Part 6

He saw her go forward under the shade of the great trees. There was caution in her movements. She kept well in the shadows, gliding from trunk to trunk, not hurrying, as though she wished to make sure that no human thing moved in the valley below her. Presently she seemed satisfied. Martin saw her walk out boldly into the open and pass out of sight below the slope of the hill.

Not till he had crawled to the edge of the beech wood did Martin Valliant realize what the valley held. A broad mere lay in a grassy hollow, shaded toward the north by willows, and ringed about with yellow flags and water herbs. An island seemed to float upon the water, all white with old fruit trees in bloom. A gray turret and the bare stone gable-ends of a house showed above the apple blossom. There was a little gate-house close to the water, but its roof was gone, and the bridge that had led to it ruinous. The charred rafters of a barn showed beyond the sweep of an ivy-covered wall. Martin could trace the suggestions of a garden, with old yew trees, hornbeam hedges all gone to top, and a broad terrace walk that looked as though it were paved with stone. The place had a still, sweet, tragic look, lying there in the deeps of the Forest, its fruit trees white with blossom, although no one had pruned them, and the fruit they bore would rot in the grass or be eaten by the birds.

Martin Valliant was so astonished by what he saw, so bewitched by the desolate beauty of the place, that he had almost forgotten Mellis. She had reached the edge of the water and was standing by a willow, looking across at the ruined house. A sudden awe seemed to steal into Martin’s eyes. Mystery! And she was the human part of it, wandering by Forest ways to this island of beautiful desolation. No chance quest had brought her to the place, and Martin, lying there with his chin on his hands, felt a strange stirring in his heart. Perhaps she had lied to him—but what then? The very thought of it quickened his compassion. In following her he had stumbled upon the real woman—a woman whose eyes were deep with unforgettable things.

The truth came to him like the opening of a book. Tags of gossip tossed to and fro across the refectory table at Paradise pieced themselves together. Woodmere, the Dales’ house, sacked and burned by Roger Bland of Troy Castle; old Dale with a spear through his body lying dead under an oak tree. Blood shed for the love of a red rose. Two children saved by a swineherd and shipped off in a fishing-boat from Gawdy Town. Woodmere rotting in the Forest, to please the Lord of Troy’s sneering and whimsical pride!

Mellis had wandered along to what had been the bridge. Two spans of it still stood, but the center arch had been thrown down, leaving a gap of twelve feet or more. Young trees had taken possession of the broken walls, and the bridge-head was choked with brambles. There was no way of crossing the gap save by thrusting a big beam or the trunk of a tree across it, and such a piece of bridge mending was wholly beyond a woman’s strength. Moreover, there was a second chasm to be crossed where the drawbridge had been worked from the gate-house, but the drawbridge was a thing of the past. Roger Bland had had it unchained and unbolted and dragged to Troy Castle as a trophy.

Martin Valliant saw her walk along the broken bridge and stand there baffled, and though there was the one obvious and most natural way of crossing the water, it never entered Martin’s head that she would choose it. She came back to the landward side, and he lost sight of her in a little hollow beside the bridge-head that was hidden by bushes and young trees. He was still wondering what she would do, and whether he had the courage to go down and confess himself and help her, when he saw her rise out of the green foam of the foliage like Venus rising out of the sea.

She had thrown off her clothes, and went as Mother Nature had made her, a beautiful white creature crowned by her dark hair. In looking at her Martin forgot that he was a man, forgot his vows, forgot that there was such a thing as sin. For there seemed no shame in her beauty, and in that white shape of hers kissed by the sun.

Beyond the bridge a little grassy headland jutted into the mere where the water was clear of weeds. Mellis made her way toward it, like Eve walking the earth before sin was born. She stepped down into the water, waded a pace or two, and then glided forward on her bosom, the water rippling over her shoulders. Thirty breast strokes earned her across. She climbed out at what had been an old mooring stage for the big flat-bottomed boat that had been used for fishing. For a moment Martin saw her stand white and straight in the sunlight; then her hands went up and her black hair came clouding down. It enveloped her like a cloak, hanging to the level of her knees, like night shrouding the day. She seemed to have no thought of being watched or spied upon; the place was a wilderness; she went as Nature made her.

