"Nonsense, girl! A poll-tax collector--'tis no thievery, my dear, but a
putting back into our own pockets what he did take from ours." And they
passed on, laughing and hiccoughing.
Another time she came across a crowd hanging on the words of an
evil-faced man, who was urging them to attack a neighboring castle.
"It will not be the only castle to fall before us," he boasted.
It disheartened her to see this fellow seeking his own ends under the
pretence of the common good.
"How long since was it that Sir John dismissed you as a dishonest
bailiff?" she cried. And the fellow turned purple and then took to his
heels, followed by the jeers of the crowd. She did what she could, but
she realized that it was but little. How long before Robert Annys would
return to them? How long?
One day Richard Meryl came back. He approached the village at a moment
when a large crowd had gathered about one who was holding forth on the
ever popular text of Adam and Eve.
"'Adam delved and Eve span,'" the fellow was saying. "So ho! where,
then, was our great gentleman? Where, then, was our fine Lord looking
down from his costly manor-house upon his men sweating and toiling in
the fields? And where was the fine lady lolling at her ease, wrapped in
dainty raiments fashioned by the hand of others? _If Eve span not she
went naked, and if her lord delved not he went hungry._ And now tell
me, if the good God saw fit to make the world in the first place only
of workers and no laggards, who, then, brought the laggards into the
world?"
"The Devil, the Devil, the Evil One," shouted several. Then cries came
from all sides, while the speaker's face glowed with satisfaction:--
"Put them out!"
"Burn them out!"
"Starve them out!"
Just then Meryl recognized Matilda, standing among the others, pale as
death, but with a great light flaming in her eyes. He left off watching
the speaker and glued his hungry eyes upon her face. He saw with a
sinking heart how thin and haggard it was, and a vague terror stole
over him. He had schooled himself all this time to bear the sight of
her happiness, and now he saw that he must begin all over again to bear
the sight of her misery.
The man's strident voice swept on: "By God! men of Cambridgeshire, when
every manor-house lieth in ashes the Lords will no longer refuse to
grant us our quit-rents. Then shall we be able to till a bit of land in
freedom and we shall grind our corn where we will, and there shall be
no masters to own us body and soul."
"Stay!"
It was Matilda. The people turned, amazed at her boldness.
"How foolishly thou dost rant, Peter Wells!" she said in a clear,
steady voice that all marvelled at. "Wot ye not, neighbors, that even
Piers Ploughman tells us we must have overlords and rulers? Wot ye not
that when the rats and mice desired to put to death all the cats in
the realm that one wise rat spake and said:--
"'If we have no cats over us, sure all the rats will eat one another!'
"Now, what good will ever come of violence and bloodshed? Oh, surely,
ye are of little faith, for if ye believed in the justice of your Cause
ye would be satisfied to stand before the kind King with no weapons
in your hands save just rightwiseness. Ye would not put your trust in
burning and sacking and pillaging. Oh, shame, shame upon you!"
There were some that seemed impressed by the girl's words, but Peter
shrugged his shoulders roughly. "Bah! spoken like thy soft-hearted poor
priest, Robert Annys. He was forever bidding us wait. _Wait!_ and for
what?" he blazed out furiously--"for another poll-tax to be wrung from
the poor while the rich hide their treasure between the folds of the
Justices' gowns? Wait? for what? For more laws to be passed making it
a crime to seek honest labor? for more raping of our women? Nay, let
thy Robert Annys face me, and I shall tell him we have waited too long
already."
Her head drooped. Ah, if he would but face them!
"Where is Robert Annys? Why is he not here to help us?" queried one,
impatiently. Matilda trembled and swayed as if she would fall, and the
shadows darkened under her glowing eyes. Meryl watched her closely.
"Why does he not come back to us?" repeated the voice. "Where does he
tarry so long?"
It would never do to let these wild men suspect the truth. She nerved
herself to answer.
"Did ye not yourselves send him on a dangerous mission into Kent?" she
asked. There was something unfamiliar in her voice that puzzled Meryl.
