There came a man by middle day, He spied his sport and went away, And
brought the king that very night, And brake my bower and slew my knight. The Border Widow’s Lament
*[footnote: Bellaise is not meant for a type of all nunneries, but
of the condition to which many of the lesser ones had come before the
general reaction and purification of the seventeenth century.]
That same Latin hymn which Cecily St. John daily chanted in her own
chamber was due from the choir of Cistercian sisters in the chapel of
the Convent of Our Lady at Bellaise, in the Bocage of Anjou; but there
was a convenient practice of lumping together the entire night and
forenoon hours at nine o’clock in the morning, and all the evening ones
at Compline, so that the sisters might have undisturbed sleep at
night and entertainment by day. Bellaise was a very comfortable little
nunnery, which only received richly dowered inmates, and was therefore
able to maintain them in much ease, though without giving occasion to a
breath of scandal. Founded by a daughter of the first Angevin Ribaumont,
it had become a sort of appanage for the superfluous daughters of the
house, and nothing would more have amazed its present head, Eustacie
Barbe de Ribaumont,--conventually known as La Mere Marie Seraphine de
St.-Louis, and to the world as Madame de Bellaise,--than to be accused
of not fulfilling the intentions of the Bienheureuse Barbe, the
foundress, or of her patron St. Bernard.
Madame de Bellaise was a fine-looking woman of forty, in a high state
of preservation, owing to the healthy life she had led. Her eyes were of
brilliant, beautiful black her complexion had a glow, her hair--for she
wore it visibly--formed crisp rolls of jetty ringlets on her temples,
almost hiding her close white cap. The heavy thick veil was tucked back
beneath the furred purple silk hood that fastened under her chin. The
white robes of her order were not of serge, but of the finest cloth, and
were almost hidden by a short purple cloak with sleeves, likewise lined
and edged with fur, and fastened on the bosom with a gold brooch. Her
fingers, bearing more rings than the signet of her house, were concealed
in embroidered gauntlets of Spanish leather. One of them held an
ivory-handled riding-rod, the other the reins of the well-fed jennet, on
which the lady, on a fine afternoon, late in the Carnival, was cantering
home through the lanes of the Bocage, after a successful morning’s
hawking among the wheat-ears. She was attended by a pair of sisters,
arrayed somewhat in the same style, and by a pair of mounted grooms, the
falconer with his charge having gone home by a footway.
The sound of horses’ feet approaching made her look towards a long lane
that came down at right angles to that along which she was riding, and
slacken her pace before coming to its opening. And as she arrived at the
intersection, she beheld advancing, mounted on a little rough pony, the
spare figure of her brother the Chevalier, in his home suit, so greasy
and frayed, that only his plumed hat (and a rusty plume it was) and the
old sword at his side showed his high degree.
He waved his hand to her as a sign to halt, and rode quickly up,
scarcely giving time for a greeting ere he said, ‘Sister the little one
is not out with you.’
‘No, truly, the little mad thing, she is stricter and more head-strong
than ever was her preceptress. Poor Monique! I had hoped that we
should be at rest when that _cass-tete_ had carried off her scruples
to Ste.-Claire, at Lucon, but here is this little droll far beyond her,
without being even a nun!’
‘Assuredly not. The business must be concluded at once. She must be
married before Lent.’
‘That will scarce be--in her present frame.’
‘It must be. Listen, sister. Here is this miserable alive!’
‘Her spouse!’
‘Folly about her spouse! The decree from Rome has annulled the foolish
mummery of her infancy. It came a week after the Protestant conspiracy,
and was registered when the Norman peasants at Chateau Leurre showed
contumacy. It was well; for, behold, our gallant is among his English
friends, recovering, and even writing a billet. Anon he will be upon our
hands in person. By the best fortune, Gillot fell in with his messenger
this morning, prowling about on his way to the convent, and brought him
to me to be examined. I laid him fat in ward, and sent Gillot off to
ride day and night to bring my son down to secure the girl at once.’
‘You will never obtain her consent. She is distractedly in love with his
memory! Let her guess at his life, and---’
‘Precisely. Therefore must we be speedy. All Paris knows it by this
time, for the fellow went straight to the English Ambassador; and I
trust my son has been wise enough to set off already; for should we wait
till after Lent, Monsieur le Baron himself might be upon us.’
‘Poor child! You men little heed how you make a woman suffer.’
‘How, Reverend Mother! you pleading for a heretic marriage, that would
give our rights to a Huguenot--what say I?--an English renegade!’