Then she was lost among the orchard trees, whose bloom was as white as her body, and a great change came over Martin Valliant. He let his head drop on the root of a beech tree; he shut his eyes, spread his arms like a suppliant. In losing sight of her he had rediscovered himself, that striving, perplexed, mistrustful self nurtured on self-starvation and physical nothingness. A passion of wonder, shame, and doubt shook him. He lay prone at the feet of Nature, trying to see the face of his God through the smoke of a new sacrifice. Had he sinned, had he shamed himself? And yet a deep and passionate voice cried out in him, fiercely denying that he had erred. What wickedness was there in chancing to gaze upon a creature whom God had created, upon a beauty that was unsoiled? He strove with himself, with clenched hands and closed eyes.

And presently a great stillness seemed to fall upon his heart. It was like the silence of the dawn, born to be broken only by the singing of birds. He opened his eyes, looked about him at the green spaces, the blue sky, the water shining in the valley. What had happened to him? Why all this wrestling and anguish? Where was the thing that men called sin when earth and the heavens were so beautiful?

And what shame was there in the vision that he had seen?

He sat up, drew aside, and leaned against the trunk of the tree. The stillness still held in his heart, but somewhere a long way off he seemed to hear a voice singing. A great tenderness thrilled him. The earth was transfigured, bathed in a glory of a light. Never had he known such deep and mysterious exultation. He felt strong, stronger than death; he feared nothing; his heart was full of a sweet sound of singing.

Mellis never knew of the great thing that happened to Martin Valliant in that beech wood. She crossed the water, dressed herself, mounted her horse, and rode back through the Forest, followed by a man whose eyes shone and whose face had a kind of awed radiance. She never guessed that a great love haunted her through the green glooms, and that a man had discovered his own soul.

And when she reached the cross on the Black Moor, Martin Valliant was there, waiting. He had run three miles like a madman across country that he knew. She looked at him and his face astonished her—it was so strangely luminous, so strong, so human.

_Chapter XIV_

Toward dusk the same day a beggar came trudging over the moor. He was a most unclean and grotesquely ragged creature, almost too ragged to be genuine, nor had he the characteristic and unstudied gestures of the true vagrant who cannot let ten minutes pass without scratching some part of him. The fellow wore a dirty old hood that once had been lined with scarlet cloth. A white bandage covered his mouth and chin as though he had some foul disease that had to be hidden. His brown smock hung in tatters around his knees, and his wallet was such a thing of patches that no one could have told what color it had been in the beginning.

This ragamuffin scouted his way toward the chapelry with stolid circumspection. He seemed to have a liking for the gorse and a hatred of the heather; his love of cover led him a somewhat devious but successful course, in that he reached the top of the moor without Martin Valliant seeing him. Once there he crawled into a patch of furze, and so fitted himself under the ragged stems that he could see the chapel, cell, and rest-house and anyone who came and went. Mellis was sitting on the bench outside the rest-house, looking at nothing with sad and vacant eyes. Martin Valliant stood reading in the doorway of his cell.

The beggar had a particular interest in Martin’s movements, in that he wanted him out of the way. The afterglow had faded, and night was settling over the moor.

“The devil take that priest! They should have learned before that old Jude was sick. And this damnable business——”

The furze was pricking the back of his neck.

“A pest on the stuff! And I have to tell the poor wench——”

He saw Martin Valliant put down his book and come out of the cell with a bucket in his hand. He was going down to the spring for water. The man in the furze perked up like a bird.

“God bless him, he has a thirst, or believes in being clean.”

He crawled out as soon as Martin had disappeared over the edge of the hill, and went quickly toward the rest-house, making signs with his hand.

Now Martin Valliant, being in a mood when a man walks with his head among the stars, had loitered just over the edge of the hill, staring at a broom bush as though it were the miraculous bush of Moses. But Martin’s eyes did not see the yellow flowers. He was looking inwards at himself, and at some wonderful vision that had painted itself upon his memory.

Therefore he was near enough to hear Mellis cry out as though some one had stabbed at her in the dark.

His dreams were gone in a moment. He turned, dropped the bucket, head in the air, nostrils quivering, and began to run with great strides across the heather.

Then the sound of voices reached him, one of them speaking in short, agonized jerks. The other voice was answering in a cautious and half-soothing murmur; the other voice was a man’s.

