bedchamber, everything she could need laid ready to her hand; while, upon the bed, lay her green riding-dress, discarded forever, eight years before!
Her mind refused to look back upon the half-hour that followed.
She saw herself next appearing in the doorway at the top of a flight of eight steps, leading down into the yard of the hostelry, where a cavalcade of men and horses waited; while Icon, the Bishop's beautiful white palfrey, was being led to and fro, and Hugh stood with an open letter in his hand.
As she hesitated in the doorway, gazing down upon the waiting, restive crowd, Hugh looked up and saw her. Into his eyes flashed a light of triumphant joy, of adoring love and admiration. She had avoided looking at her own reflection; but his face, as he came up the steps, mirrored her loveliness. It had cost her such anguish of soul to divest herself of her sacred habit and don these gay garments belonging to a life long left behind, that his evident delight in the change, moved her to an unreasonable resentment. Also that sudden blaze of love in his dark eyes, dazzled her heart, even as a burst of sunshine might dazzle one used to perpetual twilight.
She took the Bishop's letter, with averted eyes; read it; then moved swiftly down the steps to where Icon waited.
"Mount me," she said to Martin Goodfellow, as she passed him; and it was Martin who swung her into the saddle.
Then she trembled at what she had done, in yielding to this impulse which made her shrink from Hugh.
As the black mane of his horse drew level with Icon's head, and side by side they rode out from the courtyard, she feared a thunder-cloud on the Knight's brow, and a sullen silence, as the best she could expect. But calm and cheerful, his voice fell on her ear; and glancing at him furtively, she still saw on his face that light which dazzled her heart. Yet no word did he speak which all might not have heard, and not once did he lay his hand on hers. Each time they dismounted, she saw him sign to Martin Goodfellow, and it was Martin who helped her to alight.
All this, in rapid retrospect, passed through Mora's mind as she stood alone beside her splendid Knight, miserably conscious that she had shivered, and that he knew it; and fearful lest he divined the shrinking of her soul away from him, away from love, away from all for which love stood. Alas, alas! Why did this man—this most human, ardent, loving man—hang all his hopes of happiness upon the heart of a nun? Would it be possible that he should understand, that eight years of cloistered life cannot be renounced in a day?
Mora looked at him again.
The stern profile might well be about to say: "Shudder again, and I will do to thee that which shall give thee cause to shudder indeed!"
Yet, at that moment he spoke, and his voice was infinitely gentle.
"Yonder rides a true friend," he said. "One who has learned love's deepest lesson."
"What is love's deepest lesson?" she asked.
He turned and looked at her, and the fire of his dark eyes was drowned in tenderness.
"That true love means self-sacrifice," he said. "Come, my belovèd. Let us walk in the gardens, where we can talk at ease of our plans for the days to come."
CHAPTER XL
THE HEART OF A NUN
Hugh and Mora passed together through the great hall, along the armoury, down the winding stair and so out into the gardens.
The Knight led the way across the lawn and through the rose garden, toward the yew hedge and the bowling-green.
Old Debbie, looking from her casement, thought them beautiful beyond words as she watched them cross the lawn—she in white and gold, he in white and silver; his dark head towering above her fair one, though she was uncommon tall. And, falling upon her knees, old Debbie prayed to the Angel Gabriel that she might live to hold in her arms, and rock to sleep upon her bosom, sweet babes, both fair and dark: "Fair little maids," she said, "and fine, dark boys," explaining to Gabriel that which she thought would be most fit.
Meanwhile Hugh and Mora, walking a yard apart—all unconscious of these family plans, being so anxiously made for them at an upper casement—bent their tall heads and passed under the arch in the yew hedge, crossed the bowling-green, and entered the arbour of the golden roses.
Hugh led the way; yet Mora gladly followed. The Bishop's presence seemed to abide here, in comfort and protection.
All signs of the early repast were gone from the rustic table.
Mora took her seat there where in the early morning she had sat; while
Hugh, not knowing he did so, passed into the Bishop's place.