‘I plead not, brother. The injustice towards you must be repaired; but
I have a certain love for my niece, and I fear she will be heartbroken
when she learns the truth, the poor child.’
‘Bah! The Abbess should rejoice in thus saving her soul! How if her
heretic treated Bellaise like the convents of England?’
‘No threats, brother. As a daughter of Ribaumont and a mother of the
Church will I stand by you,’ said the Abbess with dignity.
‘And now tell me how it has been with the child. I have not seen her
since we agreed that the request did but aggravate her. You said her
health was better since her nurse had been so often with her, and that
she had ceased from her austerities.’
‘Not entirely; for when first she came, in her transports of despair and
grief on finding Soeur Monique removed, she extorted from Father Bonami
a sort of hope that she might yet save her husband’s, I mean the Baron’s
soul. Then, truly, it was a frenzy of fasts and prayers. Father Bonami
has made his profit, and so have the fathers of Chollet--all her money
has gone in masses, and in alms to purchase the prayers of the poor,
and she herself fasting on bread and water, kneeling barefooted in the
chapel till she was transfixed with cold. No _chaufferette_, not she!
Obstinate to the last degree! Tell her she would die--it was the best
news one could bring; all her desire, to be in a more rigid house with
Soeur Monique at Lucon. At length, Mere Perrine and Veronique found her
actually fainting and powerless with cold on the chapel-floor; and since
that time she has been more reasonable. There are prayers as much as
ever; but the fancy to kill herself with fasting has passed. She begins
to recover her looks, nay, sometimes I have thought she had an air of
hope in her eyes and lips; but what know I? I have much to occupy me,
and she persists in shutting herself up with her woman.’
‘You have not allowed her any communication from without?’
‘Mere Perrine has come and gone freely; but she is nothing. No, the
child could have no correspondence. She did, indeed, write a letter to
the Queen, as you know, brother, six weeks ago; but that has never been
answered, nor could any letters have harmed you, since it is only now
that this young man is known to be living.’
‘You are right, sister. No harm can have been done. All will go well.
The child must be wearied with her frenzy of grief and devotion! She
will catch gladly at an excuse for change. A scene or two, and she will
readily yield!’
‘It is true,’ said the Abbess, thoughtfully, ‘that she has walked and
ridden out lately. She has asked questions about her Chateaux, and their
garrisons. I have heard nothing of the stricter convent for many weeks;
but still, brother, you must go warily to work.’
‘And you, sister, must show no relenting. Let her not fancy she can work
upon you.’
By this time the brother and sister were at the gateway of the convent;
a lay sister presided there, but there was no _cloture_, as the strict
seclusion of a nunnery was called, and the Chevalier rode into the
cloistered quadrangle as naturally as if he had been entering a secular
Chateau, dismounted at the porch of the hall, and followed Madame de
Bellaise to the parlour, while she dispatched a request that her niece
would attend her there.
The parlour had no grating to divide it, but was merely a large room
furnished with tapestry, carved chests, chairs, and cushions, much
like other reception-rooms. A large, cheerful wood-fire blazed upon
the hearth, and there was a certain air of preparation, as indeed an
ecclesiastical dignity from Saumur was expected to sup with the ladies
that evening.
After some interval, spent by the Chevalier in warming himself, a low
voice at the door was heard, saying, ‘_Deus vobiscum_.’ The Abbess
answered, ‘_Et cum spiritu tuo_;’ and on this monastic substitute for a
knock and ‘come in,’ there appeared a figure draped and veiled from head
to foot in heavy black, so as to look almost like a sable moving
cone. She made an obeisance as she entered, saying, ‘You commanded my
presence, Madame?’
‘Your uncle would speak to you, daughter, on affairs of moment.’
‘At his service. I, too, would speak to him.’
‘First, then, my dear friend,’ said the Chevalier, ‘let me see you. That
face must not be muffled any longer from those who love you.’
She made no movement of obedience, until her aunt peremptorily bade her
turn back her veil. She did so, and disclosed the little face, so well
known to her uncle, but less childish in its form, and the dark eyes
sparkling, though at once softer and more resolute.
‘Ah! my fair niece,’ said the Chevalier, ‘this is no visage to be
hidden! I am glad to see it re-embellished, and it will be lovelier than
ever when you have cast off this disguised.’
‘That will never be,’ said Eustacie.
‘Ah! we know better! My daughter is sending down a counterpart of her
own wedding-dress for your bride of the _Mardi-Gras_.’
‘And who may that bride be?’ said Eustacie, endeavouring to speak as
though it were nothing to her.
‘Nay, _ma petite_! it is too long to play the ignorant when the
bridegroom is on his way from Paris.’