Martin’s stride shortened; he faltered, paused, stopped dead, and then went on again, skirting the thorn hedge of the garden. It led him close to the back of the rest-house, and he went no farther.

He heard Mellis cry out:

“My God! Oh! my God!”

The man tried to calm her.

“Softly, Mistress Mellis, or that priest fellow may hear you. A man would rather cut his tongue out than bring you such news.”

“And you were with him?”

“Why, we had just turned out of the ‘Cock’ Tavern. The fellow dodged out of a dark alley behind us, and the knife was in before you could think of an oath. The bloody rogue went off at a run. I stayed with your brother.”

There was silence for a moment—a tense silence.

“Did he die there—in the gutter?”

The words were like the limping movements of a wounded dog.

“He was dead,” said the man softly, “before the watch came along. There will be a crowner’s quest, but we can keep a secret—for your sake.”

“My sake! What does it matter? Oh, if I but knew!”

“And that?”

“Who struck that blow.”

“Some hired beast.”

“I can guess that. But who ordered it—paid the blood money?”

The man seemed to hesitate.

“It has scared me, I grant you; one is afraid of a blank wall or a bush.”

“Roger Bland of Troy?”

“It may be that you have said it.”

He was in a hurry to go; his voice betrayed his restlessness.

“The Flemming is at work. Bide here for a day or two, Mistress Dale. It is time I disappeared.”

“Yes, go. Let me try and think.”

“Gawdy Town is too dangerous now.”

“Man, I am not afraid, but I think my heart is broken.”

He gabbled a few words of comfort, and by the silence that followed Martin guessed that he had fled.

The light in the west had faded to a steely grayness, and the stars were out. Martin Valliant stood there for a while, picking loose mortar from between the stones, his whole heart yearning to do something, he knew not what. He could hear no sound of weeping or of movement. The silence was utter, poignant, unbroken.

Suddenly he heard her speaking, and he knew that it was half to herself and half to God.

“So he is dead! Dear God—you have heard. Why did you suffer it? Oh, what a fool I am! Picked up in the gutter!”

Martin’s hands were clenched.

“Did I see the old place to-day? The sun was shining. Oh, dear God, why am I all alone? The boy is dead; you let him die. And I cannot bear it—I cannot bear it.”

Nor could Martin Valliant bear that lonely, wounded agony of hers. It was as though she were drowning in the waters of despair, and there was no one to leap in and save her.

Mellis stood leaning against the wall, her face turned toward it, her arms outspread against the rough stones. She did not hear Martin Valliant coming, but she felt a hand touch one of hers.

She twisted around with startled fierceness.

“Who touched me?”

She saw him recoil. It was so dark now that his face showed as a pale surface; she could not see his eyes.

“Martin Valliant.”

His voice was awed, humble.

“Do not be angry with me. I will go away if you wish it. I heard you cry out—and——”

She guessed in an instant that he had overheard everything; that touch of his hand upon hers had been like the mute, tentative touch of a dog’s cold muzzle. Her flash of anger melted away.

“It is you? How long——?”

“I was there—behind the rest-house. I had run up, hearing you cry out. I think it was God Who made me listen.”

“Ah, God is a great listener!”

She was quivering with bitter emotion.

“He listens, but He does not help. He has no pity. Yes, it is quite true; you know all that should have been kept secret. You know that I lied to you——”

Martin made the sign of the cross.

“I do not remember it,” he said.

“That I called myself Catharine Lovel—that I was vowed to silence, and on a pilgrimage!”

“I forgot all those things,” he answered, “when I heard the truth and your anguish.”

She covered her face with her hands.

“Now you will begin preaching a sermon.”

“God forbid,” he said; “I think that this night is teaching me that I was not born to be a priest.”

There was silence between them for a while. Martin Valliant did not move; he seemed set there like a statue. She could hear his deep breathing, a strangely human sound in the soft darkness.

She began to speak again.

“Perhaps you know that they murdered my father years ago, and now they have slain my brother. We were the Dales of Woodmere, and the Lord of Troy was our enemy. Why am I here? Why was my brother in Gawdy Town? Perhaps you can guess, if you are a man as well as a priest. We wanted our home and the lands that had been ours; we wanted revenge, we wanted a new king.”

