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A MONK OF CRUTA
BY
E. PHILLIPS OPPENHEIM,
_Author of "The Peer and the Woman," "A Millionaire of Yesterday,"
Etc., Etc._
NEW YORK:
J. S. OGILVIE PUBLISHING COMPANY,
57 ROSE STREET.
COPYRIGHT, 1894, BY
F. TENNYSON NEELY.
A MONK OF CRUTA.
CONTENTS.
CHAP. PAGE
I. "THE BLACK-ROBED PHANTOM, 'DEATH'" 11
II. "THE NEW ART" 32
III. "THE DANCING GIRL" 39
IV. "ADREA'S DIARY" 47
V. "THE FAR-OFF MUTTERING OF THE STORM TO COME" 50
VI. "AN ASHEN GREY DELIGHT" 61
VII. "WHO ARE YOU, AND WHAT YOUR MISSION" 73
VIII. "I AM WEARY OF A HOPELESS LOVE" 80
IX. "AH! HOW FAIR MY WEAKNESS FINDS THEE" 91
X. "I AM BUT A SLAVE, AND YET I BID THEE COME" 104
XI. "ADREA'S DIARY" 114
XII. "WE ARE LIKE SHOOTING STARS, WHOSE MEETING IS THEIR RUIN" 122
XIII. "THE PATH THAT LEADS TO MADMEN'S KINGDOMS" 129
XIV. "THE POISON OF HONEY FLOWERS" 136
XV. "AND MOST OF ALL WOULD I FLY FROM THE CRUEL MADNESS OF LOVE" 144
XVI. "'TWIXT YOU AND ME A NOISOME SHADOW CAST" 154
XVII. "IF LOVE YOU CHOOSE, THEN LOVE SHALL BE YOUR RUIN" 159
XVIII. "SOFTLY GLIMMERING THROUGH THE LAURELS AT THE QUIET
EVENFALL" 166
XIX. "BLOOD CALLS ALOUD FOR BLOOD AND NOT FOR HANDS ENTWINED" 174
XX. "THE NEW, STRONG WINE OF LOVE" 180
XXI. "ADREA'S DIARY" 185
XXII. "OH! HEART OF STONE, YET FLESH TO ALL SAVE ME" 195
XXIII. "MY LIPS ARE CHARGED WITH TRUTH, AND JUSTICE BIDS ME SPEAK" 206
XXIV. "THE SHATTERED VASE OF LOVE'S MOST HOLY VOWS" 218
XXV. "A BECKONING VOICE FROM OUT A SHADOWY LAND" 224
XXVI. "LATE THOU COMEST, CRUEL THOU HAST BEEN" 232
XXVII. "GRIM FIGURES TRACED BY SORROW'S FIERY HAND" 241
XXVIII. "ADREA'S DIARY" 249
XXIX. "ADREA'S DIARY" 263
XXX. "ADREA'S DIARY" 275
XXXI. "ADREA'S DIARY" 280
XXXII. "THE LORD OF CRUTA" 291
XXXIII. "THE DAWN OF A SHORT, SWEET LIFE" 298
XXXIV. "A VOICE AND FIGURE FROM THE DISTANT PAST" 308
XXXV. "FROM OUT LIFE'S THUNDERS TO A STRANGE, SWEET WORLD" 322
XXXVI. "LOVE THAN DEATH ITSELF MORE STRONG" 329
A MONK OF CRUTA.
CHAPTER I
"THE BLACK-ROBED PHANTOM 'DEATH'"
"Father Adrian!"
"I am here!"
"I saw the doctor talking with you aside! How long have I to live? He
told you the truth! Repeat his words to me!"
The tall, gaunt young priest drew nearer to the bedside, and shook his
head with a slow, pitying gesture.
"The time was short--short indeed. Yet, why should you fear? Your
confession has been made! I myself have pronounced your absolution;
the holy Church has granted to you her most holy sacrament."
"Fear! Bah! I have no fear! It is a matter of calculation. Shall I see
morning break?"
"You may; but you will never see the mid-day sun."
The dying man raised himself with a slow, painful movement, and
pointed to the window.
"Throw up the window."