The sun shone through the golden roses, hanging in clusters over the entrance.
The sense of the Bishop's presence so strongly pervaded the place, that almost at once Mora felt constrained to speak of him.
"Hugh," she said, "very early this morning, long before you were awake, the Bishop and I broke our fast, in this arbour, together."
The Knight smiled.
"I knew that," he said. "In his own characteristic way the Bishop told it me. 'My son,' he said, 'you have reversed the sacred parable. In your case it was the bride-groom who, this morning, slumbered and slept.' 'True, my lord,' said I. 'But there were no foolish virgins about.' 'Nay, verily!' replied the Bishop. 'The two virgins awake at that hour were pre-eminently wise: the one, making as the sun rose most golden pats of butter and crusty rolls; the other, rising early to partake of them with appetite. Truly there were no foolish virgins about. There was but one foolish prelate.'"
She, who so lately had been Prioress of the White Ladies, flushed with indignation at the words.
"Wherefore said he so?" she inquired, severely. "He, who is always wiser than the wisest."
Hugh noted the heightened colour and the ready protest.
"Perhaps," he suggested, speaking slowly, as if choosing his words with care, "the Bishop's head, being so wise, revealed to him, in himself, a certain foolishness of heart."
Mora struck the table with her hand.
"Nay then, verily!" she cried. "Head and heart alike are wise; and—unlike other men—the Bishop's head rules his heart."
"And a most noble heart,", the Knight said, with calmness; neither wincing at the blow upon the table, nor at the "unlike other men," flung out in challenge.
Then, folding his arms upon the table, and looking searchingly into the face of his bride: "Tell me," he said, "during all these years, has this friendship with Symon of Worcester meant much to thee?"
Something in his tone arrested Mora. She answered, with an equal earnestness: "Yes, Hugh. It has done more for me than can well be told. It has kept living and growing in me much that would otherwise have been stunted or dead; an ever fresh flow of thought, where, but for him, would have been a stagnant pool. My sad heart might have grown bitter, my nature too austere, particularly when advancement to high office brought with it an inevitable loneliness, had it not been for the interest and charm of his visits and missives; his constant gifts and kindness. There is about him a light-hearted gaiety, a whimsical humour, a joy in life, which cannot fail to wake responsive gladness in any heart with which he comes in contact. And mingled with his shrewd wisdom, his wide knowledge of men and matters, there is ever a tender charity, which thinks no evil, always believing in good and hoping for the best; a love which never fails; a kindness which makes one ashamed of harbouring hard or revengeful thoughts."
Hugh made no reply. He sat with his eyes fixed upon the beautiful face before him, now glowing with enthusiasm. He waited for something more. And presently it came.
"Also," said Mora, slowly: "a very precious memory of my early days at Court, when as a young maiden I attended on the Queen, was kept alive by a remarkable likeness in the Bishop to one who was, as I learned this morning for the first time, actually near of kin to him. Do you remember, Hugh, long years ago, that I spoke to you of Father Gervaise?"
"I do remember," said the Knight.
She leaned her elbows on the table, framed her face in her hands, and looked straight into his eyes.
"Father Gervaise was more to me than I then told you, Hugh."
"What was he to thee, Mora?"
"He was the Ideal of my girlhood. For a time, I thought of him by day, I dreamed of him by night. No word of his have I ever forgotten. Many of his sayings and precepts have influenced, and still deeply influence, my whole life. In fact, Hugh, I loved Father Gervaise; not as a woman loves a man—ah, no! But, rather, as a nun loves her Lord."
"I see," said the Knight. "But you were not then a nun, Mora."
"No, I was not then a nun. But I have been a nun since then; and that is how I can best describe my love for the Queen's Confessor."
"Long after," said the Knight, "you were betrothed to me?"
"Yes, Hugh."
"How did you love me, Mora?"
Across the rustic table they looked full into each other's eyes. Tragedy, stalking around that rose-covered arbour, drew very near, and they knew it. Almost, his grim shadow came between them and the sunshine.
