Montjoy--yes, Montjoy!
A house that he had loved came down about Montjoy’s ears. A garden that
he had tended the swine rooted up. One came and threw filth against his
Love.
He seemed to understand this monk and the monk to understand him. For
an instant they were brothers in suffering and rage.
Sow it with salt--Silver Cross!
Abbot Mark and Prior Matthew. Who best to send to cardinal and to Rome
on that business? Procure their degradation! Have them cursed with
bell, book and candle!
The whore--let her be burned slowly until she was ashes!
_O Isabel--Isabel--Isabel!_
O Kingdom of Heaven that hath suffered wrong!
Montjoy sat with a working face. He sat in his great chair on the dais
in castle hall and his hands gripped the arms of the chair. At last he
spoke with voice of one underground who has fire still but has lost the
light of day. “Well, as for thee, monk--”
“Give me, no more, that name!” cried the man addressed. “The monk is
dead. I am Richard Englefield, the Smith!”
At that moment entered bruit of the arrival of Abbot and Prior. “Yes,
yes, let us see them!” said Montjoy, and who knows what hope sprang up
in his heart. He believed Richard Englefield, but there pressed against
his belief all the weight of old, loved Silver Cross, and the weight
of the priest and the weight of Mother Church. Things happened, vile
things, as they happened in Kingdom, in Nobility and Knighthood. But
for all that Knighthood was heroic and Holy Church holy. Child could
not go against mother, lover against beloved. Let us at any rate hear
what this Iscariot Abbot and Prior shall say! And with that rolled for
the first time upon Montjoy’s mind Saint Leofric, and he heard the joy
of Hugh who was not discovered. “That this vileness that he saith were
not true!” cried Montjoy within. “O Isabel, that it were not true!”
_Morgen Fay!_ The Lord of Montjoy was dead ember there, and all the
breathing of Morgen Fay might not relume. “O High God, I would live
cleanly! That harlot, wherever she is, doth always only evil!”
Silver Cross--Silver Cross! The church, Isabel’s tomb and the great
picture. He saw that Morgen Fay could have played it because she had
the height and faintly, faintly the face. Isabel was the true likeness
and Morgen Fay the false, the evil. “Let her burn, who deserveth it if
ever any did!”
Silver Cross, and cold wretchedness and grinning, mocking Satan if it
were no better than Saint Leofric! Mark a kinsman, too. All honour
smirched!
Again his eyes were for Richard Englefield. To have believed that
Heaven had singled you out--to have had vast raptures of mind and
heart, all fragrance, all flavour, all light, all music, all warmth,
all lifting--to have fallen at the feet of the Brightest Star, to
have had the honey of touch and the honey of word and the honey of
smile, and knowledge that all was immortal and holy, all was heavenly
true!--to have had that and believed it eternal--and then to have
fallen, fallen, gulf upon gulf, dreary world by dreary world, to last
mire and stubble, nay, past that into caverns of hell--
Abbot Mark came into the hall, he and Prior Matthew, and behind them
Brothers Anselm and Norbert with Walter the leech and six besides. Out
of these monks five at least knew only that the fiend had made sortie
against and taken and poured madness upon the holy man, yesterday the
pride, the boast, of Silver Cross. Abbot Mark--large, authoritative,
stately--showed pallor indeed, but also concern and innocency and high
unawareness that Silver Cross did or could stand in any danger. As for
Prior Matthew, he stood and moved, red, dry, cool, collected, always
a man with a head. Abbey monks, drawing together, looked trustingly
upon their Superiors and pityingly, it was seen, upon Brother Richard,
standing very gaunt and ghastly white, with blazing eyes.
Montjoy faced that entry. All Silver Cross with long venerableness
and power, great church of Silver Cross, the jewel windows, the
picture, the sculptured Isabel upon her tomb entered also castle hall
and drowned it into vaster space and into significances otherwise
and potent. Something of rigidity went out of the lord of Montjoy.
Trust--trust!
Friar Martin, the Black Friar, saw it go--clouds again mounting against
Saint Leofric. And all the hall full of people, hanging divided in
wish and thought! He felt it running through, “Was it not monstrous,
unthinkable--were there not explanations--was it reasonable now--and
if it was all a cheating show, where was Middle Forest? Why, left
holding a great bag of Loss!” The Black Friar felt, as though he were
Leofric’s Hugh, stricture about the heart. Good Chance was quitting,
the fickle jade!