He was obeyed. A servant who had been sitting quietly in the shadows
of the vast apartment, with his head buried in his hands, rose and did
his master's bidding.
"What hour is it?"
"Three o'clock."
"Gomez, strain your eyes seaward. Is there no light on the horizon?"
"None! The storm has wrapped the earth in darkness. Listen!"
A torrent of rain was swept against the streaming window pane, and a
gust of wind shook the frame in its sockets. The watcher turned away
from the window with a mute gesture of despair. No eye could pierce
that black chaos. He sank again into his seat, and looked around
shuddering. The high, vaulted chamber was lit by a pair of candles
only, leaving the greater part of it in gloom. Grim, fantastic shadows
lurked in the corners, and lay across the bare floor. Even the tall
figure of the priest, on his knees before a rude wooden crucifix,
seemed weird and ghostly. The heavy, mildewed bed-hangings shook
and trembled in the draughts which filled the room, and the candles
flickered and burnt low in their sockets. Gomez watched them with a
sort of anxious fascination. His master's life was burning out,
minute for minute, with those candles. Twenty-five years of constant
companionship would be ended in a few brief hours. Gomez was not
disposed to trouble much at this; but he bethought himself of a snug
little abode in Piccadilly, where the discomforts now surrounding them
were quite unknown. Surely, to die there would be a luxury compared
with this. He began to feel personally aggrieved that his master
should have chosen such an out-of-the-way hole to end his days in.
Then came a rush of thought, and he was grave. He knew why! Yes! he
knew why!
The dying man lay quite still, almost as though his time were already
come. Once he raised himself, and the feeble light flashed across a
grey, haggard face and a pair of burning eyes. But his effort was
only momentary. He sank back again, and lay there with his eyes half
closed, and breathing softly. He was nursing his strength.
One, two, three, four, five! The harsh clanging of a brazen clock
somewhere in the building had penetrated to the chamber, followed by a
deep, resonant bell. The man on the bed lifted his head.
"How goes the storm?" he asked softly.
Gomez stood up and faced the window.
"The storm dies with the night, sir," he answered. "The wind has
fallen."
"When does day break?"
Gomez looked at his watch.
"In one hour, sir."
"Stay by the window, Gomez, and let your eyes watch for the dawn."
The priest frowned. "Surely the time has come when you should quit
your hold on earthly things," he said quietly. "What matters the dawn!
soon you will lose yourself in an everlasting sleep, and the dawn for
you will be eternity. Take this crucifix, and pray with me."
The dying man pushed it away with a gesture almost contemptuous.
"Is there no light on the sea yet, Gomez?" he asked anxiously.
Gomez leant forward till his face touched the window pane. He strained
his eyes till they ached; but the darkness was impenetrable. Yet
stay,--what was that? A feeble yellow light was glimmering far away
in the heart of that great gulf of darkness. He held his breath, and
watched it steadily. Then he turned round.
"There is a light in the far distance, sir," he said. "I cannot tell
what it may be, but there is a light."
A wave of excitement passed over the strong, wasted features of the
man upon the bed. He half raised himself, and his voice was almost
firm.
"Push my bed to the window," he ordered.
The two men, priest and servant, bent all their strength to the task,
and inch by inch they moved the great, creaking structure. When at
last they had succeeded, and paused to take breath, the light in the
distance had become stronger and more apparent. Together the three men
watched it grow; master and servant, with breathless eagerness, the
priest with a show of displeasure in his severe face. Suddenly Gomez
gave a little cry.
"The dawn!" he exclaimed, pointing to the north of the light. "Morning
is breaking."
Sure enough, a grey, pallid light was stealing down upon the water.
The darkness was becoming a chaos of grey and black; of towering seas
and low-lying clouds, with cold white streaks of light falling through
them, and piercing the curtains of night. There was no vestige of
colouring--nothing but cold grey and slate white. Yet the dawn moved
on, and through it the yellow light in the distance gleamed larger and
larger.
"Hold me up," ordered the man on the bed. "Prop me up with pillows!"