She looked at him challengingly in the darkness.

“Now you know all. We were traitors to Richard Hunchback. We serve Henry Tudor. Now you can go to Troy Castle—if it pleases you—and tell the truth.”

His voice began to sound a deeper note.

“God’s curse be upon me if I do any such thing.”

He walked up and down, and then came back to her.

“Will you not sit down, Mistress Dale?”

“I have not the heart to feel weary.”

“It is very still and calm by the great cross up yonder. I will spread a cloak for you. We must speak of certain things, you and I.”

A new manhood spoke in him. She seemed to question it, and to wonder at the change in him.

“I am suspect, and have made you share my outlawry—is that it?”

He answered with sudden passion.

“No.”

She surrendered to him of a sudden.

“The cross? Oh, very well. What have you to say to me?”

“What a man with the heart of a man might say. Am I so poor a thing that I cannot take part in a quarrel?”

“Ah!”

He turned abruptly, went to the cell, and came back with a heavy winter cloak.

“The dew is heavy on such a night.”

“Yes.”

They walked side by side to the great cross, with a sudden and subtle sense of comradeship drawing them together.

Martin spread the cloak on the grass at the foot of the cross. She sat down with her back to the beam, and looked up at him in the darkness.

“You told me your man’s name—not the priest’s.”

“Valliant.”

“You are not the son of old Roger Valliant?”

“He was my father.”

Her eyes gave a gleam.

“Son of that old fire-eater! Strange!”

“He was a man of blood, my father.”

She looked at him with a new interest, a new curiosity. His bigness took on a different meaning.

“A great fighter and a fine man-at-arms, though he fought for pay. And he made a priest of you!”

Martin felt her veiled scorn of all men-women, and his flesh tingled.

“I have never questioned his wisdom.”

“Never yet! Have you ever heard the trumpets calling? But what am I saying? Yet men must fight, Father Martin, sometimes, or be dishonored.”

“It is possible,” he confessed.

“Bishops and abbots have ridden into battle before now.”

“True. The cause may sanctify the deed.”

Her bitterness returned of a sudden. She seemed to clasp her grief, and press her lips to it with fanatical passion.

“Son of old Valliant—listen. Your father would have understood these words of mine. Why do I not lie down and weep? Why do I thirst to go on living? Because my heart cries out against a great wrong—my wrong. Yes, I am a wild wolf—an eagle. This is a world of teeth and talons; your father knew it, and lived by his sword. And I tell you, Martin Valliant, that I shall fight to the death—hate to the death. My holy wine is the blood of my brother—and I am not ashamed.”

He stood swaying slightly, with a tumult, like the clashing of swords, in his brain.

“Does the soul of the father dwell in the son?” he asked himself.

He clenched his hands and answered her.

“You will tarry here, Mistress Dale, so long as you may please. No man shall lay a hand upon you. The Church can protect—with the sword of the spirit.”

By her silence he knew that his words rang hollow.

“I would rather have old Valliant’s sword,” she said grimly; “but I thank you, Father Martin. My need may be fierce, God knows!”

_Chapter XV_

Noble Vance, the Forest Warden, came riding into Paradise on his black horse, with two archers in russet and green following at his heels. He crossed the Rondel at the mill, and his scarlet coat went burning through the orchards and over the fields. Such common folk as saw him louted very low to the man, for, though he rode over Church lands, he was a fellow to be feared, being merciless and very cunning. Poachers and laborers whom he caught chasing the deer had but one thing to hope for from Noble Vance. He loved tying a man to a tree and thrashing him with his own whip, and the fellows he caught red-handed would rather have it so than be sent to Roger Bland of Troy Castle.

About a furlong from the priory gate the Forest Warden overtook Dom Geraint.

“The best of a May morning to you, man of God.”

“And God’s grace be upon you, defender of the deer!”

They were gossips, these two, men of animal energy who understood each other, and looked at life with the same shrewd cynicism. Their eyes met whimsically. Neither had any solid respect for the dignity of the other. Their appetites and prejudices were alike; they met on common ground and made life a gloating, full-blooded jest.

“You ride early, Master Warden.”

“All for the joy of being shrived by you, Dom Geraint.”

“Tut-tut—I am busy to-day. It would be a long affair.”