Then the Knight smiled; and with that smile rushed back the flood-tide of remembrance; remembrance of all which their young love had meant, of the sweet promise it had held.
His eyes still holding hers, she smiled also.
The golden roses clustering in the entrance swayed and nodded in the sunlight, as a gently rising breeze fanned them to and fro.
"Dear Knight," she said, softly, a wistful tenderness in her voice, "I suppose I loved you, as a girl loves the man who has won her."
"Mora," said Hugh, "I have something to tell thee."
"I listen," she said.
"My wife—so wholly, so completely, do I love thee, that I would not consciously keep anything from thee. So deeply do I love thee, that I would sooner any wrong or sin of mine were known to thee and by thee forgiven, than that thou shouldest think me one whit better than I am."
He paused.
Her eyes were tender and compassionate. Often she had listened, with a patient heart of charity, to the tedious, morbid, self-centred confessions of kneeling nuns, who watched with anxious eyes for the sign which would mean that they might clutch at the hem of her robe and press it to their lips in token that they were forgiven.
But she had had no experience of the sins of men. What had the "splendid Knight" upon his conscience, which must now be told her, in this sunny arbour, on the morning of their bridal day?
Her heart throbbed painfully. Alas, it was still the heart of a nun. It would not be controlled. Must she hear wild tales of wickedness and shame, of which she would but partly understand the meaning?
Oh, for the calm of the Cloister! Oh, for the sheltered purity of her quiet cell!
Yet his eyes, still meeting hers, were clear and fearless.
"I listen," she said.
"Mora, not long ago a wondrous tale was told me of a man's great love for thee—a man, nobler than I, in that he mastered all selfish desires; a love higher than mine, in that it put thy welfare, in all things, first. Hearing this tale, I failed both myself and thee, for I said: 'I pray heaven that, if she come to me, she may never know that she once won the love of so greatly better a man than I.' But, since I clasped thy hand in mine, and the Bishop, laying his on either side, gave thee to be my wife, I have known there would be no peace for me if I feared to trust thee with this knowledge, because that the man who loved thee was a better man than the man who, by God's mercy and our Lady's grace, has won thee."
As the Knight spoke thus, the grey eyes fixed on his face grew wide with wonder; soft, with a great compunction; yet, at the corners, shewed a little crinkle in which the Bishop would instantly have recognised the sign of approaching merriment.
Was this then a sample of the unknown sins of men? Nothing here, surely, to cause the least throb of apprehension, even to the heart of a nun! But what strange tale had reached the ears of this most dear and loyal Knight? She leaned a little nearer to him, speaking in a tone which was music to his heart.
"Dear Knight of mine," she said, "no tale of a man's love for me can have been a true one. Yet am I glad that, deeming it true, and feeling as it was your first impulse to feel, you now tell me quite frankly what you felt, thus putting from yourself all sense of wrong, while giving me the chance to say to you, that none more noble than this faithful Knight can have loved me; for, saving a few Court pages, mostly popinjays, and Humphry of Camforth, of whom the less said the better, no other man hath loved me."
More kindly she looked on him than she yet had looked. She leaned across the table.
By reaching out his arms he could have caught her lovely face between his hands.
Her eyes were merry. Her lips smiled.
Greatly tempted was the Knight to agree that, saving himself, and Humphry of Camforth, of whom the less said the better, none save Court popinjays had loved her. Yet in his heart he knew that ever between them would be this fact of his knowledge of the love of Father Gervaise for her, and of the noble renunciation inspired by that love. He had no intention of betraying the Bishop; but Mora's own explanation, making it quite clear that she would not be likely to suspect the identity of the Bishop with his supposed cousin, Father Gervaise, seemed to the Knight to remove the one possible reason for concealment. He was willing to risk present loss, rather than imperil future peace.
With an effort which made his voice almost stern: "The tale was a true one," he said.
She drew back, regarding him with grave eyes, her hands folded before her.
"Tell me the tale," she said, "and I will pronounce upon its truth."