They did as he bade them, and for the first time his face was fully
revealed in the straggling twilight. A flowing grey beard, still
plentifully streaked with black, rested upon his chest; and the eyes,
steadily fixed upon the window pane, were dark and undimmed. A long
illness had wasted his fine features, but had detracted nothing from
their strength and regularity of outline. His lips were closely
set, and his expression, though painfully eager, was not otherwise
displeasing. There was none of the fear of death there; nor was there
anything of the passionless resignation of the man who has bidden
farewell to life, and made his peace with God and man; nor, in
those moments of watching, had his face any of the physical signs of
approaching death.
"Ah!"
They started at the sharp, almost triumphant exclamation which had
escaped from his white lips, and followed his long, quivering finger.
Above that glimmering light was a faint, dim line of smoke, fading on
the horizon.
"It is a steamer, indeed," the priest said, with some interest. "She
is making for the island."
"When is the supply boat due?" Gomez asked.
"Not for a fortnight," the priest answered; "it is not she, it is a
stranger."
There was no other word spoken. Soon the dawn, moving across the great
waste of waters, pierced the dark background behind the steamer's
light. The long trail of white, curdling foam in her track gleamed
like a silver cleft in a dark gulf. The dim shape of her sails stole
slowly into sight, and they could see that she was carrying a great
weight of canvas. Then into the grey air, a rocket shot up like a
brilliant meteor, and the sound of a gun came booming over the waters.
"Can she make the bay?" Gomez asked suddenly. "Look at the surf."
They all removed their eyes from the steamer, and fixed them nearer
home. The darkness had rolled away, and the outlook, though a little
uncertain in the misty morning light, was still visible. Right before
the window, a little to the left, a great rocky hill, many hundreds
of feet high, ran sheer down into the sea, and facing it on the right,
was a lower range of rocks running out from the mainland. Inside the
natural harbour thus formed, the sea was quiet enough; but at the
entrance, a line of white breakers and huge ocean waves were leaping
up against the base of the promontory, and dashing over the lower
range of rocks. Beyond, the sea was wild and rough, and the steamer
was often almost lost to sight in the hollow of the Waves.
"Ah!"
The faces of all three men underwent a sudden change. Three rockets,
one after another, shot up into the sky from the top of the rocky
hill, leaving a faint, violet glow overhead. The dying man set his
teeth hard, and his eyes glistened.
"Three rockets," he muttered. "What is the meaning of that signal,
Father?" he asked.
The priest looked downward, pityingly. "It is a warning that the
entrance to the bay is unsafe," he answered. "Take comfort; it is
the hand of God keeping from you those who would distract your dying
thoughts from Heaven. Take comfort, and pray with me."
He seemed strangely deaf to the priest's words, and made no movement
or sign in response. Only he kept his eyes the more steadfastly
fixed upon the steamer, now plainly visible. His face showed no
disappointment. It seemed almost as though he might have seen across
the grey sea, and heard the stern orders thundered out from a slim,
motionless figure on the captain's bridge. "Right ahead, helmsman!
Never mind the signal. There's fifty pounds for every man of you if we
make the bay. It's not so bad as it looks! Back me up like brave lads,
and I'll remember it all your lives!"
Almost, too, he might have heard the answering cheer, for a faint
smile parted his white lips as he saw the steamer ploughing her way
heavily straight ahead, paying no heed to the warning signal.
On she came. The priest and the servant started as they saw her
intention, and a sharp ejaculation of surprise escaped from the
former. Side by side, they watched the labouring vessel with strained
eyes. Her hull and shape were now visible in the dim morning twilight,
as she rose and fell upon the waves. It was evident that she was a
large, handsome pleasure yacht, daintily but strongly built.