“Not so long, either; for you have only to name me any sin, good sir, and I will say that I have committed it.”

“What a mass of guilt is here—riding in scarlet!”

“The black coat has its red in the lining!”

They laughed in each other’s faces.

“You will come in and drink some of our ale?”

“Such brown Paradise is not to be despised. I have an hour to spare.”

“I will give you a penance: not to look at a woman for two months.”

“Fudge, good sir, I am out to tie one behind me on the saddle this very day.”

The archers were sent to the buttery hatch, while the prior’s parlor served Vance and Dom Geraint. Prior Globulus had ridden out on a white mule to visit one of his farms, and Geraint had no prejudices against sitting in the old man’s chair.

Vance drank to him.

“May you have the filling of it, dear gossip. Then Paradise will lack nothing.”

Geraint gave blow for blow.

“And no man will stay me when I go a-hunting, whether it be the red deer——”

“Or others. You have a park of your own, man.”

“And you—the whole Forest.”

“Thin, sir—very thin. Game is scarce, though I am trapping a fine young doe this very day. And here is the jest, gossip Geraint; she has taken cover in one of your thickets.”

Geraint looked hard at Vance over the top of his mug.

“Here—in Paradise! Rabbits, man! I know everything that happens in Paradise.”

“Who doubts it? But this is a great gibe, with that woolly-noddled saint of yours serving as father confessor!”

“I miss the scent, my friend.”

“You and I can keep each other’s secrets. There is some trouble brewing about here, though I have not got to the bottom of it as yet. Old Dale’s cubs had sneaked back out of France; we sighted them in Gawdy Town. We have the young man’s brush, and now I am after the girl. She is going to ride to Troy with me.”

Geraint’s black eyes were on the alert.

“I know nothing of all this, gossip. Where are you going to find the lady?”

“On the Black Moor.”

“What!”

“Under the protection of St. Florence and Brother Martin, and taking her sleep in your rest-house.”

Geraint gaped like a great bird.

“Blood and wounds, but this is—miraculous!”

He began to laugh—deep, gloating laughter.

“Dear gossip, I have not heard such monstrous good news for many months. Brother Martin playing the nurse to a woman! Why, sir, we sent him one, and he would have none of her, the pious fool!”

“I dare say Brother Martin could not help himself.”

“How so?”

“The young woman arrived, claimed St. Florence’s charity, and friend Martin had to give it. I could swear he has kept the door of his cell shut all the while, and only gone out after dark.”

Geraint’s mouth showed its typical snarl.

“It’s probable, most probable, but such a tale does not suit us, good sir.”

“What has the fool done that you hate him so heartily?”

“He is too good for this world, Vance; I would that you could help us to be rid of him.”

The red man grinned.

“Why, anything in reason! One bruises one’s toe against these incorruptible lumps. And your toe may be swollen, holy friend.”

“Have done. This is serious to us.”

“Speak out, then; confess to me, Dom Geraint; I am no suckling.”

Geraint poured out more ale.

“But for Abbot Hilary we should not care a snap of the fingers.”

“Every man has a man over him, gossip, even if it be only a grave-digger. My Lord of Troy—well, I would not lose Roger Bland’s good-will. I should be a broken man in a month, and I know it. You are afraid of this pup’s yelping?”

Geraint nodded, and sat biting the nail of his thumb.

“Teach him to gnaw bones.”

“We have tried it.”

“But here is a pretty tale that could be told. Why, souse me in vinegar, one only has to lie hard enough in this world—see things crooked! Supposing I and my two fellows dream that we found——”

He painted the picture with a few coarse flourishes, and Geraint wriggled in his chair.

“Great, sweet gossip—great! But supposing he calls for a court?”

“Let him have it. He can call no witnesses. Madame Mellis will not be forthcoming, and we shall be ready to swear—for the jest of it. Of course a gold piece or two for my fellows! These little mazes please me, gossip; brains—brains! I’m tickled by a rebus! Now—what of it?”

Geraint stretched out one of his hairy paws.

“A bargain, Vance.”

“I’ll hold the debt over you, and call it some day. Prayers put up for me in Paradise—hey! No, a priest may be useful on occasions.”

Half an hour later he called his men, mounted his horse, and set out for the Black Moor.

_Chapter XVI_