"Years ago, Mora, when you were a young maiden at the Court, attending on the Queen, you were most deeply loved by one who knew he could never ask you in marriage. That being so, so noble was his nature and so unselfish his love, that he would not give himself the delight of seeing you, nor the enjoyment of your friendship, lest, being so strong a thing, his love—even though unexpressed—should reach and stir your heart to a response which, might hinder you from feeling free to give yourself, when a man who could offer all sought to win you. Therefore, Mora, he left the Court, he left the country. He went to foreign lands. He thought not of himself. He desired for you the full completion which comes by means of wedded love. He feared to hinder this. So he went."
Her face still expressed incredulous astonishment.
"His name?" she demanded, awaiting the answer with parted lips, and widely-open eyes.
"Father Gervaise," said the Knight.
He saw her slowly whiten, till scarce a vestige of colour remained.
For some minutes she spoke no word; both sat silent, Hugh ruefully facing his risks, and inclined to repent of his honesty.
At length: "And who told you this tale," she said; "this tale of the love of Father Gervaise for a young maid, half his age?"
"Symon of Worcester told it me, three nights ago."
"How came the Bishop to know so strange and so secret a thing? And knowing it, how came he to tell it to you?"
"He had it from Father Gervaise himself. He told it to me, because his remembrance of the sacrifice made so long ago in order that the full completion of wifehood and motherhood might be thine, had always inclined him to a wistful regret over thy choice of the monastic life, with its resultant celibacy; leading him, from the first, to espouse and further my cause. In wedding us to-day, methinks the Bishop felt he was at last securing the consummation of the noble renunciation made so long ago by Father Gervaise."
With a growing dread at his heart, Hugh watched the increasing pallor of her face, the hard line of the lips which, but a few moments before, had parted in such gentle sweetness.
"Alas!" he exclaimed, "I should not have told thee! With my clumsy desire to keep nothing from thee, I have spoilt an hour which else might have been so perfect."
"You did well to tell me, dear Knight of mine," she said, a ripple of tenderness passing across her stern face, as swiftly and gently as the breeze stirs a cornfield. "Nor is there anything in this world so perfect as the truth. If the truth opened an abyss which plunged me into hell, I would sooner know it, than attempt to enter Paradise across the flimsy fabric of a lie!"
Her voice, as she uttered these words, had in it the ring which was wont to petrify wrong-doers of the feebler kind among her nuns.
"Dear Knight, had the Bishop not forestalled me when he named his palfrey, truly I might have found a fine new name for you! But now, I pray you of your kindness, leave me alone with my fallen image for a little space, that I may gather up the fragments and give them decent burial."
With which her courage broke. She stretched her clasped hands across the table and laid her head upon her arms.
Despair seized the Knight as he stood helpless, looking down upon that proud head laid low.
He longed to lay his hand upon the golden softness of her hair.
But her shoulders shook with a hard, tearless sob, and the Knight fled from the arbour.
As he paced the lawn, on which the Bishop had promenaded the evening before, Hugh cursed his rashness in speaking; yet knew, in the heart of his heart, that he could not have done otherwise. Mora's words concerning truth, gave him a background of comfort. Even so had he ever himself felt. But would it prove that his honesty had indeed shattered his chances of happiness, and hers?
A new name? . . . What might it be? . . . What the mischief, had the
Bishop named his palfrey? . . . Sheba? Nay, that was the ass!
Solomon? Nay, that was the mare! Yet—how came a mare to be named
Solomon?
In his disturbed mental state it irritated him unreasonably that a mare should be called after a king with seven hundred wives! Then he remembered "black, but comely," and arrived at the right name, Shulamite. Of course! Not Solomon but Shulamite. He had read that love-poem of the unnamed Eastern shepherd, with the Rabbi in the mountain fastness. The Rabbi had pointed out that the word used in that description signified "sunburned." The lovely Shulamite maiden, exposed to the Eastern sun while tending her kids and keeping the vineyards, had tanned a ruddy brown, beside which the daughters of Jerusalem, enclosed in King Solomon's scented harem, looked pale as wilting lilies. Remembering the glossy coat of the black mare, Hugh wondered, with a momentary sense of merriment, whether the Bishop supposed the maiden of the "Song of Songs" to have been an Ethiopian.