Close up against the high, bare window the three watchers,
unconsciously enough, formed a striking-looking group. The priest,
tall, pale, and severe, stood in the shadow of the bed-curtains, an
impressive and solemn figure in his dark, flowing robes, but with the
impassibility of his features curiously disturbed. He, who had been
preaching calm, was himself agitated. He had drawn a little on one
side, so that the cold grey light should not fall upon his face and
betray its twitching lips and quivering pallor; but if either of the
men who shared his watch had thought to glance at him, the sickly
candlelight would have shown at once what he was so anxious to
conceal. It was little more than chance which had brought this man
to die in his island monastery, and under his care; little more than
chance which had revealed to him this wonderful secret. But the agony
of those last few hours, and the gloomy words of the priest who leant
over his bedside, had found their way in between the joints of the
dying man's armour of secrecy. Word by word, the story had been
wrested from him. In the cold and comfortless hour of death, the
strong, worldly man felt his physical weakness loosen the iron bands
of his will, and he became for a time almost like a child in the hands
of the keen, swiftly-questioning priest. He had not found much comfort
in the mumbled prayers and absolution, which were all he got in
exchange for his life's secret,--and such a secret! He had not,
indeed, noticed the fixed, far-away gaze in the priest's dark eyes as
he knelt by the bedside; but his prayers, his faint words of comfort,
had fallen like drops of ice upon his quickened desire to be brought
a little nearer to that mysterious, shadowy essence of goodness which
was all his mind could conceive of a God. It had seemed like a dead
form of words, lifeless, hopeless, monotonous; and all that faint
striving to attain to some knowledge of the truth--if indeed truth
there was--had been crushed into ashes by it. As he had lived, so must
he die, he told himself with some return of that philosophic quietude
which had led him, stout-hearted and brave, through many dangers. And,
at that moment when he had been striving to detach his thoughts from
their vain task of conjuring up useless regrets, there had come what
even now seemed to be the granting of his last passionate prayer. The
man whom he had longed to see once more before his eyes were closed
forever upon the world, with such a longing that his heart had grown
sick and weary with the burden of it, had been brought as though by a
miracle almost to his side. He knew as though by some strange instinct
the measure of his strength. He had no fear of dying before his
heart's dearest wish could be gratified. If only that fiercely
labouring vessel succeeded in her brave struggle, he knew that there
would be strength left to him to bear the shock of meeting, to bear
even the shock of the tidings which could either sweeten his last few
moments, or deepen the gloom of his passage into the unknown world.
And so he lay there, with fixed, glazed eyes and shortened breath,
watching and waiting.
The supreme moment came; the steamer had reached the dangerous point,
and the waves were breaking over her with such fury that more than
once she vanished altogether from sight, only to reappear in a moment
or two, quivering and trembling from stern to hull like a living
creature. After all, the struggle was a brief one, though it seemed
long to the watchers at the window. In less than ten minutes it
was over; she had passed the line of breakers, and was in the
comparatively smooth water of the bay, heading fast for the shore
under leeway of the great wall of towering rocks, at the foot of which
she seemed dwarfed almost into the semblance of a boy's toy vessel.
Within a quarter of a mile from the shore, she anchored, and a boat
was let down from her side.
A new lease of life seemed to have come to the man on the bed. The
morning sun had half emerged from a bank of angry purple-coloured
clouds, and its faint slanting beams lay across the white coverlet of
the bed, and upon his face. His eyes were bright and eager, and the
death-like pallor seemed to have passed from his features. His voice,
too, was firm and distinct.
"Place my despatch-box upon the table here, Gomez," he ordered.
Gomez left his seat by the window, and, opening a portmanteau, brought
a small black box to the bedside. His master passed his hand over it,
and drew it underneath the coverlet.
"I am prepared," he murmured, half to himself. "Father, according to
the physician's reckoning, how long have I to live?"
"Barely an hour," answered the priest, without removing his eyes from
the boat, whose progress he seemed to be scanning steadfastly. "Is
your eternal future of so little moment to you," he went on in a tone
of harsh severity, "that you can give your last thoughts, your last
few moments, to affairs of this world? 'Tis an unholy death! Take this
cross in your hands, and listen not to those whose coming will surely
estrange you from heaven. Let the world take its own course, but lift
your eyes and heart in prayer! Everlasting salvation, or everlasting
doom, awaits you before yonder sun be set!"
"I have no fear, Father," was the quiet reply. "What is, is; a few
frantic prayers now could alter nothing, and, besides, my work on
earth is not yet over. Speak to me no more of the end! Nothing that
you or I could do now would bring me one step nearer heaven. Gomez,
your eyes are good! Whom do you see in the boat?"
