IT was supper-time. Eli's family were collected round the board;
Margaret only was missing. To Catherine's surprise Eli said he would
wait a bit for her.
"Why, I told her you would not wait for the duke."
"She is not the duke: she is a poor, good lass, that hath waited not
minutes, but years, for a graceless son of mine. You can put the meat on
the board all the same; then we can fall to, without further loss o'
time, when she does come."
The smoking dishes smelt so savoury that Eli gave way, "She will come if
we begin," said he; "they always do. Come, sit ye down, Mistress Joan;
y'are not here for a slave, I trow, but a guest. There, I hear a quick
step--off covers, and fall to."
The covers were withdrawn, and the knives brandished. Then burst into
the room, not the expected Margaret, but a Dominican friar, livid with
rage.
He was at the table in a moment, in front of Cornelis and Sybrandt,
threw his tall body over the narrow table, and, with two hands hovering
above their shrinking heads, like eagles over a quarry, he cursed them
by name, soul and body, in this world and the next. It was an age
eloquent in curses: and this curse was so full, so minute, so blighting,
blasting, withering, and tremendous, that I am afraid to put all the
words on paper. "Cursed be the lips," he shrieked, "which spoke the lie
that Margaret was dead; may they rot before the grave, and kiss the
white-hot iron in hell thereafter; doubly cursed be the hands that
changed those letters, and be they struck off by the hangman's knife,
and handle hell-fire for ever; thrice accursed be the cruel hearts that
did conceive that damned lie, to part true love for ever; may they
sicken and wither on earth joyless, loveless, hopeless; and wither to
dust before their time; and burn in eternal fire." He cursed the meat at
their mouths, and every atom of their bodies, from their hair to the
soles of their feet. Then turning from the cowering, shuddering pair,
who had almost hid themselves beneath the table, he tore a letter out of
his bosom, and flung it down before his father.
"Read that, thou hard old man, that didst imprison thy son, read, and
see what monsters thou hast brought into the world. The memory of my
wrongs, and hers, dwell with you all for ever! I will meet you again at
the judgment day; on earth ye will never see me more."
And in a moment, as he had come, so he was gone, leaving them stiff, and
cold, and white as statues, round the smoking board.
* * * * *
And this was the sight that greeted Margaret's eyes and Jorian's--pale
figures of men and women petrified around the untasted food, as Eastern
poets feigned.
Margaret glanced her eye round, and gasped out, "Oh, joy! all here; no
blood hath been shed. Oh, you cruel, cruel men! I thank God he hath not
slain you."
At sight of her Catherine gave an eloquent scream; then turned her head
away. But Eli, who had just cast his eye over the false letter, and
begun to understand it all, seeing the other victim come in at that very
moment with _her_ wrongs reflected in her sweet, pale face, started to
his feet in a transport of rage, and shouted, "Stand clear, and let me
get at the traitors. I'll hang for them." And in a moment he whipped out
his short sword, and fell upon them.
"Fly!" screamed Margaret. "Fly!"
They slipped howling under the table, and crawled out the other side.
But, ere they could get to the door, the furious old man ran round and
intercepted them. Catherine only screamed and wrung her hands; your
notables are generally useless at such a time; and blood would certainly
have flowed, but Margaret and Jorian seized the fiery old man's arms,
and held them with all their might, whilst the pair got clear of the
house; then they let him go; and he went vainly raging after them out
into the street.
They were a furlong off, running like hares.
He hacked down the board on which their names were written, and brought
it in doors, and flung it into the chimney-place.
Catherine was sitting rocking herself with her apron over her head. Joan
had run to her husband. Margaret had her arms round Catherine's neck;
and, pale and panting, was yet making efforts to comfort her.
But it was not to be done. "O my poor children!" she cried. "O
miserable mother! 'Tis a mercy Kate was ill upstairs. There, I have
lived to thank God for that!" she cried, with a fresh burst of sobs. "It
would have killed her. He had better have stayed in Italy, as come home
to curse his own flesh and blood, and set us all by the ears."
"Oh, hold your chat, woman," cried Eli, angrily; "you are still on the
side of the ill-doer. You are cheap served; your weakness made the
rogues what they are; I was for correcting them in their youth: for sore
ills, sharp remedies; but you still sided with their faults, and
undermined me, and baffled wise severity. And you, Margaret, leave
comforting her that ought rather to comfort you; for what is her hurt to
yours? But she never had a grain of justice under her skin; and never
will. So come thou to me; that am thy father from this hour."
This was a command; so she kissed Catherine, and went tottering to him,
and he put her on a chair beside him, and she laid her feeble head on
his honest breast: but not a tear: it was too deep for that.
"Poor lamb," said he. After awhile--"Come, good folks," said true Eli,
in a broken voice, to Jorian and Joan, "we are in a little trouble, as
you see; but that is no reason you should starve. For our Lady's sake,
fall to; and add not to my grief the reputation of a churl. What the
dickens!" added he, with a sudden ghastly attempt at stout-heartedness,
"the more knaves I have the luck to get shut of, the more my need of
true men and women, to help me clear the dish, and cheer mine eye with
honest faces about me where else were gaps. Fall to, I do entreat ye."
Catherine, sobbing, backed his request. Poor, simple, antique,
hospitable souls! Jorian, whose appetite, especially since his illness,
was very keen, was for acting on this hospitable invitation; but Joan
whispered a word in his ear, and he instantly drew back. "Nay, I'll
touch no meat that holy Church hath cursed."
"In sooth, I forgot," said Eli, apologetically. "My son, who was reared
at my table, hath cursed my victuals. That seems strange. Well, what God
wills, man must bow to."
The supper was flung out into the yard.
Jorian took his wife home, and heavy sadness reigned in Eli's house that
night.
Meantime, where was Clement?
Lying at full length upon the floor of the convent church, with his lips
upon the lowest step of the altar, in an indescribable state of terror,
misery, penitence, and self-abasement: through all which struggled
gleams of joy that Margaret was alive.
Night fell and found him lying there weeping, and praying: and morning
would have found him there too; but he suddenly remembered that,
absorbed in his own wrongs and Margaret's, he had committed another sin
besides intemperate rage. He had neglected a dying man.
He rose instantly, groaning at his accumulated wickedness, and set out
to repair the omission. The weather had changed; it was raining hard,
and, when he got clear of the town, he heard the wolves baying; they
were on foot. But Clement was himself again, or nearly; he thought
little of danger or discomfort, having a shameful omission of religious
duty to repair: he went stoutly forward through rain and darkness.
And, as he went, he often beat his breast, and cried, "Mea Culpa! Mea
Culpa!"