Yet when Montjoy stepped toward the Abbot, pale Accusation stepped
with him. “Lord Abbot--Lord Abbot, you are in time! You have fouled
Christendom--oh, if you have fouled Christendom!”
But the Abbot seemed not to notice words and mien. He cried, “O
Montjoy, the holy man, good Brother Richard, hath gone mad! Yesterday
he broke into a frightful babbling, the fiend at his ear, the fiends
within him! The morn, Walter the leech leaving him awhile, thinking
that loneliness might do somewhat, he burst window, broke cloister!
Whereupon we ourselves follow him, not knowing what harm he doth to
himself and to all! For alas! he now doubteth the happening of the
Great Miracle and clamoureth that it was the demon. We know, alas! how
at times it happeneth! Overmuch light, the weak soul bending aside
from Heaven-grace, the fiends gathering to torment and perplex, and
were it possible, to defeat light! The warder faints. Madness enters.
Poor soul, alas! yet Heaven did use him! Heaven-grace and the miracle
persists, though for him be madman’s cell--”
He stood, father Abbot, in his large face godly concern for all
awryness. He loomed. All Silver Cross seemed with him, Silver Cross
through the centuries. Three fourths in the hall turned that way. “He
crieth otherwise,” said Montjoy, and with a gesture set Brother Richard
and his Superior face to face.
Cried Richard Englefield, “Thou shameless, false shepherd! Thou lying
Abbot of a rotted fold!”
At which a young monk, Brother Wilfrid, so forgot himself, defending
good, shaming ill, that he rushed against the mad monk. “Son!”
thundered the Abbot and brought Brother Wilfrid to his knees, crying,
“Pardon!”
Truly Richard Englefield maddened. He saw how it would end, and the
legion before him. His vision swam and darkened, light foam came about
his lips. He sent out a loud, hoarse and broken voice. “Fraud! Fraud!
Lord of Montjoy, come to Silver Cross and see!”
The Black Friar, straining forward with the rest, caught at that word,
“Fraud!” He did not dare to echo it aloud, for now, in a moment as
it were, many a hundred year of Silver Cross, many a goodly deed and
use penetrated, reverberated here, large space entering somehow small
space, riving it apart. Old authority, long veneration, the great Abbey
church, Montjoy’s love for it, Middle Forest’s clinging to it--Friar
Martin had thundered one misty afternoon against Montjoy’s doubting of
Saint Leofric. Montjoy had had to down head and slink homeward. Now
Friar Martin wished to shout, “Fraud! Fraud!” and, “It began in envy of
Saint Leofric his great glory!” But he was afraid. There might be no
proof. If the monk were not already mad he would soon be so.
Prior Matthew of Westforest moved a piece. Still, conclusive, calming,
entered his voice. “It is seldom well to take madman’s advice! But here
it seemeth to me well. Lord of Montjoy, you cannot do better than to
ride with us to Silver Cross.”
Lean and strong, and a master chess player, he came to front of the
dais, and lifting voice, entered into explanation of Brother Richard’s
sad illness and of the ways of the fiend who for this time had
overthrown the saintly man. But he would recover--Prior Matthew had no
doubt of it--under Walter the leech’s care, amid his brethren at Silver
Cross, or at Westforest, where was smaller range, stricter solitude. He
should have tendance; he should have prayers. “As for that Presence
that did descend upon him. She the Blessed is not harmed! Men and women
of Middle Forest, the Rose still rests in reliquary, the Healing Well
still heals! Let them that are sick come prove it!”
Edmund the Preacher cried out mightily. “If it be so, still hath the
devil compacted with the harlot, Morgen Fay! How else could the thought
of her, the form of her, enter here? The devil made her to be seen in
monastery cell, thrusting aside True Queen! Seek her out, bind her to
the stake by town cross and burn her! Never else will this countryside
be cleansed!”