Gomez answered without turning round from the window, "Mr. Paul is
there, sir, steering!"
"Thank God!"
"There are others with him, sir!"
"Others! Who?"
"Strangers to me, sir. There is a man, a gentleman by his dress and
appearance, and a child--a girl, I think. Two sailors from the yacht
are rowing."
The dying man knitted his brows, and his fingers convulsively clutched
at the bed-clothes. He had lost something of that calm and effortless
serenity which seemed to have fallen upon him since the safety of the
steamer had been assured.
"The boat is quite close, Gomez! Can you not describe the stranger?"
"I can only see that he is thin, rather tall, and, I think, elderly,
sir. He is very much wrapped up, as though he were an invalid."
"Lift me up so that I can see them. Father Adrian will help you."
The priest shook his head. "The effort would probably cost you your
life," he said, "and it would be useless. Before you could see them
the boat would be round the corner."
"So near! God grant me strength! Gomez, give me a tablespoonful of the
brandy!"
Gomez moved silently to his side, and poured out the brandy.
Afterwards his master closed his eyes, and there was an intense
silence in the chamber--the deep, breathless silence of expectancy.
The monastery itself, a small and deserted one, tenanted only by a
few half-starved monks of one of the lower orders of the Church, was
wrapped in a profound gloom. There was no sound from the half-ruined
chapel or the long, empty corridors. The storm had ceased, and the
casements no longer rattled in the wind. To the man who lay there,
nursing his fast-ebbing strength, it seemed indeed like the silence
before the one last tragedy of death, looming so black and so grim
before him.
It was broken at last. Away at the end of the corridor the faint sound
of hurrying footsteps and subdued voices reached the ears of the three
watchers. They came nearer and nearer, halting at last just outside
the door. There was a knock, a quick, impetuous answer, and the
visitors entered, ushered in by the priest, who had met them on the
threshold.
Of the two men, one advanced hastily with outstretched hand and
pitying face to the bedside; the other moved only a step or two
further into the room, and stood looking intently, yet without any
salutation or form of recognition, at the dying man. The former, when
he reached the bed, sank on his knees and took the white hand which
lay upon the coverlet between his.
"Father! My father! I would have given the world to have found you
better. Tell me that it is not true what they say. You will pull round
now that I have come!"
There was no answer. The dying man did not even look into the handsome
young face so close to his. His eyes, bright and unnaturally large,
were rivetted upon the figure at the foot of the bed. His breath came
quickly, and he was shivering; an inarticulate sort of moan came from
his lips.
"Father! you are agitated, and no wonder, to see him here. You had my
letter preparing you; nothing that I could do would stop his coming."
It was Gomez who answered, advancing out of the gloom: "There has been
no letter."
There was an instant's silence. Then the younger man rose up, pale
as death. "God! what a fool I was to trust to mails in this
out-of-the-way hole! Father! I shall never forgive myself. Blind idiot
that I was, to bring him in like this."
It seemed as if no one save he possessed the power of speech. There
was a dead silence. He looked from one to another of the figures in
that silent drama in fast-growing despair. The face of the man whom
he had brought there revealed little, although in a certain way its
expression was remarkable. The lips were parted in a slow,
quiet smile, not in itself sardonic or cruel, although under the
circumstances it seemed so, for it was difficult to associate any
idea of mirth with the scene which was passing in that grim, gloomy
chamber. Something of the awe inseparable from this close approach of
death was visible in the faces of all the other watchers. Not so in
his! It was the contrast which seemed so strange. He stood there, with
his hands thrust deep into the pockets of his long travelling coat,
returning the fixed, glazed stare of the dying man with a sort of
indifferent good humour. Perhaps a very close observer might have
detected a shade of mockery in those soft black eyes and faintly
twitching lips, but the light in the room was too obscure for any one
there to penetrate beneath the apparent indifference. It was he who
broke that deep, tragic silence, and his voice, light and even gay,
struck a strange note in that solemn chamber of death.
"So you are dying, Martin, _mon ami_? How odd! If any one had told me
one short month ago that I should have been here to watch your last
moments, and start you on your journey to hell, bah! how mad I should
have thought them. 'Tis a pleasure I never anticipated."
