The monk at midnight visiting the cross,
The knight taming his fiery steed,
The man who with dread sound of trumpet dies,
And he who dies with peaceful voice of prayer,
Are all the objects of Thy care, lavished alike
On every pious soul, whether he tonsure wear or helm.
_Hymn to Saint Anselm._
“Yes, master, we really owe a pilgrimage to Lynrass grotto. Who would
have thought that the hermit, whom I cursed as if he had been the Devil,
would prove to be our guardian angel, and that the sword which seemed to
threaten our very lives would serve for a bridge to take us over the
abyss?”
It was in these somewhat grotesquely figurative terms that Benignus
Spiagudry poured into Ordener’s ears his joy, his admiration, and his
gratitude for the mysterious monk. As will readily be supposed, our two
travellers had left the Cursed Tower; nay, when we again encounter them,
they have even left the village of Vygla far behind them, and are
painfully pursuing a steep path, interrupted by frequent pools or
blocked by huge stones, which transient torrents caused by storms had
washed down from the wet, sticky soil. Day had not yet dawned; but the
bushes growing above the rocks on either side of the road stood out
against the clear sky like dark silhouettes, and various objects,
although still colorless, gradually assumed form in the dim, dull light
which daybreak in the North filters through the chill fogs of early
morning.
Ordener was silent, for he had yielded to that somnolent state sometimes
permitted by the mechanical motion of walking. He had not slept since
the night before, when he allowed himself to rest in a fishing-boat
moored in Throndhjem harbor for the few hours intervening between his
departure from the Spladgest and his arrival at Munkholm. Accordingly,
while his body moved toward Skongen his spirit had flown back to
Throndhjem Fjord,--to that gloomy prison and those melancholy towers
which contained the only being on earth to whom he attached any idea of
hope and happiness.
Awake, thoughts of his Ethel filled his mind; asleep, her memory became
a fanciful image which irradiated all his dreams. In this second life of
sleep, where for a time the soul alone exists, and the physical being
with all its material ills seems to disappear, he saw the beloved
maiden, no more beautiful, no purer, than in reality, but happier,
freer, more wholly his own. Only, upon the road to Skongen, the
oblivion of his body, the torpor of his senses, could not be complete;
for from time to time a bog, a stone, the branch of a tree, impeding his
progress, recalled him suddenly from the ideal to the real. He would
then raise his head, half open his drowsy eyes, and regret the fall from
bright celestial wanderings to his painful earthly journey, where
nothing could compensate for his lost illusions, save that he felt close
to his heart the ringlet which was his until Ethel herself should be his
own. Then this memory revived the charming dream-image, and he gently
relapsed, not into slumber, but into a vague, persistent revery.
“Master,” repeated Spiagudry, in a louder tone, which, combined with a
blow from the trunk of a tree, aroused Ordener, “fear nothing. The
bowmen turned to the right with the hermit when they left the tower, and
we are far enough away from them to venture to speak. It is true that
silence was most prudent until now.”
“Indeed,” said Ordener, yawning, “you push your prudence to extremes. It
is at least three hours since we left the tower and the bowmen behind
us.”
“That is true, sir; but prudence never does any harm. Only think, if I
had declared myself when the chief of that infernal troop asked for
Benignus Spiagudry in a voice like that of Saturn calling for his
new-born son that he might devour him! Suppose, even, I had not taken
refuge in a prudent silence at that awful moment, where should I be now,
noble master?”
“Faith, old man, I fancy that at that moment nothing, not even pincers,
could have drawn your name from you.”
“Was I wrong, master? If I had spoken, the monk,--may Saint Hospitius,
and Saint Usbald the Solitary, bless him!--the monk would have had no
opportunity to ask the captain of the archers whether his men did not
belong to the Munkholm regiment; a trifling question, merely asked in
order to gain time. Did you notice, sir, after that stupid archer
answered ‘Yes,’ with what a peculiar smile the monk requested him to
follow him, saying that he knew the hiding-place of the fugitive,
Benignus Spiagudry?”
Here the keeper paused for a moment, as if to make a fresh start; for he
suddenly resumed, in a voice quivering with emotion: “A good priest, a
worthy and upright anchorite, practising the principles of Christian
virtue and evangelic charity; and I was alarmed at his mere outward
appearance, forbidding enough, truly; but what a beautiful soul lies
beneath! Did you notice too, noble master, that there was something
peculiar in the tone with which he said to me, ‘We shall meet again!’ as
he led away the archers? At any other time that tone would have alarmed
me; but it is not the pious and excellent hermit’s fault. Solitude
undoubtedly gives that strange intonation; for I know, sir,”--here the
voice of Benignus sank lower,--“I know another hermit, that dreadful
fellow who--But no; out of respect for the venerable hermit of Lynrass I
will not make so odious a comparison. Neither was there anything
peculiar about his gloves; it is quite cold enough to wear them; and his
salty beverage does not surprise me either. Catholic anchorites often
follow singular examples; the very same thing, master, is alluded to in
this line by the famous Urensius, the monk of Mount Caucasus:--
‘Rivos despicieus, maris undam potat amaram.’
Why didn’t I think of that verse while I was in that confounded ruin at
Vygla? A little better memory would have spared me much needless alarm.
