ONE LEG GREEN AND ONE LEG PINK
For, after all, Laurence was a good deal older than I. And that
makes a difference. Besides, he had known me from the time that Maud
Lindsay sent me off to play with him, that she might have the more
time (and the better) in which to torment his brother Sholto with her
wilfulnesses.
That was, of course, before they were married and had five children.
Some time before.
But all of that may be read in the history, that is titled after the
chief of our house, _The Black Douglas_. But that is writ solemnly and
of set purpose; also straight on, as a book should be, while this
which for my pleasure I am writing contains just the things that a
woman has done and thought and heard and seen ever since she was a
girl, and is of little value save to herself and to make the winter
nights pass.
And so Laurence M‘Kim was an abbot, and, indeed, might have been a
bishop had he wished it. But he was not given that way, having enough
knowledge of himself to know that he was not worthy. That he was a
real Lord Abbot I knew. For had not I myself made him so--or, rather,
my cousins William and James, who acted for me, and did not cross me
in aught, save only in sending me to this abominable convent!
But that is always the way with men. They give us a thousand things we
do not want; they refuse us the one thing we do.
I wonder, indeed, how they would have liked it themselves. William
would have spitted the porteress in a week, I know, and broke open the
great spiked door. But James, who was ever ready with his answer, had
in after-times the effrontery to tell me that he would have liked it,
contenting himself always well where women were.
Bah! At any rate, I am not come to that yet. _Then_ I was glad enough
to see Larry. Yes, glad with a great gladness that no man can tell.
And he did not even damp me when he out with a great folded parchment,
all done in purple and black, with the seal of St. Peter hanging to
it, almost as big as the great censer of Trèves which only a six-foot
man can swing.
And then, last of all, there came out the Lady Superior, whom we maids
called the Bald Cat. I mean that I did--I, and two French girls who,
for various kittenishnesses wrought in overstrait homes, had been sent
to the Sign of the Bald Cat to repent themselves of their sins. The
Lady Superior’s other name was Marie Noël de Saint Verrier, and she
had (I remarked it myself, but not overtly to Sister Eulalie) as much
discernment of the good things of life, or the honest, well-meaning
thoughts of men and women, as a sow hath of the perfumes in a flower
garden. She had but one table in her decalogue--that at which she did
continually over-eat herself; but one article in her _credo_--that all
was right which was done within the convent of St. Brigida of
Cheverney, and all wrong that was done outside of it.
Well--there was more done in St. Brigida than was told to Madame Noël
de Saint Verrier--otherwise and more exactly the Bald Cat.
But let it be understood that Laurence, Venerable Prior of the Abbey
of Holy Devorgil, called Dulce Cor by Solway Side, did not in the
least misbecome his errand. Troth, sirs, I wot not! William, my
cousin, now Earl of Douglas, would not have sent him else. He was,
albeit, a young and personable prelate, also well to look upon--a
thing which always had its effect with the Bald Cat--that is, in a
man. In girls she could not abide it. She cut their love-locks to the
bristle with her own hand, and added an extra six inches to their poke
bonnets if their eyes sparkled. But not to mine. For though she had
been bidden to be strict with me in the matter of discipline, yet for
all that, I was still a princess in my own country, and the daughter
of one Duke of Touraine and the sister of another.
But the Bull--the papal Bull!
The Bald Cat took it, fumbling meanwhile for the pieces of Venice
glass set together in an oval frame with water between them, by means
of which it pleased her to think that she could read. But all the
glasses in the world--no, not Agrippa’s ball of crystal itself, could
have taught her to read that Papal Bull. It was in Latin, and so after
turning it this way and that, she gave it back to the Abbot Laurence,
who now stood before her, tall and young and fair to look upon.
“Read it, if you please, your learned reverency!” she said, softly for
her.
But Laurence, with a proud gesture, which amounted almost to contempt,
handed it to the almoner of the convent, Father Pierre Bartentane,
called Gigot from his shape--this, by us ill-behaved girls.
“Let the Lady Abbess hear what says the Holy Father!” he said. “As I
am come to carry off her fairest flower, I wish her to understand that
I do not misconstrue my warrant!”
I leaped towards Larry, and would have hugged him in my arms.
“Am I indeed quit of this for ever and a day?” I cried in our own
Scots, which I knew that none of the others could understand. “Am I to
go away with you? Tell me quick!”
“Ay,” said Laurence, turning away his eyes, “you are to go with me.