Then he remembered "Iconoklastes." Yes, surely! The palfrey was Iconoklastes. Now wherefore gave the Bishop such a name to his white palfrey?
Striding blindly about the lawn, of a sudden the Knight stepped full on to a flower-bed. At once he seemed to hear the Bishop's gentle voice: "I named him Iconoklastes because he trampled to ruin some flower-beds on which I spent much time and care, and of which I was inordinately fond."
Ah! . . . That was it! The destroyer of fair bloom and blossom, of buds of promise; of the loveliness of a tended garden. . . . Was this then what he seemed to Mora? He, who had forced her to yield to the insistence of his love? . . . In her chaste Convent cell, she could have remained true to this Ideal love of her girlhood: and, now that she knew it to have been called forth by love, could have received, mentally, its full fruition. Also, in time she might have discovered the identity of the Bishop with Father Gervaise, and long years of perfect friendship might have proved a solace to their sundered hearts, had not he—the trampler upon flower-beds—rudely intervened.
And yet—Mora had been betrothed to him, her love had been his, long after Father Gervaise had left the land.
How could he win her back to be once more as she was when they parted on the castle battlements eight years before?
How could he free himself, and her, from these intangible, ecclesiastical entanglements?
He was reminded of his difficulties when he tried to walk disguised in the dress of the White Ladies, and found his stride impeded by those trailing garments. He remembered the relief of wrenching them off, and stepping clear.
Why not now take the short, quick road to mastery?
But instantly that love which seeketh not its own, the strange new sense so recently awakened in him, laid its calm touch upon his throbbing heart. Until that moment in the crypt the day before, he had loved Mora for his own delight, sought her for his own joy. Now, he knew that he could take no happiness at the cost of one pang to her.
"She must be taught not to shudder," cried the masterfulness which was his by nature.
"She must be given no cause to shudder," amended this new, loyal tenderness, which now ruled his every thought of her.
Presently, returning to the arbour, he found her seated, her elbows on the table, her chin cupped in her hands.
She had been weeping; yet her smile of welcome, as he entered, held a quality he had scarce expected.
He spoke straight to the point. It seemed the only way to step clear of immeshing trammels.
"Mora, it cuts me to the heart that, in striving to be honest with you, I have all unwittingly trampled upon those flower-beds in which you long had tended fair blossoms of memory. Also I fear this knowledge of a nobler love, makes it hard for you to contemplate life linked to a love which seems to you less able for self-sacrifice."
She gazed at him, wide-eyed, in sheer amazement.
"Dear Knight," she said, "true, I am disillusioned, but not in aught that concerns you. You trampled on no flower-beds of mine. My shattered idol is the image of one whom I, with deepest reverence, loved, as a nun might love her Guardian Angel. To learn that he loved me as a man loves a woman, and that he had to flee before that love, lest it should harm me and himself, changes the hallowed memory of years. This morning, three names stood to me for all that is highest, noblest, best: Father Gervaise, Symon of Worcester, and Hugh d'Argent. Now, the Bishop and yourself alone are left. Fail me not, Hugh, or I shall be bereft indeed."
The Knight laughed, joyously. The relief at his heart demanded that much vent. "Then, if I failed thee, Mora, there would be but the Bishop?"
"There would be but the Bishop."
"I will not fail thee, my belovèd. And I fear I must have put the matter clumsily, concerning Father Gervaise. As the Bishop told it to me, there was naught that was not noble. It seemed to me it should be sweet to the heart of a woman to be so loved."
"Hush," she said, sternly. "You know not the heart of a nun."
He did not reason further. It was enough for him to know that the shattered image she had buried was not the ideal of his love and hers, or the hope of future happiness together.
"Time flies, dear Heart," he said. "May I speak to thee of immediate plans?"