‘Madame,’ said Eustacie, turning to her aunt, ‘you cannot suffer this
scandal. The meanest peasant may weep her first year of widowhood in
peace.’
‘Listen, child. There are weighty reasons. The Duke of Anjou is a
candidate for the throne of Poland, and my son is to accompany him
thither. He must go as Marquis de Nid de Merle, in full possession of
your estates.’
‘Let him take them,’ began Eustacie, ‘who first commits a cowardly
murder, and then forces himself on the widow he has made?’
‘Folly, child, folly,’ said the Chevalier, who supposed her ignorant of
the circumstances of her husband’s assassination; and the Abbess, who
was really ignorant, exclaimed--‘_Fid donc_ niece; you know not what you
say.’
‘I know, Madame--I know from an eye-witness,’ said Eustacie, firmly. ‘I
know the brutal words that embittered my husband’s death; and were
there no other cause, they would render wedlock with him who spoke them
sacrilege.’ Resolutely and steadily did the young wife speak, looking
at them with the dry fixed eye to which tears had been denied ever since
that eventful night.’
‘Poor child,’ said the Chevalier to his sister. ‘She is under the
delusion still. Husband! There is none in the case.’ Then waving his
hand as Eustacie’s face grew crimson, and her eyes flashed indignation,
while her lips parted, ‘It was her own folly that rendered it needful to
put an end to the boy’s presumption. Had she been less willful and more
obedient, instead of turning the poor lad’s head by playing at madame,
we could have let him return to his island fogs; but when SHE encouraged
him in contemplating the carrying her away, and alienating her and her
lands from the true faith, there was but one remedy--to let him perish
with the rest. My son is willing to forgive her childish pleasure in
a boy’s passing homage, and has obtained the King’s sanction to an
immediate marriage.’
‘Which, to spare you, my dear,’ added the aunt, ‘shall take place in our
chapel.’
‘It shall never take place anywhere,’ said Eustacie, quietly, though
with a quiver in her voice; ‘no priest will wed me when he has heard
me.’
‘The dispensation will overcome all scruples,’ said the Abbess. ‘Hear
me, niece. I am sorry for you, but it is best that you should know at
once that there is nothing in heaven or earth to aid you in resisting
your duty.’
Eustacie made no answer, but there was a strange half-smile on her lip,
and a light in her eye which gave her an air not so much of entreaty as
of defiance. She glanced from one to the other, as if considering, but
then slightly shook her head. ‘What does she mean?’ asked the Chevalier
and the Abbess one of another, as, with a dignified gesture, she moved
to leave the room.
‘Follow her. Convince her that she has no hope,’ said the uncle; and
the Abbess, moving faster than her wont, came up with her at the archway
whence one corridor led to the chapel, another to her own apartments.
Her veil was down again, but her aunt roughly withdrew it, saying, ‘Look
at me, Eustacie. I come to warn you that you need not look to tamper
with the sisters. Not one will aid you in your headstrong folly. If you
cast not off ere supper-time this mockery of mourning, you shall taste
of that discipline you used to sigh for. We have borne with your fancy
long enough--you, who are no more a widow than I--nor wife.’
‘Wife and widow am I in the sight of Him who will protect me,’ said
Eustacie, standing her ground.
‘Insolent! Why, did I not excuse this as a childish delusion, should I
not spurn one who durst love--what say I--not a heretic merely, but the
foe of her father’s house?’
‘He!’ cried Eustacie; ‘what had he ever done?’
‘He inherited the blood of the traitor Baron,’ returned her aunt. ‘Ever
have that recreant line injured us! My nephew’s sword avenged the wrongs
of many generations.’
‘Then,’ said Eustacie, looking at her with a steady, fixed look of
inquire, ‘you, Madame l’Abbesse, would have neither mercy nor pity for
the most innocent offspring of the elder line?’
‘Girl, what folly is this to talk to me of innocence. That is not
the question. The question is--obey willingly as my dear daughter, or
compulsion must be used.’
‘My question is answered,’ said Eustacie, on her side. ‘I see that there
is neither pity nor hope from you.’
And with another obeisance, she turned to ascend the stairs. Madame
paced back to her brother.
‘What,’ he said; ‘you have not yet dealt with her?’
‘No, brother, I never saw a like mood. She seems neither to fear nor
to struggle. I knew she was too true a Ribaumont for weak tears and
entreaties; but, fiery little being as once she was, I looked to see her
force spend itself in passion, and that then the victory would have been
easy; but no, she ever looks as if she had some inward resource--some
security--and therefore could be calm. I should deem it some Huguenot
fanaticism, but she is a very saint as to the prayers of the Church, the
very torment of our lives.’