But--I am to take you to marry your Cousin William--my Lord Earl of
Douglas.”
“The Man of Iron!” I said.
And I think I made a wry face and shrugged my shoulders--for I was but
young, and knew no better. “I had rather it had been yourself I was to
wed, Larry,” I said. “And that in spite of your clerkery!”
His face reddened till it became almost scarlet. But he did not look
at me as he replied.
“My clerkhood would not stand in my way, God wot--if that were all,”
he answered; “but, my lady, I do not forget that I am but a poor man’s
son, and my princess’s very humble servant.”
Now, all this about young Laurence M‘Kim being Abbot of beautiful
Dulce Cor, and yet no whit a monk (save that he could sing like an
angel), may sound strange to ears accustomed to authority episcopal
and papal, to monasteries French and Italian. But in Galloway we
Douglases minded not the King of Scots at all, wet day or dry day, and
the pope only when we had need of him--generally to give us leave to
marry within the proscribed degrees, for the sake of the Douglas
properties, family tree, and such-like. At other times we of the
Southern House did much as we liked, in the Church as in the State,
our yea being yea, and our nay nay.
Now, the Douglases of the Red grew great, and are to this day great
and high, by reason of truckling and fawning on the king and the
Stewarts. But the Douglases of the Black--never! All except my Lord
James, that is, and he never could help trying to please all that came
his way, man and woman, gentle and simple. For he was ruddy as young
David, the shepherd boy that became a king; tall, too, like a god; and
my heart--went after him. Ah! but enough of this. The time to tell
these things is not yet. All the same, James was always at heart, as
in his person, a Douglas of the Red. For me, I am Black of the Black.
It was, of course, impossible that all the great train of honour and
of defence which William Douglas, my cousin, had given to the Abbot
Laurence to travel to Rome withal should find lodging within the walls
of the convent of St. Brigida. Indeed, as these (barring the
churchmen) were exclusively soldiers, and dashing blades most of them,
it was perhaps as well, or certain variations in the Rule of that most
excellent founder might have been introduced.
So it fell out exceedingly _à propos_. While the Bald Cat was
hesitating what she should do, hemming and hawing hither and thither,
trying to grant and not to grant at the same time, as was her
bald-cattish way, there appeared from the midst of the retinue a man
in an ample “pelicon,” or pelisse, longer than was then in vogue, but
with a rich under-garnishing of fur. This garment had a wide rolling
collar, all covered over with the Bloody Heart of the Douglases, and a
great “bar sinister” of threaded gold crossed the mantle from shoulder
to its deepest fold, as if it had been a heraldic shield hung upon an
altar.
The new-comer was a man of about fifty, quickly greying, and with a
mouth that pouted continually like that of a pettish, changeable
woman. His long hose were of silk, in what I afterwards found was the
height of the fashion at Paris--one leg and thigh being covered with
pale blush rose-colour and the other tucked out in clear greenish
white, like that which one sometimes sees behind a windy sunset, far
in the deeps of the sky.
The man was indeed a marvel to behold, and at the sight of him the
High Lady Superior ordered all her _pensionnaires_, especially the two
kittenish French girls, back to their cells. But in the circumstances,
of course, she was forced to permit me to remain. I should not have
obeyed in any case. I would have shaken the papal Bull in her face.
“My lady,” he said, “I am Paul Herault de Douglas, Sieur de Cheverney.
Permit me, Madame the Superior, to kiss your fair and devoted hand!”
The haughty expression which had distinguished the Mother Superior
swiftly gave place to another--one of almost fearful anticipation.
“Ah,” she said, “then you are our over-lord of Cour Cheverney, the
Seignior and civil protector of this blessed house of religion?”
“I fear I have but ill done my duty,” said the Sieur Paul, smiling and
pouting; “I have wasted my time, lingering so long in Paris, in the
train of the king, helping to drive out the English, and also employed
in other ways. I have somewhat neglected my property of
Cheverney--more especially in so far as concerns my duty to you, and
to this noble and beautiful establishment!”
And again he bowed and kissed the hand of the Lady Superior.
“A beautiful hand and one more fit for a king’s court than--!”
He stopped, and believe it who will (the sisters in the convent would
not!) the Bald Cat lifted her forefinger and waggled it at him, right
well pleased, smiling the while like a fox at a barnyard pullet.
“Ah, naughty,” she murmured coaxingly; “these are indeed the manners
of a court. But in Touraine we are accustomed to plainer things, are
we not, Sister Margaret?”
