"And like a double cherry--seeming parted."
The clear light of an English spring evening was shining down on the
grey walls of the convent of Saint Mary, streaming through the golden
green of the neighbouring wood, showing the towers of Northberry Manor
House through the trees, and sparkling on the blue strip of sea behind
them. Far on either side stretched wood and forest, hitherto untouched
by the hand of man, while from the pleasant fields cultivated round the
convent and Manor House green glades and glens wound away into the
forest, where the hunter might sound his horn, the outlaw take refuge,
where wild game of all kinds still dwelt without chance of extinction,
and where fairy rings were found on the grass, strange sights seen, and
strange sounds heard beyond the chime of the church bells of Northberry.
The lords of the manor rode through the rough roads now and again on
visits to their neighbours, or for assize meetings at the nearest town;
the convent priests, who also served the little village church, went
through the wood now and then at the summons of the Bishop; but the
villagers who clustered round the convent and manor walls were afraid of
the forest, and Eleanor Northberry had never passed through it since she
had been brought there, six years before, a solitary and frightened
child, pining for the little twin sister who had been torn from her
side. She had been tenderly received and cherished by her cousins, and
with their daughter Adela was placed at the convent, where she learnt to
read and to sing, to sew and to embroider, going home occasionally to
Northberry Manor, and growing so much into a part of the family, that
Sir Edward Northberry contemplated finding a husband for her in due time
among the gallant squires of Devon, and never sending her back again to
the "foreign parts," which, spite of his connection with Lisbon, he
regarded as peopled by a mixture of Frenchmen and Moors.
Within the convent precincts was a garden surrounded by high old walls,
through one of which a gate led into the little burial-ground where the
convent chapel stood. There was a sun-dial in the midst of the garden,
on the step of which Eleanor--or as she loved better to be called,
Nella--Northberry sat making wreaths from a great heap of white hawthorn
on the grass beside her. The garden was neatly kept, with a plentiful
supply of herbs useful for cooking or for medicine, and a few spring
flowers, such as bluebells or lilies of the valley, and in the centre of
the turf an apple-tree in full blossom; there were cherries and plums in
plenty, with the fruit just setting among their green leaves. A large
oblong pond full of fish lay across the bottom of the garden. The birds
sang sweetly; a family of robin-redbreasts were making their first
attempts at flying from the low branches of the apple-trees. There was
a low sound of chanting from the chapel, where the nuns were practising
the services for the approaching festival of Whitsuntide. All was full
of peace and calm, brightened by the fresh and hopeful spring-time.
Nella finished her long white garland, and laid it at her feet. She
clasped her hands on her knees, and watched the little snowy clouds as
they came floating from behind the cherry-trees across the sky. She was
very simply dressed in a grey frock cut square at her neck, and finished
with a white frill; but she was a tall and beautiful girl, almost a
woman in height, with her long brown hair drawn back from a broad fair
brow, a frank and simple countenance, and eyes at once innocent and
fearless. She was almost too much for the nuns sometimes, with her wild
spirits and dauntless gaiety, delighting in woodland scrambles and
hairbreadth escapes. But she was loving and loyal-hearted, and no
rebel, though a little difficult of control.
Just now, however, the evening calm had stolen over her spirit, and she
sat lost in thought, her memory, seldom active, going back to the days
of her early childhood, as she glanced at the gold cross which she wore
constantly round her neck.
Nella could not be said to have forgotten Catalina. She prayed for her
morning and evening, and she knew that masses were constantly sung in
the convent chapel for her deliverance; but the sorrow of her loss was
regarded as too terrible for common speech. A cloud of horror hung over
her memory, and Nella, whose simple, healthy nature easily adapted
itself to new surroundings, rather shrank from the thought of her. Her
father had never fulfilled his promise of coming to England; her nurse
had been taken captive with Kate. She could vividly remember the night
attack, when she had run out to see what was the matter, and found the
others gone on her return, and carrying her thoughts back she could
remember different trees and flowers, a house that seemed to her of
wonderful splendour, a mother's kiss, her bluff father's voice, and,
more clearly than anything else, the tall, pale young prince who had
given her the jewel round her neck and bid her trust in God.
It must be remembered that though Nella's memory enabled her to recall
orange-trees and pomegranates, strange dresses and customs, and the
"Moors" as familiar objects of dread, she never met with any one who had
ever seen an orange-tree, or done more than hear of a Moor as a sort of
emissary of evil. She had nothing therefore but her own childish
impressions to fall back upon, which were confused and blurred, and she
invariably pictured Catalina as her own double, grown to the same
height, wearing the same clothes, and thinking the same thoughts. But
the image seemed as far removed from her as if she had been taught to
regard Catalina as among the saints in Paradise. Nella was not
imaginative; she did not realise strange conditions; a sort of reserve
had always veiled even from her own thoughts the present condition of
her twin sister. But her convent life was almost over, and the change
in her own existence made her thoughtful.
"I am thirteen," she thought; "I have made my first communion, perhaps
before many years I shall be married; but Catalina--"
Suddenly, for the first time, it came clearly before her mind that
Catalina, if alive, could not be in the least like herself, could not be
a Christian at all. Nella sprang to her feet and almost cried out as
the thought stung her, and for the first time in her life she was seized
with the intensest desire to know her sister's fate; she felt as if she
must discover what had become of her, as if the uncertainty so long
acquiesced in had become suddenly intolerable to her.