"I listen," she answered.
Hugh stood in the entrance, among the yellow roses, leaning against the doorpost, his arms folded on his breast, his feet crossed.
At once she was reminded of the scene in her cell, when he had taken up that attitude while still garbed as a nun, and she had said: "I know you for a man," and, in her heart had added: "And a stronger man, surely, than Mary Seraphine's Cousin Wilfred!"
"We ride on to-day," said the Knight, "if you feel able for a few hours in the saddle, to the next stage in our journey. It is a hostel in the forest; a poor kind of place, I fear; but there is one good room where you can be made comfortable, with Mistress Deborah. I shall sleep on the hay, without, amongst my men. Some must keep guard all night. We ride through wild parts to reach our destination."
He paused. He could not hold on to the matter of fact tones in which he had started. When he spoke again, his voice was low and very tender.
"Mora, I am taking thee first to thine own home; to the place where, long years ago, we loved and parted. There, all is as it was. Thy people who loved thee and had fled, have been found and brought back. Seven days of journeying should bring us there. I have sent men on before, to arrange for each night's lodging, and make sure that all is right. Arrived at thine own castle, Mora, we shall be within three hours' ride of mine—that home to which I hope to bring thee. Until we enter there, my wife, although this morning most truly wed, we will count ourselves but betrothed. Once in thy home, it shall be left to thine own choice to come to mine when and how thou wilt. The step now taken—that of leaving the Cloister and coming to me—had perforce to be done quickly, if done at all. But, now it is safely accomplished, there is no further need for haste. The wings of my swift desire shall be dipt to suit thine inclination."
Hugh paused, looking upon her with a half-wistful smile. She made no answer; so presently he continued.
"I have planned that, each day, Mistress Deborah, with the baggage and a good escort, shall go by the most direct route, and the best road. Thus thou and I will be free to ride as we will, visiting places we have known of old and which it may please thee to see again. To-day we can ride out by Kenilworth, and so on our first stage northward. Martin will take Mistress Deborah on a pillion behind him. Should she weary of travelling so, she can have a seat in the cart with the baggage. But they tell me she travels bravely on horseback. We will send them on ahead of us, and on arrival all will be in readiness for thee. If this weather holds, we shall ride each day through a world of sunshine and beauty; and each day's close, my wife, will find us one day nearer home. Does this please thee? Have I thought of all?"
Rising, she came and stood beside him in the entrance to the arbour.
A golden rose, dipping from above, rested against her hair.
Her eyes were soft with tears.
"So perfectly have you thought and planned, dear faithful Knight, that I think our blessèd Lady must have guided you. As we ride out into the sunshine, I shall grow used to the great world once more; and you will have patience and will teach me things I have perhaps forgot."
She hesitated; half put out her hands; but his not meeting them, folded them on her breast.
"Hugh, it seems hard that I should clip your splendid wings; but—oh, Hugh! Think you the heart of a nun can ever become again as the heart of other women?"
"Heaven forbid!" said the Knight, fervently, thinking of Eleanor and
Alfrida.
And, as leaving the arbour they walked together over the lawn, she smiled, remembering, how that morning the Bishop had answered the same question in precisely the same words. Whatever Father Gervaise might have said, the Bishop and the Knight were agreed!
Yet she wished, somewhat wistfully, that this most dear and loyal
Knight had taken her hands when she held them out.
She would have liked to feel the strong clasp of his upon them.
Possibly our Lady, who knoweth the heart of a woman, had guided the
Knight in this matter also.
CHAPTER XLI
WHAT THE BISHOP REMEMBERED
Symon, Bishop of Worcester, sat in his library, in the cool of the day.
He was weary, with a weariness which surpassed all his previous experience of weariness, all his imaginings as to how weary, in body and spirit, a man could be, yet continue to breathe and think.
With some, extreme fatigue leads to restlessness of body. Not so with the Bishop. The more tired he was, the more perfectly still he sat; his knees crossed, his elbows on the arms of his chair, the fingers of both hands pressed lightly together, his head resting against the high back of the chair, his gaze fixed upon the view across the river.