And she turned to me as she spoke. But I had suffered too much
already, and was in no mood to be gracious at the eleventh hour.
“Indeed,” said I, “I am no sister, either of yours or of the Order of
St. Bridget. Call in Sister Eulalie with her bread-and-water, if you
like--she will tell you. I am on my way to be married to the greatest
lord in all Scotland, and, besides, I am a princess in my own right!”
It was not, perhaps, very ladylike, though I have
[Illustration: AND AGAIN HE BOWED AND KISSED THE HAND OF THE LADY
SUPERIOR.]
heard worse things said by much greater and wiser people. But then no
more can bread-and-water for four days be called “ladylike.” If girls
of eighteen are to be treated like galley-knaves--God wot, somebody
has to pay for it in the end.
Yet I was no little ashamed when the Lady Superior took my ill-nature
with great quietude, passing it over as the mere naughtiness of a
child, as yet irresponsible--and so (I grant it) showing herself of
the better breeding.
Then the Sieur Paul, advancing the rose-blush leg out of his armorial
mantle (or, as we women say, pelisse), invited me to consider his
castle of Cour Cheverney my home till such time as I should be ready
to set out upon my journey to Scotland, there to wed with my Cousin
William--my Lord High Buckram-and-Iron, as I had already named him in
my heart.
Indeed, the phrase, which I thought happily invented, passed my lips
that very night after we had departed for Cour Cheverney. I was
speaking to Laurence at the time. But to my surprise and vexation he
rebuked me for it, saying that William of Avondale was worth all the
rest of the family put together--all, that is, who had been left on
the earth after the Black Dinner which Chancellor Crichton, the fox,
and Tutor Livingston, the Queen Mother’s fat spaniel, had given my
brothers William and David within the castle of Edinburgh.
And at this rebuke I shrugged my shoulders and pouted, like the spoilt
child I was at that time. God wot, I learned to behave better
afterwards.
“Well, since it must be--so must it be!” I said, sighing, “but (I say
it twice) I had rather have wedded with yourself, Larry!”
He turned on me, white this time, not red--yes, blue-white as the
little shadows that sunshine makes behind snow-wreaths. (Oh, I love to
see a man moved like that!)
“For God’s sake, girl, have ye no pity?” he cried, putting his hand to
his brow--a gesture which his father also had when perplexed--“if ye
say the like again, I will--I will--!”
“Ay, and what will ye do then?” said I, mocking his Galloway accent,
which showed itself whenever he was excited. “Will ye refuse me your
reverence’s blessing? Na, surely never! Or aiblins would ye smite a
poor lass, that never did ye harm, with the Greater Excommunication?”
Larry turned away without speaking, and that made me a little sorry.
But ah, the inward happiness to be among men again after two years!
Yet even then I did not know the power which had come to me during
these years, nor yet the good that all the greyhound fare of the
convent had done me. In a word, I was just beginning to learn what I
could do with the hearts of men.
And there is nothing like that to a woman! In her heart, carefully
covered over, maybe--to be dug for deep and long, but still
there--indisputable, unobtrusive, there is the same desire to every
one of womankind. Bah--they tell you different, some of them, but they
lie. To be beautiful and to turn men between their fingers this way
and that, as a potter doth a vessel, moulding it to his thought. That
is the Thing Desired of the Heart--the princesshood, the queen’s
sceptre. All else, as I, who have tried all, do know--housewifery,
maternity, charity, the life conventual, the chatter of a court, the
mistressing of a great house--are, as the folk say in Galloway, but a
“do-no-better”! And, indeed, among such men as I have known--Douglases
of the Black and of the Red, Stewarts with the bitter, murderous Bruce
blood in them--what better can a woman do?
Well, it is past for me now, and yet I can warm my heart at the fires
of the past--yea, to this very day I chew the pleasant cud of memory.
It was not all dust and ashes, as the priests say; it has not all
turned to apples of Sodom, and the taste is not as of bitter ashes in
my mouth. Still, even in old age, I judge that this is the second best
thing which can happen to a woman--that she should have been beautiful
in her youth, or, at least, by some quirk or trick of tongue or face
or manner, witching, and capable of making herself desired.
I say that is the _second_ best thing in a woman’s life. The absolute
best, the gold centre of all, is that during her love-time she should
have known one man good, and true, and great. Then only can she wholly
forget self in another, which is a woman’s heaven of heavens.