The chapel bell began to ring for vespers; one of the nuns came into the
garden and called Nella. She took up her wreath and followed into the
chapel, and as she knelt and prayed, the twin sister whom she could no
longer picture to herself seemed to call to her out of terrible and
unknown darkness.
In the convent chapel, among the oak-wood and the cherry-blossoms of an
English spring, Eleanor Northberry laid her garlands on a holy shrine
and listened to the chanting of the vesper service; while the light
faded away over the peaceful garden, and the last reflection of the
sunset died out from the long fish-pond, and the nuns were left to the
peace and the stillness of night.
The sun also dropped down to rest over another small inclosure, far away
in the warm south. Round the royal palace of Muley Hassan, King of Fez,
were magnificent gardens, and on the side devoted to the women was one,
the very gem of them all. A kind of cloister surrounded it, built with
the utmost elaboration of Moorish art, horseshoe arches, fretwork of the
most exquisite forms, blazing with gold and silver, and glowing with the
gorgeousness of Oriental colour. Flowers of almost tropical variety and
beauty were growing in profusion, and in the centre was a fountain in
which gold and silver fish were swimming. On the brink stood a young
girl with a splendid wreath of crimson passion-flowers in her hand. She
was dressed in a tunic of blue silk, wonderfully embroidered with
coloured flowers, full white silk trousers were fastened round her
ankles above her golden slippers; on her head was a rose-coloured
turban, coquettishly set on the top of the long straight plait of hair
that fell down her back. She seated herself on the rim of the fountain,
and laying her flowers at her feet, listened to the distant sound of
girlish voices laughing and chattering beyond the cloister, or to the
noise of a number of parrots and other birds inclosed in a golden
network at one corner of the garden.
The girl's face was fair, with fine outlines, large blue eyes of a
peculiar wistful softness, and with an expression gentle, dreamy, and
somewhat passive. This was Leila, a Christian slave, the pet and
plaything of the ladies of Muley Hassan's harem; this was Katharine,
Eleanor Northberry's lost sister.
Strangely enough there had been a sort of outward similarity between the
lives that were essentially so different. Each sister had been brought
up in seclusion in a household of women. Catalina, like Nella, learnt
to embroider and to sing; she too lived among birds and flowers and
pleasant places. She too was taught to be obedient, to submit to rules;
and the gentle nature obeyed more perfectly, and carried cushions and
sang little songs or gathered flowers for the princesses, more aptly
than Nella learnt her tasks or steadied her dancing steps in Northberry
convent. But the little slave had been treated as a favourite toy, and
nothing had occurred to drive her thoughts beyond herself. She had at
once been separated from her nurse and taken to the palace, and though
she could have told, if asked, her real name and have understood
probably her own language, years of soft living separated her from any
reminder of her old life.
"Leila, Leila!" cried a clear voice.
Leila sprang up and ran to the garden-gate to meet a lady, of exquisite
dark beauty, who came and sat down on a pile of silken cushions near the
fountain. Leila took, at her signal, a golden casket from another
little girl, and kneeling before her mistress, began to take out its
contents and display them.
Mistress and maiden smiled with delight as rubies, diamonds, and
emeralds came to view.
"My jewels are the best in the harem," said the Princess Zarah, proudly.
"Yes, lady," said Leila, "neither Zuleika nor Zoraya have half so many."
"There is a string of pearls for you," said Zarah. "Or, no--choose
among these for yourself."
"What is that?" said the little slave suddenly, pointing to a small
eight-pointed ornament with a ruby in the centre.
"That!" said the princess. "Why, child, that is yours already. It was
tied round your neck when you were brought to me."
Leila took the cross in her hand, and gazed at it with a fixed, dreamy
look.
"Nella had one too," she said suddenly. "Dom Fernando gave them to us."
"Who is that?" said Zarah, indolently.
Leila looked perplexed, tears filled her eyes, and, with a
half-unconscious movement, she made the sign of the cross.
Zarah struck her hand sharply.
"Hold, child! that is wicked. Do that again and you shall be beaten."
"Are all Christians wicked?" said Leila, timidly.
"Of course, child--they are unbelievers."
"And Nella must be a Christian--I was once."
"There, do not fret. Here is a spray of emeralds, for you to put in
your turban. You are happy enough, and spoiled, my little one.
Religions do not matter so much for a woman, certainly not for a slave.
Some day, when I can spare you, you shall marry a true Mussulman, who
shall give you sweetmeats and jewels. You are very pretty--none of the
other princesses have such a pretty slave."
Leila laid the jewels down, and, slipping away from her mistress' side,
she leaned over the carved parapet of the ladies' garden, peeping
through the trellis-work that divided it from the more public grounds of
the palace. Down below, she saw four or five men, haggard, weary, and
scantily clothed, dragging heavy loads of earth to form a bank on one
side of the garden. Presently a Moor came up and struck one of them a
sharp blow. He cowered under it for a moment, and then, as the striker
turned away, his victim looked up to Heaven and made the sign of the
Cross.
These poor sufferers were Leila's fellow-Christians. Tears filled her
eyes; she longed to help them. But she was a slave, petted, soft, and
self-indulgent, like a pet animal. She shrank away from the painful
thought, and, going back to her mistress, tried to forget it in
wreathing the passion-flowers round her hair.