‘Could she escape?’ exclaimed the Chevalier, who had been considering
while his sister was speaking.
‘Impossible! Besides, where could she go? But the gates shall be closed.
I will warn the portress to let none pass out without my permission.’
‘The Chevalier took a turn up and down the room; then exclaimed, ‘It
was very ill-advised to let her women have access to her! Let us have
Veronique summoned instantly.’
At that moment, however, the ponderous carriage of Monseigneur, with
out-riders, both lay and clerical, came trampling up to the archway,
and the Abbess hurried off to her own apartment to divest herself of her
hunting-gear ere she received her guest; and the orders to one of the
nuns to keep a watch on her niece were oddly mixed with those to the
cook, confectioner, and butterer.
La Mere Marie Saraphine was not a cruel or an unkind woman. She had been
very fond of her pretty little niece in her childhood, but had
deeply resented the arrangement which had removed her from her own
superintendence to that of the Englishwoman, besides the uniting to the
young Baron one whom she deemed the absolute right of Narcisse. She had
received Eustacie on her first return with great joy, and had always
treated her with much indulgence, and when the drooping, broken-hearted
girl came back once more to the shelter of her convent, the
good-humoured Abbess only wished to make her happy again.
But Eustacie’s misery was far beyond the ken of her aunt, and the jovial
turn of these consolations did but deepen her agony. To be congratulated
on her release from the heretic, assured of future happiness with her
cousin, and, above all, to hear Berenger abused with all the bitterness
of rival family and rival religion, tore up the lacerated spirit. Ill,
dejected, and broken down, too subdued to fire up in defence, and only
longing for the power of indulging in silent grief, Eustacie had shrunk
from her, and wrapped herself up in the ceaseless round of masses and
prayers, in which she was allowed to perceive a glimmering of hope for
her husband’s soul. The Abbess, ever busy with affairs of her convent or
matters of pleasure, soon relinquished the vain attempt to console where
she could not sympathize, trusted that the fever of devotion would wear
itself out, and left her niece to herself. Of the seven nuns, two were
decorously gay, like their Mother Abbess; one was a prodigious worker
of tapestry, two were unrivalled save by one another as confectioners.
Eustacie had been their pet in her younger days; now she was out of
their reach, they tried in turn to comfort her; and when she would not
be comforted, they, too, felt aggrieved by the presence of one whose
austerity reproached their own laxity; they resented her disappointment
at Soeur Monique’s having been transferred to Lucon, and they, too,
left her to the only persons whose presence she had ever seemed to
relish,--namely, her maid Veronique, and Veronique’s mother, her old
nurse Perrine, wife of a farmer about two miles off. The woman had been
Eustacie’s foster-mother, and continued to exert over her much of the
caressing care of a nurse.
After parting with her aunt, Eustacie for a moment looked towards the
chapel, then, clasping her hands, murmured to herself, ‘No! no! speed is
my best hope;’ and at once mounted the stairs, and entered a room, where
the large stone crucifix, a waxen Madonna, and the holy water font
gave a cell-like aspect to the room; and a straw pallet covered with
sackcloth was on the floor, a richly curtained couch driven into the
rear, as unused.
She knelt for a moment before the Madonna; ‘Ave Maria, be with me and
mine. Oh! blessed Lady, thou hadst to fly with thy Holy One from cruel
men. Have thou pity on the fatherless!’
Then going to the door, she clapped her hands; and, as Veronique
entered, she bade her shut and bolt the door, and at the same moment
began in nervous haste to throw off her veil and unfasten her dress.
‘Make haste, Veronique. A dress of thine---’
‘All is known, then!’ cried Veronique, throwing up her arms.
‘No, but he is coming--Narcisse--to marry me at once--_Marde-Gras_---’
‘_Et quoi_? Madame has but to speak the word, and it is impossible.’
‘And after what my aunt has said, I would die a thousand deaths ere
speaking that word. I asked her, Veronique! She would have vengeance
on the most guiltless--the most guiltless--do you hear?--of the Norman
house. Never, never shall she have the chance! Come, thy striped
petticoat!’
‘But, oh! what will Madame do? Where would she go? Oh! it is
impossible.’
‘First to thy father’s. Yes, I know. He has once called it a madness
to think of rallying my vassals to protect their lady. That was when
he heard of it from thee--thou faint of heart--and thy mother. I shall
speak to him in person now. Make haste, I tell thee, girl. I must be out
of this place before I am watched or guarded,’ she added breathlessly.