To be sure, it is not easy, is it, sir, to collect your thoughts in such
a den, seated at the table of a hangman,--a hangman, a creature given
over to universal scorn and execration, who only differs from an
assassin in the frequency and impunity of his murders; whose heart to
all the atrocity of the most awful brigands unites the cowardice of
which at least their daring crimes do not admit; a being who offers food
and drink with the same hand that wields the instruments of torture, and
crushes the bones of his miserable victims between the planks of the
rack! Think of breathing the same air with a hangman! And the vilest
beggar, if polluted by his loathsome touch, would cast aside with horror
the last rags which protected his nakedness and his disease from the
wintry blast! And the chancellor, after sealing his commission, flings
the paper under the table in token of his malediction and his disgust!
And in France, when the hangman dies in his turn, the provost’s
assistants would rather pay a fine of forty pounds than succeed him! And
at Pesth, when Churchill was condemned to die, and they offered to
pardon him if he would turn executioner, he preferred death to such a
trade. Is it not still notorious, noble sir, that Turmeryn, bishop of
Mäestricht, ordered a church to be purified because the hangman had
entered it; and that Czarina Petrowna washed her face whenever she
witnessed an execution? You know also that the kings of France, to honor
warriors, permit them to be punished by their comrades, so that these
brave men, even if they be criminals, may not be made infamous by
contact with the hangman. And finally, which is decisive, in the
‘Descent of Saint George into Hell,’ by the learned Melasius Iturham,
does not Charon give the robber, Robin Hood, precedence over the
hangman, Philip Crass? Truly, master, if ever I attain to power, which
God alone can foresee, I shall put down hangmen, and restore the ancient
custom and the ancient tariff. For the murder of a prince a man shall
pay, as in 1150, fourteen hundred and forty double-crown pieces; for the
murder of a count, fourteen hundred and forty plain crowns; for that of
a baron, fourteen hundred and forty half-crowns; the killing of a mere
noble shall be rated at fourteen hundred and forty escalins; and that of
a citizen--”
“Don’t I hear the tread of a horse coming toward us?” interrupted
Ordener.
They looked back, and, as day had dawned during Spiagudry’s long
soliloquy, they could distinguish, a hundred paces behind them, a man
dressed in black waving one hand to them, and with the other urging on
one of those small dingy white ponies so often seen, either wild or
domesticated, in the lower mountain ranges of Norway.
“For mercy’s sake, master,” said the timid keeper, “let us hasten; that
black fellow looks to me just like an archer!”
“What, old man; we are two, and we should fly before a single man!”
“Alas! twenty sparrows fly before an owl. What glory is there in waiting
for an officer of the law?”
“And who tells you that this is one?” rejoined Ordener, whose eyes were
not blinded by fear. “Keep up your courage, my valiant guide; I
recognize this traveller. Let us wait for him.”
The keeper was forced to submit. A moment later the horseman came up
with them, and Spiagudry ceased to tremble when he saw the grave, calm
face of the chaplain, Athanasius Munder.
The latter greeted them with a smile, and reined in his steed, saying in
an almost breathless voice, “My dear children, it is for your sake that
I retrace my steps; and the Lord will surely not permit my absence,
prolonged with a charitable intent, to injure those who sorely need my
presence.”
“Sir minister,” answered Ordener, “we shall be happy to aid you in any
way we can.”
“On the contrary, it is I, noble young man, who desire to serve you.
Will you deign to tell me the object of your journey?”
“Reverend sir, I cannot.”
“All I ask, my son, is that your refusal may proceed from inability, and
not from distrust. If not, I am indeed unhappy! Unhappy is he whom the
good man distrusts, even if he have seen him but once!”
The priest’s modesty and unction touched Ordener deeply.
“All that I can tell you, Father, is that we are bound to the mountains
of the North.”
“So I thought, my son, and that is why I followed you. There are bands
of roving hunters and miners in those mountains who might injure
travellers.”
“What then?”
“Well, I know that it is useless to dissuade a noble young man in search
of adventure; but the esteem I feel for you inspires me with another
plan for helping you. The unfortunate counterfeiter to whom I bore the
last consolations of religion yesterday was a miner. Just before he died
he gave me a paper inscribed with his name, saying that this passport
would protect me from all danger if I ever had to travel among those
mountains. Alas! what can it avail a poor priest who must live and die
among prisoners, and who, moreover, _inter castra latronum_, should seek
no other defence than patience and prayer, the only weapons of God! I
did not decline the pass, because we should never distress by refusal
the heart of one who in a few minutes more will have nothing to receive
or to give on earth. The good God deigned to inspire me, for now I can
offer you this parchment, that it may go with you in all the perils of
your journey, and that the gift of the dying man may benefit the
traveller.”
Ordener accepted the old priest’s gift with emotion.
“Sir Chaplain,” said he, “God grant that your prayer may be heard! Thank
you. But,” he added, laying his hand on his sword, “I already carry my
passport at my side.”
“Young man,” said the priest, “that poor parchment may perhaps protect
you better than your steel blade. The gaze of a penitent man is more
potent than the archangel’s sword. Farewell! My prisoners await me. Pray
sometimes for them and me.”
“Holy priest,” rejoined Ordener, with a smile, “I told you that your
prisoners should be pardoned, and they shall be.”
“Oh, do not speak with such assurance, my son! Do not tempt the Lord! No
man can know what passes in the mind of another, and you cannot tell
what the viceroy’s son may decide to do. Perhaps, alas! he will never
condescend to admit a humble chaplain to his presence. Farewell, my son;
may your journey be blessed, and may you sometimes remember the poor
priest and pray for his unhappy prisoners.”