"Heaven does with us, as we with torches do--
Not light them for themselves."
Shakespeare.
"It is of no use, Jack," quoth I. "I never did love her, I never can,
and never shall."
"And I never bade you, Sissot," answered he. "Put that in belike,
prithee."
"But you bade me write the story out," said I. "Ay, I did so. But I
left you free to speak your mind of any body that should come therein,
from a bishop to a baa-lamb," said he.
"Where shall I go for mine ink?" I made answer: "seeing that some part
of my tale, to correspond to the matter, should need to be writ in
vernage, [Note 1] and some other in verjuice."
"Keep two quills by you," saith he, "with inkhorns of the twain, and use
either according to the matter."
"Ay me!" said I. "It should be the strangest and woefullest tale ever
writ by woman."
"The more need that it should be writ," quoth Jack, "by them that have
lived it, and can tell the sooth-fastness [truth] thereof. Look you,
Sissot, there are men enough will tell the tale of hearsay, such as they
may win of one and another, and that is like to be full of guile and
contrariousness. And many will tell it to win favour of those in high
place, and so shall but the half be told. Thou hast lived through it,
and wist all the inwards thereof, at least from thine own standing-spot.
Let there be one tale told just as it was, of one that verily knew, and
had no purpose to win gold or favour, but only to speak sooth-fastness."
"You set me an hard task, Jack!" I said, and I think I sighed.
"Easier to do, maybe, than to reckon on," saith he, in his dry,
tholemode [Note 2] way. "Thou needest write but one word at once, and
thou canst take thine own time to think what word to write."
"But I have no parchment," said I. I am a little afraid I coveted not
any, for I fancied not the business at all. It was Jack who wanted the
story writ out fair, not I.
"Well, I have," saith Jack calmly.
"Nor any quills," said I.
"I have," saith Jack, after the same fashion.
"And the ink is dried-up."
"Then will we buy more."
"But--" I stayed, for I thought I had better hold my tongue.
"But--I have no mind to it," saith Jack. "That might have come first,
Sissot. It shows, when it doth, that thou hast come to an end of thine
excuses. Nay, sweet heart, do but begin, and the mind will have after."
"Lack-a-daisy!" said I, trying to laugh, though I felt somewhat irked
[worried, irritated]: "I reckon, then, I had best do mine husband's
bidding without more ado."
"There spake my Sissot," saith he. "Good dame!"
So here am I, sat at this desk, with a roll of parchment that Jack hath
cut in even leches [strips] for to make a book, and an inkhorn of fresh
ink, and divers quills--O me! must all this be writ up?
Well, have forth! I shall so content Jack, and if I content not myself,
that shall pay me.
It was through being one of Queen Isabel's gentlewomen that I came to
know these things, and, as Jack saith, to live through my story. And I
might go a step further back, for I came to that dignity by reason of
being daughter unto Dame Alice de Lethegreve, that was of old time nurse
to King Edward. So long as I was a young maid, I was one of the Queen's
sub-damsels; but when I wedded my Jack (and a better Jack never did
maiden wed) I was preferred to be damsel of the chamber: and in such
fashion journeyed I with the Queen to France, and tarried with her all
the time she dwelt beyond seas, and came home with her again, and was
with her the four years following, until all brake up, and she was
appointed to keep house at Rising Castle. So the whole play was played
before mine own eyes.
I spake only sooth-fastness when I told Jack I could never love her.
How can man love whom he cannot trust? It would have been as easy to
put faith in a snake because it had lovesome marks and colouring, as in
that fair, fair face--ay, I will not deny that it was marvellous fair--
with the gleaming eyes, which now seemed to flash with golden light, and
now to look like the dark depths of a stagnant pool. Wonderful eyes
they were! I am glad I never trusted them.
Nor did I never trust her voice. It was as marvellous as the eyes. It
could be sweet as honey and sharp as a two-edged sword; soft as dove's
down, and hard as an agate stone. Too soft and sweet to be sooth-fast!
She meant her words only when they were sword and agate.