His words seemed to dissolve the lethargy which his presence had cast
over the dying man. He turned away towards the younger figure by his
side.
"How came he here?" he asked feebly.
"Listen, and I will tell you," was the low reply. "I sought him first
at Monaco, but he had not been heard of there for two years. Then I
found traces of him at Algiers; and followed up the clue to Cairo,
Athens, Syracuse, and Belgrade. It was at Constantinople I found
him at last--an officer--actually an officer in the Turkish army;
'Monsieur le Captaine,' my interpreter called him," the young man
added, with a fine scorn in his raised voice. "Imagine it! Well,
I gave him your letter, delivered the messages, and awaited his
pleasure. He kept me waiting for two days before he vouchsafed
one word of answer. On the third day he announced his intention of
accompanying me here. Nothing that I could say made any difference.
'His answer should be given to you in person, or not at all.' I
wrote to you three days before we started; that letter you never had.
Forgive me, father, for the shock! As for you," he continued, turning
abruptly towards the motionless figure at the foot of the bed, "I have
kept my word, and brought you here in safety, though no one in the
world will ever know how near I came to breaking it, and throwing you
into the Dardanelles. Ah! I was sorely tempted, I can tell you. Speak
your answer, and go! This is no place for you to linger in."
"Upon my word, you are courteous, very! But, my dear friend Martin,
as this is to be our farewell, I must really see you a little more
distinctly."
For the first time, the man in the long overcoat changed his position,
and came a little nearer to the bed. The movement showed him the
priest, kneeling with closed eyes and uplifted hands before an iron
crucifix.
"Ah! we are not quite alone then, Martin, _cher ami_! the gentleman in
the long robe appears to be listening."
"He is as dead," answered the man on the bed slowly. "He is a monk;
you can speak."
He raised himself slightly on the bed. One hand remained grasping his
despatch-box under the bed-clothes; the other was held by the young man
who knelt by his side. His face was curiously changed; all the effect
of his unlooked-for visitor's arrival seemed to have passed away. His
eyes were bright and eager. His white lips were closely set and firm.
"You can speak," he repeated.
His visitor was leaning over the foot of the bed now, and the smile
had quite gone, leaving his face cold and white. He spoke a little
quicker than before.
"Here is your answer, Martin de Vaux! You offer me a fortune, on
condition that I give up to you on your deathbed the power by which I
hold those whom you love, my slaves. Money is dear to me, as it is to
most men, but I would die sooner than touch yours. Curse you, and
your money, and your family! Not for all the gold that was ever coined
would I yield up my power! My day will come, and may the evil spirit
bring you tidings of it down into hell! Curse you, Martin de Vaux! Now
you know my mind."
The dying man was strangely calm. From under the bed-clothes came the
faint sound of the opening and shutting of the despatch-box.
"Yes, I know your mind," he repeated quietly. "You mean me to die with
the torturing thought that I have left a poisonous reptile to suck
the life and blood from those I love, and the honour from a grand old
name. But I will not! We will take our next journey together, Victor."
A sudden change had crept into his tone before the last sentence; and
before it had died away, the priest and the man by the bedside had
leaped to their feet in horror. He whom they had thought too weak to
stir was sitting bolt upright in bed, his eyes blazing and his hand
extended. There was a line of fire, a loud report, and then a single
cry of agony. The man who had leaned over the foot of the bed lay on
the ground just as he had fallen, shot dead through the heart, and a
child, dark-skinned and thin, who had rushed in at the sound of the
report, was sobbing passionately with her arms wound around him.
Across the bed, still grasping the pistol, but with his hands hanging
helplessly down, lay the man who had fired the shot. The effort had
killed him.
The priest was the first in the room to move. He slowly bent over both
bodies, and then turned round to the other man.
"Dead?" he asked, with a dry, choking gasp.
"Both dead."
The priest and his companion, shocked and unnerved, looked at one
another in silence. The child's sobs grew louder, and the morning
sunlight stole across the bare floor, and fell upon the white, still
faces.
The tragedy was over, and the seeds of another sown.