When Annys approached the Castle the following morning, he learned
that the Baron had gone to one of his manors lying on the highroad
to Sudbury, which was the direct way to the Mile End. Hearing of the
growing boldness of the insurgents, and having some of his costliest
purchases from the Stourbridge Fair yet stored within the Manor House,
he thought it well to bring them to the well-protected Castle.
On the terrace Annys hid himself behind an abutment of a tower, and
peered out cautiously every now and then to see if any one came by who
could get word for him to Rose. As he waited there came along Will
Langland, no longer the glutton of the night before, but of a sad and
dejected mien, as if his conscience lay none too easy within his breast.
"Ah, Robert Annys!" he exclaimed, as he recognized the poor priest whom
he had encountered several times in the past. "How comes it I find you
not with our new masters of England? What brings a poor priest within
the Baron's domains? 'Tis enough to make thy head cease acquaintance
with thy neck."
"Better die of an honest twist of the neck, and have done with it, than
from a heart that breaks within and slowly wastes the blood drop by
drop," cried Annys, bitterly, turning away his face. He could not bear
it that this man should be his long-idolized Will Langland.
The poet looked at him long and silently out of his deep-seated,
piercing eyes. The lines about his mouth deepened; it was evident that
the man's soul wept within him. At last he spoke.
"Ay! if one did but die of a broken heart. Ah, you would not see Will
Langland alive were it so. If it only were vouchsafed one to die. But
alas, when only the heart is dead, we live on and on, and play the fool
to our clod of clay."
Annys regarded him impatiently. "Little looked you yestere'en as one
whose heart was broken. You seemed not unjoyful sitting a beggar at my
Lord Baron's table."
A queer look came into Langland's face. "Nay, not as a beggar," he
interposed softly, "not as a beggar. I keep my Lord's chantry in London
which he did erect for the soul of his mother. I came but for the
feast. I return to London to-morrow."
"Then worse than beggar, thou," broke out Annys, indignantly. "Thou,
Will Langland, a chantry priest, chanting and mumbling some Latin words
for thy belly's hunger! For do you aught else for the good of the land?
Do you feed the poor, or clothe them? Are you serving Christ if you but
mouth some words over the empty pates of the gentry so that they have
leave to go and lie as they will ever after? Can this be he who wrote:--
"'Faith without deeds is as dead as a door-tree'?"
Langland quivered as if he had received a blow. "Ah, wot I well what
kind of a man that Will Langland, singer of Piers, should be. Stay!
If it tortures you to see in the gluttonous, servile chantry priest
of yestere'en the poet whom you honored, doth it not hurt more, ay! a
thousand-fold more, that very Will Langland? Think you there is one
word that these hands have writ that does not rise up and mock at me?
Think you it is a light thing to be thus crucified, as it were, by
one's own flesh and blood?"
"Surely," he went on, after an instant's pause, during which he
looked sadly away, far into the distant horizon, as if his own words
had stirred many recollections within him, "surely I can be no more
hateful in thy sight than in mine own. Do I not daily curse this weak,
lust-loving clod of flesh that holdeth prisoner a mind that at least
once dreamed noble dreams? Ah, Robert Annys, thou wouldst weep water
fast enough with both eyes didst know one tenth part of the unruth of
him who walks the earth as Will Langland."
And he was about to go, when Annys cried: "Hold! who am I, indeed, that
I should judge thee? Well wot I how oft the deed fits ill with the
creed. But stay, canst get a word to one Rose Westel in the Castle? But
a hint of my presence, and she will come, as she awaits me." Langland
readily promised to return to the Castle and give her the message, and
Annys again sought his hiding-place.
He did not have long to wait before Rose approached. Before he came
forward to meet her, he observed the Legate walking swiftly after her,
so he remained hidden. When Rose saw that she was being followed, she
gave a little gasp of surprise. "I thought you had gone with my Lord,"
she said to the Cardinal Legate.
His eyes gloated over her beauty as he replied. "Thou knowest, little
one, I could not find it in my heart to leave thee."
"Oh, can you never let me be?" she moaned.
"So ho, my fine lady! So ho, still scornful even after thy lover has
tired of thee and left his beautiful Rose with her petals falling
about her on the ground, for him who chooses to pick them up and enjoy
their fragrance?" He folded his arms and looked down upon her, smiling
maliciously.
"Then not for you, not for you, Pierre Barsini, shall they lie there,"
she answered angrily, stamping her foot; "why do you follow me about
and torture me so? What have I done to you that you should so gloat
over my misery? Can you not let me be since I am unhappy enough to suit
even you?"
A sardonic smile shot across the Cardinal's face. "Done to me," he
repeated, "what have you done to me? Oh, nothing,--nothing,--only
awakened within me the fires of Hell, robbed me of my sleep and all
desire for food, made my waking moments a torture, and my nights
a tantalus of entrancing visions, changed me one instant into a
drivelling idiot,--and the next into a cruel demon with no mercy
whatever in my heart. Why seek to make me hate thee? Be mine, and I
shall provide for thee a state which you, in England, know naught of.
In Rome you will be a very princess. Basta! I could almost laugh to
think of the Cardinal Barsini begging for a woman's favors."
The girl smiled to think that there was a time, not so very long ago,
when such talk might have had weight with her.
He misinterpreted the smile. "Be not so cruel," he said, reaching forth
his arms. But she sprang back with horror in her face.
"Sooner than give myself to thee," she cried vehemently, "I would
cheerfully seek out the lowliest churl who slinks on his foul litter."
The haughty Legate paled with rage; for an instant he regarded in stony
silence the beautiful girl who dared to defy him so insolently, then,
drawing himself up to his full height, with one arm raised high above
his head, as a last resort to compel her to his will, he launched forth
the awful words of excommunication from the Church.
But now Annys could stand it no longer. Dashing from his hiding-place,
and facing the Legate, trembling with fierce indignation, he cried:--
"'Cast out from the body of the Church, doomed to everlasting
hell-fire, torture without end.' It is you, you foul fiend in holy
garb, and not this woman, that should be cast out."
The Legate smiled, a cold, hard smile, fully master of himself again.
"Pardon me, Sir Knight," he remarked with studied politeness, "had I
known that the lady had decided already to comfort herself with another
gallant, I should not have presumed to press my suit."
"You liar, you craven-hearted liar," exclaimed Annys, hotly.
"Well, then, if I mistake, for your language is not of the
choicest,--and so I marvel at the lady's favor shown you,--what is
it that brings the most holy monk from his monastery masquerading in
minstrels garb?"
Then Annys became aware of his minstrel's badge still clinging to his
shoulder. Hastily tearing it off, he retorted scornfully:--
"Masquerade indeed! By Mary in Heaven, I know not why the words do not
choke thee in thy throat. _I_ masquerade forsooth! And does he not
masquerade rather who dares to wear the holy garb of a priest of God
and uses the most solemn offices of Holy Church to serve his own base
purposes? It is thou who art masquerading and in a priest's frock. Go,
get thee a suit of flaming scarlet, and let thy cloven foot and thy
long tail show honestly, and then, and then only, shall I not accuse
thee of masquerading."
The Legate's eyes blazed with fury. "Think not that I do not know you,
Robert Annys, for well do I now remember that lying, sedition-loving
tongue. I shall have the hue and cry set after you. I shall accuse you
of coming here and seeking to set the insurgents against the Baron. You
shall yet be quartered and strung for this day's work." And he swept by.
"Quick, quick," cried Rose, "he is a dangerous enemy. Meet me down by
the river and tie a bit of white about the willow bush that hides thee.
Await me there. Lose not an instant."