And the King--what shall I say of him? In good sooth, I will say
nothing, but leave him to unfold himself in the story. I was not the
King's foster-sister in sooth, for I was ten years the younger; and it
was Robin, my brother, that claimed kin with him on that hand. But he
was ever hendy [amiable, kindly, courteous] to me. God rest his hapless
soul!
But where shall my tale begin? Verily, I have no mind to set forth from
the creation, as chroniclers are wont. I was not there then, and lived
not through that, nor of a long while after. Must I then begin from my
creation? aswhasay [as who should say--that is to say], as near it as my
remembrance taketh me. Nay, I think not so: for then should I tell much
of the reign of King Edward of Westminster [Edward the First], that were
right beside the real story. I think I shall take date from the time of
the Queen's first departure to France, which was the year of our Lord
God, 1324.
I was a young maid of seventeen years when I entered the Queen's
household,--her own age. But in another sense, I was tenfold the child
that she was. Indeed, I marvel if she ever were a child. I rather
think she was born grown-up, as the old heathen fabled Minerva to have
been. While on waiting, I often used to see and hear things that I did
not understand, yet which I could feel were disapproved by something
inside me: I suppose it must have been my conscience. And if at those
times I looked on my mother's face, I could often read disapproval in
her eyes also. I never loved the long secret discourses there used to
be betwixt the Queen and her uncle, my Lord of Lancaster: they always
had to me the air of plotting mischief. Nor did I ever love my Lord of
Lancaster; there was no simplicity nor courtesy in him. His natural
manner (when he let it be seen) was stern and abrupt; but he did very
rarely allow it to be seen; it was nearly always some affectation put
on. And I hate that, and so doth Jack.
At that time I loved and hated instinctively, as I think children do;
and at seventeen years, I was a child in all things save by the almanac.
I could rarely tell why I did not love people--only, I did not love
them. I knew oftener why I did. I never thought much of Sir Piers de
Gavaston, that the King so dearly affected, but I never hated him in a
deadly fashion, as some did that I knew. I loved better Sir Hugh Le
Despenser, that was afterwards Earl of Gloucester, for he--
"Sissot," saith a voice behind me, "what is the name of that chronicle?"
"I cannot tell, Jack," said I. "What wouldst have it called?"
"`The Annals of Cicely,'" quoth he; "for she is beginning, middle, and
end of it."
I felt as though he had cast a pitcher of cold water over me. I sat
looking at my parchment.
"Read it over, prithee," saith he, "and count how many great I's be
therein."
So did I, and by my troth there were seventy-seven. Seventy-seven of
me! and all in six leaves of parchment, forsooth. How many soever shall
there be by the time I make an end?
"That's an ill beginning, Jack!" said I, and I felt ready to cry. "Must
I begin over again?"
"Sissot," quoth he, "nothing is ever undone in this world."
"What mean you?" said I.
"There was man died the year before thou wert born," he made answer,
"that was great friend of my father. He was old when my father was
young, yet for all that were they right good friends. He was a very
learned man; so wise in respect of things known but to few, that most
men accounted him a very magician, and no good Christian. Howbeit, my
father said that was but folly and slander. He told my father some of
the strange matters that he found in nature; and amongst them, one
thing, which hath ever stuck by me. Saith Friar Roger, Nothing is ever
destroyed. Nothing that hath once had being, can ever cease to be."
"Why, Jack!" cried I. "Verily that must be folly! I cast this scrap of
parchment on the chafer, and it burneth up. It is gone, see thou.
Surely it hath ceased to be?"
"No," saith he. "It is gone into ashes and smoke."
"What be ashes and smoke?" asked I, laughing.
"Why, they be ashes and smoke," he made answer. "And the smoke curleth
up chimney, and goeth out into the air: and the air cometh up Sissot's
nose-thirls, and feedeth her bodily life; and Sissot maketh
seventy-seven I's to six pages of parchment."
"Now, Jack, softly!" said I.
"So it is, my dame," pursueth he. "Every thing that dieth, feedeth
somewhat that liveth. But I can go further an' thou wilt. Friar Roger
thought (though he had not proved it) that every word spoken might as it
were dwell in the air, and at bidding of God hereafter, all those words
should return to life and be heard again by all the world."