Prior Matthew looked with narrowed eyes. “There is truth in what
you say, Edmund the Preacher! Long hath she been great scandal!” He
thought, “Best that she have her cry quickly and be done with it! All
the poison out at once in one dish, not trailing forever, word here and
word there! She set sail, long ago, to come to this end. This year or
next, what matter?”
And he saw that it would make diversion. Let her clamour what she would
of what she had done! It would be the fiend speaking. Silver Cross and
Matthew of Westforest against a mad monk and a harlot!
Silver Cross and Westforest and Montjoy. He saw as in a scroll that
Montjoy would never wholly believe nor yet wholly disbelieve.
Richard Englefield cried again, “Ride at once, Montjoy! They will have
burned ladder and ropes and cloaks and scarfs. But the door behind the
rood--they have not had time there--”
“What is that? What?” cried the Abbot sharply. “Door behind rood?”
“Where was none, door was made between my cell and yonder villain
monk’s! So you sent me for penance to Westforest, so it was done.
Then a great rood, great and black, was set before it. Yea, you used
Christ on the cross for mask! Dim was it in that cell--never had I
light in that cell! Now I have light--now it burns! Aside she pushed
salvation--in she stepped, mincing like a harlot, having taken sugar
for her voice--”
Abbot Mark fairly shrieked with horror. “Oh, if we did not know that it
is Sathanas himself that speaketh, not the poor man whom he hath laid
in bonds! Door--door!” He summoned sub-prior.
“Reverend father, door truly was made, it being once plan to take
the wall down wholly, making of two cells one and using it for an
infirmary. Then it was found that the light was not good, and the plan
was abandoned. Stone was set back in the opening, and true it is that
a rood being about that time placed in each cell, it was fastened, in
this man’s and in Brother Norbert’s, against that wall. Of all his
story it is the only truth! In his madness he must have torn the rood
aside and seen that once there was opening, though now stone-filled
and mortared. After that what Sathanas saith to him God forbid that we
should know or repeat!”
“Shall I believe?” whispered Montjoy. “Shall I not believe? O Isabel--O
Lady near whom moveth Isabel--”
Richard Englefield towered. He stretched his arms, he raised his face.
“O Christ, if thou be true--O Blissful One, Eternal Virgin, if thou be
real--”
But summer sun shone on.
It was Prior Matthew who summed up and delivered judgment in Montjoy’s
hall. “Ride with us now to Silver Cross, Montjoy--and do you come
also, Edmund the Preacher, and you, Master Eustace Bettany, and any and
all others who will! Yea, make throng and procession! What! Shall there
be division between Silver Cross and Middle Forest who have dwelled
together since the Confessor’s day? Sometimes eh, Middle Forest?--we
have quarrelled, but not for long, have we? Ours, after all, one bed
and one hearth! Doth Silver Cross grow rich and great, it is for
Middle Forest. Doth Middle Forest increase, Silver Cross goes smiling.
Remember the saintly abbot--Abbot Robert--and how did he and his monks
when befell the Plague! Remember war, and we stood together. And now
Heaven blesseth both, and Holy Well, a thousand years from now, shall
still be Holy Well!”
He had it now--Mark and he had it in their four hands! If they carried
it carefully, and they would do so, four hands obeying the Prior of
Westforest’s head. Now for the trouble maker, the crazed one who failed
to see or hear Interest though she shouted at him and pulled him by the
robe! Prior Matthew gave a short order to Silver Cross monks. “Take
him!”
Brother Norbert, Brother Anselm, Brother Wilfrid and the others
fell upon Brother Richard. Short, hard struggle, and they had him.
Brother Norbert bound his arms with hempen girdle. As he still shouted
accusations, at the Prior’s nod they gagged him. “Not holy man who
may be holy man again, but Apollyon who now hath seized the tower and
speaketh from the gate!”
Montjoy sat in his lord’s chair and looked straight before him.
Truth, truth--is it not profoundly likely to be here? Were it not
for Hugh of Saint Leofric, could ever he have doubted it? The monk’s
tale,--fantastic, like a romaunt! Say, darkly, it is true; what other
can cry Aye! and strengthen it, or No! and dash it into dreams? _Who
other but Morgen Fay?_
It formed in Montjoy’s mind that that harlot must be found.