As he looked with unseeing eyes upon the wide stretch of meadow, the distant woods and the soft outline of the Malvern hills, he was thinking how good it would be never again to leave this quiet room; never to move from this chair; never again to see a human being; never to have to smile when he was heart-sick, or to bow when he felt ungracious!
Those who knew the Bishop best, often spoke together of his wondrous vitality and energy, their favourite remark being: that he was never tired. They might with more truth have said that they had never known him to appear tired.
It had long been a rule in the Bishop's private code, that weariness, either of body or spirit, must not be shewn to others. The more tired he was, the more ready grew his smile, the more alert his movements, the more gracious his response to any call upon his sympathy or interest.
He never sighed in company, as did Father Peter when, having supped too well off jolly of salmon, roast venison, and raisin pie, he was fain to let indigestion pass muster for melancholy.
He never yawned in Council, either gracefully behind his hand, as did the lean Spanish Cardinal; or openly and unashamed, as did the round and rosy Abbot of Evesham, displaying to the fascinated gaze of the brethren in stalls opposite, a cavernous throat, a red and healthy tongue, and a particularly fine set of teeth.
Moreover the Bishop would as soon have thought of carrying a garment from the body of a plague-stricken patient into the midst of a family of healthy children, as of entering an assemblage with a jaded countenance or a languorous manner.
Therefore: "He is never weary," said his friends.
"He knoweth not the meaning of fatigue," agreed his acquaintances.
"There is no merit in labour which is not in anywise a burden, but, rather, a delight," pronounced those who envied his powers.
"He is possessed," sneered his enemies, "by a most energetic demon!
Were that demon exorcised, the Bishop would collapse, exhausted."
"He is filled," said his admirers, "by the Spirit of God, and is thus so energized that he can work incessantly, without experiencing ordinary human weakness."
And none knew that it was a part of his religion to Symon of Worcester, to hide his weariness from others.
Yet once when, in her chamber, he sat talking with the Prioress, she had risen, of a sudden, saying: "You are tired, Father. Rest there in silence, while I work at my missal."
She had passed to the table; and the Bishop had sat resting, just as he was sitting now, save that his eyes could then dwell on her face, as she bent, absorbed, over the illumination.
After a while he had asked: "How knew you that I was tired, my dear
Prioress?"
Without lifting her eyes, she had made answer: "Because, my Lord
Bishop, you twice smiled when there was no occasion for smiling."
Another period of restful silence, while she worked, and he watched her working. Then he had remarked: "My friends say I am never tired."
And she had answered: "They would speak more truly if they said that you are ever brave."
It had amazed the Bishop to find himself thus understood. Moreover he could scarce put on his biretta, so crowned was his head by the laurels of her praise. Also this had been the only time when he had wondered whether the Prioress really believed Father Gervaise to be at the bottom of the ocean. It is ever an astonishment to a man when the unerring intuition of a woman is brought to bear upon himself.
Now, in this hour of his overwhelming fatigue, he recalled that scene. Closing his eyes on the distant view, and opening them upon the enchanted vistas of memory, he speedily saw that calm face, with its chastened expression of fine self-control, bending above the page she was illuminating. He saw the severe lines of the wimple, the folds of the flowing veil, the delicate movement of the long fingers, and—yes!—resting upon her bosom the jewelled cross, sign of her high office.
Thus looking back, he vividly recalled the extraordinary restfulness of sitting there in silence, while she worked. No words were needed. Her very presence, and the fact that she knew him to be weary, rested him.
He looked again. But now the folds of the wimple and veil were gone.
A golden circlet clasped the shining softness of her hair.
The Bishop opened tired eyes, and fixed them once again upon the landscape.
He supposed the long rides on two successive days had exhausted him physically; and the strain of securing and ensuring the safety and happiness of the woman who was dearer to him than life, had reacted now in a mental lassitude which seemed unable to rise up and face the prospect of the lonely years to come.