‘I feel as if each moment I lost might have death upon it;’ and she
looked about her like a startled deer.
‘To my father’s. Ah! there it is not so ill! But the twilights, the
length of way,’ sobbed Veronique, in grievous distress and perplexity.
‘Oh! Madame, I cannot see you go. The Mother Abbess is good. She must
have pity. Oh, trust to her!’
‘Trust! Did I not trust to my cousin Diane? Never! Nothing will kill me
but remaining in their hands.’
Veronique argued and implored in vain. Ever since, in the height of
those vehement austerities by which the bereaved and shattered sufferer
strove to appease her wretchedness by the utmost endeavour to save her
husband’s soul, the old foster-mother had made known to her that she
might thus sacrifice another than herself. Eustacie’s elastic heart had
begun to revive, with all its dauntless strength of will. What to her
women seemed only a fear, was to her only a hope.
Frank and confiding as was her nature, however, the cruel deceptions
already practiced on her by her own kindred, together with the harsh
words with which the Abbess spoke of Berenger, had made her aware
that no comfort must be looked for in that quarter. It was, after all,
perhaps her won instinct, and the aunt’s want of sympathy, that withheld
her from seeking counsel of any save Perrine and her daughter, at any
rate till she could communicate with the kind young Queen. To her, then,
Eustacie had written, entreating that a royal mandate would recall her
in time to bestow herself in some trustworthy hands, or even in her
husband’s won Norman castle, where his heir would be both safe and
welcome. But time has passed--the whole space that she had reckoned as
needful for the going and coming of her messenger--allowing for all the
obstructions of winter roads--nay, he had come back; she knew letter was
delivered, but answer there was none. It might yet come--perhaps a royal
carriage and escort--and day after day had she waited and hoped, only
tardily admitting the conviction that Elisabeth of Austria was as
powerless as Eustacie de Ribaumont, and meantime revolving and proposing
many a scheme that could only have entered the brain of a brave-spirited
child as she was. To appeal to her vassals, garrison with them a ruinous
old tower in the woods, and thence send for aid to the Montmorencys;
to ride to Saumur, and claim the protection of the governor of the
province; to make her way to the coast and sail for England; to start
for Paris, and throw herself in person on the Queen’s protection,--all
had occurred to her, and been discussed with her two _confidantes_;
but the hope of the Queen’s interference, together with the exceeding
difficulty of acting, had hitherto prevented her from taking any
steps, since no suspicion had arisen in the minds of those about
her. Veronique, caring infinitely more for her mistress’s health and
well-being than for the object of Eustacie’s anxieties, had always
secretly trusted that delay would last till action was impossible, and
that the discovery would be made, only without her being accused of
treason. In the present stress of danger, she could but lament and
entreat, for Eustacie’s resolution bore her down; and besides, as she
said to herself, her Lady was after all going to her foster-father and
mother, who would make her hear reason, and bring her back at once,
and then there would be no anger nor disgrace incurred. The dark muddy
length of walk would be the worst of it--and, bah! most likely Madame
would be convinced by it, and return of her own accord.
So Veronique, though not intermitting her protests, adjusted her own
dress upon her mistress,--short striped petticoat, black bodice, winged
turban-like white cap, and a great muffling gray cloth cloak and hook
over the head and shoulders--the costume in which Veronique was wont to
run to her home in the twilight on various errands, chiefly to carry
her mistress’s linen; for starching Eustacie’s plain bands and cuffs
was Mere Perrine’s special pride. The wonted bundle, therefore, now
contained a few garments, and the money and jewels, especially the
chaplet of pearls, which Eustacie regarded as a trust.
Sobbing, and still protesting, Veronique, however, engaged that if her
Lady succeeded in safely crossing the kitchen in the twilight, and in
leaving the convent, she would keep the secret of her escape as long
as possible, reporting her refusal to appear at supper, and making such
excuses as might very probably prevent the discovery of her flight till
next day.
‘And then,’ said Eustacie, ‘I will send for thee, either to Saumur or
to the old tower! Adieu, dear Veronique, do not be frightened. Thou
dost not know how glad I am that the time for doing something is come!
To-morrow!’
‘To-morrow!’ thought Veronique, as she shut the door; ‘before that you
will be back here again, my poor little Lady, trembling, weeping, in
dire need of being comforted. But I will make up a good fire, and shake
out the bed. I’ll let her have no more of that villainous palliasse. No,
no, let her try her own way, and repent of it; then, when this matter is
over, she will turn her mind to Chevalier Narcisse, and there will be no
more languishing in this miserable hole.’