THEREAFTER for two years the Hermit and the Wild Woman lived side by
side, meeting together to pray on the great feast-days of the year, but
on all other days dwelling apart, engaged in pious practices.
At first the Hermit, knowing the weakness of woman, and her little
aptitude for the life apart, had feared that he might be disturbed by
the nearness of his penitent; but she faithfully held to his commands,
abstaining from all sight of him save on the Days of Obligation; and
when they met, so modest and devout was her demeanour that she raised
his soul to fresh fervency. And gradually it grew sweet to him to think
that, near by though unseen, was one who performed the same tasks at
the same hours; so that, whether he tended his garden, or recited his
chaplet, or rose under the stars to repeat the midnight office, he had
a companion in all his labours and devotions.
Meanwhile the report had spread abroad that a holy woman who cast out
devils had made her dwelling in the Hermit's cliff; and many sick
persons from the valley sought her out, and went away restored by her.
These poor pilgrims brought her oil and flour, and with her own hands
she made a garden like the Hermit's, and planted it with corn and
lentils; but she would never take a trout from the brook, or receive
the gift of a snared wild-fowl, for she said that in her vagrant life
the wild creatures of the wood had befriended her, and as she had slept
in peace among them, so now she would never suffer them to be molested.
In the third year came a plague, and death walked the cities, and many
poor peasants fled to the hills to escape it. These the Hermit and his
penitent faithfully tended, and so skilful were the Wild Woman's
ministrations that the report of them reached the town across the
valley, and a deputation of burgesses came with rich offerings, and
besought her to descend and comfort their sick. The Hermit, seeing her
depart on so dangerous a mission, would have accompanied her, but she
bade him remain and tend those who fled to the hills; and for many days
his heart was consumed in prayer for her, and he feared lest every
fugitive should bring him word of her death.
But at length she returned, wearied-out but whole, and covered with the
blessings of the townsfolk; and thereafter her name for holiness spread
as wide as the Hermit's.
Seeing how constant she remained in her chosen life, and what advance
she had made in the way of perfection, the Hermit now felt that it
behoved him to exhort her again to return to the convent; and more than
once he resolved to speak with her, but his heart hung back. At length
he bethought him that by failing in this duty he imperilled his own
soul, and thereupon, on the next feast-day, when they met, he reminded
her that in spite of her good works she still lived in sin and
excommunicate, and that, now she had once more tasted the sweets of
godliness, it was her duty to confess her fault and give herself up to
her superiors.
She heard him meekly, but when he had spoken she was silent and her
tears ran over; and looking at her he wept also, and said no more. And
they prayed together, and returned each to his cave.
It was not till late winter that the plague abated; and the spring and
early summer following were heavy with rains and great heat. When the
Hermit visited his penitent at the feast of Pentecost, she appeared to
him so weak and wasted that, when they had recited the _Veni, sancte
spiritus_, and the proper psalms, he taxed her with too great rigour of
penitential practices; but she replied that her weakness was not due to
an excess of discipline, but that she had brought back from her labours
among the sick a heaviness of body which the intemperance of the season
no doubt increased. The evil rains continued, falling chiefly at night,
while by day the land reeked with heat and vapours; so that lassitude
fell on the Hermit also, and he could hardly drag himself down to the
spring whence he drew his drinking-water. Thus he fell into the habit
of going down to the glen before cockcrow, after he had recited Matins;
for at that hour the rain commonly ceased, and a faint air was
stirring. Now because of the wet season the stream had not gone dry,
and instead of replenishing his flagon slowly at the trickling spring,
the Hermit went down to the waterside to fill it; and once, as he
descended the steep slope of the glen, he heard the covert rustle, and
saw the leaves stir as though something moved behind them. As he looked
silence fell, and the leaves grew still; but his heart was shaken, for
it seemed to him that what he had seen in the dusk had a human
semblance, such as the wood-people wear. And he was loth to think that
such unhallowed beings haunted the glen.
A few days passed, and again, descending to the stream, he saw a figure
flit by him through the covert; and this time a deeper fear entered
into him; but he put away the thought, and prayed fervently for all
souls in temptation. And when he spoke with the Wild Woman again, on
the feast of the Seven Maccabees, which falls on the first day of
August, he was smitten with fear to see her wasted looks, and besought
her to cease from labouring and let him minister to her in her
weakness. But she denied him gently, and replied that all she asked of
him was to keep her steadfastly in his prayers.