The thought of her as now with the Knight, did not cause him suffering. His one anxiety was lest anything unforeseen should arise, to prevent the full fruition of their happiness.
He had never loved her as a man loves the woman he would wed;—at least, if that side of his love had attempted to arise, it had instantly been throttled and flung back.
It seemed to him that, from the very beginning he had ever loved her as Saint Joseph must have loved the maiden intrusted to his keeping—his, yet not his; called, in the inspired dream, "Mary, thy wife"; but so called only that he might have the right to guard and care for her—she who was shrine of the Holiest, o'ershadowed by the power of the Highest; Mother of God, most blessèd Virgin forever.
It seemed to the Bishop that his joy in watching over Mora, since his appointment to the See of Worcester, had been such as Saint Joseph could well have understood; and now he had accomplished the supreme thing; and, in so doing, had left himself desolate.
On the afternoon of the previous day, so soon as the body of the old lay-sister had been removed from the Prioress's cell, the Bishop had gathered together all those things which Mora specially valued and which she had asked him to secure for her; mostly his gifts to her.
The Sacramentaries, from which she so often made copies and translations, now lay upon his table.
His tired eyes dwelt upon them. How often he had watched the firm white fingers opening those heavy clasps, and slowly turning the pages.
The books remained; yet her presence was gone.
His weary brain repeated, over and over, this obvious fact; then began a hypothetical reversal of it. Supposing the books had gone, and her presence had remained? . . . Presently a catalogue formed itself in his mind of all those things which might have gone, unmissed, unmourned, if her dear presence had remained. . . . Before long the Palace . . . the City . . . the Cathedral itself . . . all had swelled the list. . . . He was alone with Mora and the sunset; . . . and the battlements of glory were the radiant walls of heaven; . . . and soon he and she were walking up old Mary Antony's golden stair together. . . .
Hush! . . . "So He giveth His belovèd sleep."
* * * * * *
The Bishop had but just returned from laying to rest, in the burying-ground of the Convent, the worn-out body of the aged lay-sister.
When he had signified that he intended himself to perform the last rites, Mother Sub-Prioress had ventured upon amazed expostulation.
Such an honour had never, in the history of the Community, been accorded even to the Canonesses, much less to a lay-sister. Surely Father Peter—or the Prior? Had it been the Prioress herself, why then——
Few can remember the petrifying effect of a flash of sudden anger in the kindly eyes of Symon of Worcester. Mother Sub-Prioress will never forget it.
So, with as much pomp and circumstance as if she had been Prioress of the White Ladies, old Mary Antony's humble remains were laid in that plot in the Convent burying-ground which she had chosen for herself, half a century before.
Much sorrow was shewn, by the entire Community. The great loss they had sustained by the mysterious passing of the Prioress from their midst, weighed heavily upon them; and seemed, in some way which they could not fathom, to be connected with the death of the old lay-sister.
As the solemn procession slowly wended its way from the Chapel, along the Cypress Walk, and so, across the orchard, to the burying-ground, the tears which ran down the chastened faces of the nuns, were as much a tribute of love to their late Prioress, as a sign of sorrow for the loss of Mary Antony. The little company of lay-sisters sobbed without restraint. Sister Abigail, so often called "noisy hussy" by old Antony, fully, on this final occasion, justified the name.
As the procession was re-forming to leave the grave, Sister Mary Seraphine felt that the moment had now arrived, old Antony being disposed of, when she might suitably become the centre of attention, and be carried, on the return journey. She therefore fell prone upon the ground, in a fainting fit.
The Bishop, his chaplain, the priests and acolytes, paused uncertain what to do.
Sister Teresa, and other nuns, would have hastened to raise her, but the command of Mother Sub-Prioress rang sharp and clear.
"Let her lie! If she choose to remain with the Dead, it is but small loss to the Living."
And with hands devoutly crossed upon her breast, ferret face peering to right and left from out the curtain of her veil, Mother Sub-Prioress moved forward at the head of the nuns.