"It is long since time that he returned," muttered the fellow, and
Matilda broke out with a sudden impatience: "Mayhap he is risking his
life even now for us while ye stand idly talking. Learn to obey, bide
ye in patience, for it lacks not many days before the word will be
spoken and then ye may go forth as honest men."
Then Meryl approached her and drew her aside, and, as she recognized
him, she fell sobbing into his arms.
He conducted her home, and then he asked the meaning of it all.
"Thou art unhappy. Tell me what has happened. And where is Robert
Annys?"
"Said I not already that he was in Kent?" she whispered.
"Nay," he said impatiently, "thy face is far too dear to me to permit
it to deceive."
As she did not reply to this, he gazed at her in gloomy silence for a
while, and then spoke with a certain stern deliberateness.
"He is not in Kent."
She quivered. "How should I know more than I have said?" she asked
plaintively.
"'How should I know,'" he mocked; "I left thee on the eve of wedding
Robert Annys. Art thou his wife?"
"Nay!"
"Art thou betrothed?"
"Nay!"
"What? not even betrothed?" Then in a low, trembling voice, "Has he
wronged thee?"
"Oh, Richard, for shame! for shame!"
"When did he go away?"
"The second day of the Stourbridge Fair."
"And thou hast not seen him since?" he asked in amazement.
"Nay, I have not seen him since."
He paced up and down a few times, and then he came back to her and
looked down on her, sullen, uncertain, not knowing what to think.
"Listen!" at last he broke out, "I return and find thee unhappy. He
must have caused this. Tell me the truth and the whole truth, or I
shall seek him if it be to the end of the earth, and I shall wring the
truth from him if it has to be from his dying lips. Dost understand?"
She understood. But before she would speak, she made him promise
solemnly not to reveal his whereabouts. It was a promise given most
reluctantly, nevertheless she felt certain it would not be broken.
He received the news with amazement and incredulity just as she had
done. Impossible! Robert Annys a Benedictine? Impossible! "What is it
that thou art keeping from me? What drove him to this?"
He paced up and down in deep thought. Suddenly he stood before her
again and asked abruptly, "Where is Rose?"
In a few words she told him of Rose's flight and the death of her
grandmother.
"When did Rose go?"
"The second day of the Stourbridge Fair," she said.
Meryl's face darkened. "How? the very day he went? What is this that
thou art telling me?"
The blood leapt to her cheeks, she looked up into his stormy eyes,
protesting, denying--she scarce knew what--"Nay, nay, Richard! How
canst thou? Believe me, thou art quite wrong--She"--but the long strain
of the past months had worn on her and her self-control was at an end.
She fled into the house, weeping bitterly, while he left in a turmoil,
angry, sore at heart.
During the next few days, he deeply regretted his promise. He saw the
growing rebellion against the harsh landlordism of the monastery; he
knew but a word would send dozens of the men rioting at the gates. It
was easy to predict what would happen if he led them there and then
cried out that their former leader was within, a deserter, caring
naught for them and their woes, concerning himself solely with Aves
and Breviaries. Ah, he would not stay behind, either! His blood leapt
at the thought of breaking down the doors with the maddened men at his
heels, of beating his way through the surging crowd, of dragging Annys
from his cell and flinging him, with all the guilt of his miserable
soul upon him, straight to the judgment seat. He had guessed something
of the truth. He knew the nature of Rose Westel, he knew also that it
must have taken some tremendous upheaval to send Robert Annys knocking
at St. Dunstan's. But there was no pity in his heart for the struggle
which his friend must have waged, nothing but a blind rage against the
man who had broken Matilda's heart.
He had no patience to bide at home. He joined a party of desperate men
who were setting out for Ely on a wild errand. His mood had entirely
changed. He derived a certain fierce satisfaction in rousing the people
to immediate action, in stirring them to commit deeds of violence--in
short, to do all that Robert Annys would have deplored. It was the only
way there was left to fight him--he had not chosen the weapons, it was
all that was left him.
Soon among all the men of the Bury there was not one more reckless,
more feared, than he.