Prior Matthew, Brother Richard silenced, had present eyes for the Black
Friar there to one side, standing grimly for Saint Leofric. “Now and
here!” said within the Westforest chess player. Matthew spoke in his
dry, reasonable voice.
“Ride you, too, with us, Friar Martin! You shall have mule. What! Saint
Leofric and Saint Willebrod, be sure they ride together! Shall we not
make England and Christendom ring for that all this corner of earth,
this side river, that side river, Silver Cross and Saint Leofric alike
are blessed? Bridge over river shall be to you and be to us, and I
see it built thick and high with booths and rooms for pilgrims! The
Princess of Spain goes to-day to Saint Leofric’s tomb, to-morrow to
Holy Well! To-day the Dauphin heareth mass in Silver Cross, to-morrow
goeth in procession around Saint Leofric his church! Both ways he
passeth through Middle Forest. Common good--common good! What else is
worth anything in this life? The more massive the bruit, the broader,
higher, shooteth the fame of all!”
It was undeniable! Black Friar thought somewhat surlily, “If I go I
can at least take account of all to Prior Hugh. And there is something
in ‘If you can’t increase apart, increase together’!”
Rested that fanatic, Father Edmund the Preacher. Better always have
Father Edmund preach for you, not against you! He could any time whip
calm sea into storm. The chess player considered him, to whom just now
Morgen Fay, the harlot, stood for all harlotry, whether of brain or
heart. When all heinousness was believed of Morgen Fay, then would the
countryside be roused at last, then would every man, woman and child
become huntsman! Father Edmund meant to continue to believe Brother
Richard’s story. Why not? She was capable of it. Certain abbeys of this
later time were capable. Father Edmund was one to cry under the Pope’s
great window, “Reform! Reform!”
Prior Matthew saw the weather thickening. Presently from that quarter
lightning flash and thunder clap! “Boldness my wisdom!” he breathed.
His dry voice, somehow powder red like his hair and tint, dry, rarely
loud but procuring attention, continued to hold all ears. “As to the
harlot, Morgen Fay, would you have my mind? It is quite likely she be
hidden somewhere within five leagues. Now Sathanas worketh underground
and taketh evil mind to evil mind, or often to weak mind, or to mind
that was Sathanas’ enemy against whom he useth every springe! So to my
thought it hath been here. Heaven permitteth--yes, to try faith, Heaven
permitteth! The fiend works what seemeth victory, good man turning
toward him. Whom doth he use? Yea, there is it! Harlot consenting, he
yesternight taketh her image and with it entereth neither by door nor
window cell of Brother Richard; yea, entereth his mind and his eye and
his ear, his will, his belief and his heart. Brother Richard thinketh,
‘It is the great True Pearl!’ And falleth upon his knees before empty
air, for the devil fixeth images within, not without. But the devil
gives never for proof Holy Well that healeth a score a week! And the
devil hath had only yesternight. Yea, moreover, midway Heaven sendeth
some aid and he that hath been holy man seeth that it is not she who
came before, but stained wax and that the devil cheateth him! Whereat
the devil, that harlot no doubt still aiding, leapeth, greatly angered,
upon his mind, teareth and bruiseth it tiger-wise and bringeth it for
this time into huge confusion and madness. Again Heaven suffereth it,
and suffereth him to cry and accuse as madmen ever cry and accuse,
that by trial of our faith we may all be brought clearer. But Heaven
willeth always that we defeat the fiend and his instruments. Aye,
search for these and grind them small and so grieve and weaken that
Evil One who rides invisible!”
Father Edmund cried. “She said, ‘Aye, aye!’ or the devil could not
use her! Lord of Montjoy, town of Middle Forest, Abbey of Silver
Cross, Priory of Westforest and Priory of Saint Leofric, I, Edmund
the Preacher, summon you by souls’ welfare to join search for the
Plague-spot, the Witch-mark! When she is burned then may the monk
recover his mind, then may the True Pearl, the Very Rose, show again,
the toad be banished from the Holy Well, Saint Leofric and Saint
Willebrod be sworn brothers, Montjoy give again with joy to Silver
Cross, Middle Forest prosper, and all England and the Princess of Spain
and the Dauphin come in pilgrimage!”