Before the feast of the Assumption the rains ceased, and the plague,
which had begun to show itself, was stayed; but the ardency of the sun
grew greater, and the Hermit's cliff was a fiery furnace. Never had
such heat been known in those regions; but the people did not murmur,
for with the cessation of the rain their crops were saved and the
pestilence banished; and these mercies they ascribed in great part to
the prayers and macerations of the two holy anchorets. Therefore on the
eve of the Assumption they sent a messenger to the Hermit, saying that
at daylight on the morrow the townspeople and all the dwellers in the
valley would come forth, led by their Bishop, who bore the Pope's
blessing to the two solitaries, and who was mindful to celebrate the
Mass of the Assumption in the Hermit's cave in the cliffside. At the
blessed word the Hermit was well-nigh distraught with joy, for he felt
this to be a sign from heaven that his prayers were heard, and that he
had won the Wild Woman's grace as well as his own. And all night he
prayed that on the morrow she might confess her fault and receive the
Sacrament with him.
Before dawn he recited the psalms of the proper nocturn; then he girded
on his gown and sandals, and went forth to meet the Bishop in the
valley.
As he went downward daylight stood on the mountains, and he thought he
had never seen so fair a dawn. It filled the farthest heaven with
brightness, and penetrated even to the woody crevices of the glen, as
the grace of God had entered into the obscurest folds of his heart. The
morning airs were hushed, and he heard only the sound of his own
footfall, and the murmur of the stream which, though diminished, still
poured a swift current between the rocks; but as he reached the bottom
of the glen a sound of chanting came to him, and he knew that the
pilgrims were at hand. His heart leapt up and his feet hastened
forward; but at the streamside they were suddenly stayed, for in a pool
where the water was still deep he saw the shining of a woman's
body--and on a stone hard by lay the Wild Woman's gown and sandals.
Fear and rage possessed the Hermit's heart, and he stood as one smitten
speechless, covering his eyes from the shame. But the song of the
approaching pilgrims swelled ever louder and nearer, and finding voice
he cried to the Wild Woman to come forth and hide herself from the
people.
She made no answer, but in the dusk he saw her limbs sway with the
swaying of the water, and her eyes were turned to him as if in mockery.
At the sight blind fury filled him, and clambering over the rocks to
the pool's edge he bent down and caught her by the shoulder. At that
moment he could have strangled her with his hands, so abhorrent to him
was the touch of her flesh; but as he cried out on her, heaping her
with cruel names, he saw that her eyes returned his look without
wavering; and suddenly it came to him that she was dead. Then through
all his anger and fear a great pang smote him; for here was his work
undone, and one he had loved in Christ laid low in her sin, in spite of
all his labours.
One moment pity possessed him; the next he bethought him how the people
would find him bending above the body of a naked woman, whom he had
held up to them as holy, but whom they might now well take for the
secret instrument of his undoing; and beholding how at her touch all
the slow edifice of his holiness was demolished, and his soul in mortal
jeopardy, he felt the earth reel round him and his sight grew red.
Already the head of the procession had entered the glen, and the
stillness shook with the great sound of the _Salve Regina_. When the
Hermit opened his eyes once more the air was quivering with thronged
candle-flames, which glittered on the gold thread of priestly
vestments, and on the blazing monstrance beneath its canopy; and close
above him was bent the Bishop's face.
The Hermit struggled to his knees.
"My Father in God," he cried, "behold, for my sins I have been visited
by a demon--" But as he spoke he perceived that those about him no
longer heeded him, and that the Bishop and all his clergy had fallen on
their knees about the pool. Then the Hermit, following their gaze, saw
that the brown waters of the pool covered the Wild Woman's limbs as
with a garment, and that about her floating head a great light floated;
and to the utmost edges of the throng a cry of praise went up, for many
were there whom the Wild Woman had healed and comforted, and who read
God's mercy in this wonder. But fresh fear fell on the Hermit, for he
had cursed a dying saint, and denounced her aloud to all the people;
and this new anguish, coming so close upon the other, smote down his
weakened frame, so that his limbs failed him and he sank once more to
the ground.
Again the earth reeled about him, and the bending faces grew remote;
but as he forced his weak voice once more to proclaim his sins he felt
the blessed touch of absolution, and the holy oils of the last voyage
laid on his lips and eyes. Peace returned to him then, and with it a
great longing to look once more upon his lauds, as he had dreamed of
doing at his last hour; but he was too far gone to make this longing
known, and so tried to banish it from his mind. Yet in his weakness the
wish held him, and the tears ran down his face.
Then, as he lay there, feeling the earth slip from under him, and the
Everlasting Arms replace it, he heard a great peal of voices that
seemed to come down from the sky and mingle with the singing of the
throng; and the words of the chant were the words of his own lauds, so
long hidden in the secret of his breast, and now rejoicing above him
through the spheres. And his soul rose on the chant, and soared with it
to the seat of mercy.