The Firebrand
Page 8
CHAPTER VIII
SANCTUARY
The severe confessor solemnly preceded them, a candle in his hand. Rollothought that Father Anselmo had the air of perpetually assisting at anexcommunication, a burning of heretics, or other extreme disciplinaryceremony of Holy Church. His inferior, the bearer of the Petrine keys,dimpled behind him, rattling the wards vigorously to hide any tendencyof the bottle of wine to make music of its own in his ample skirts.
The treasury of Montblanch had indeed been most grievously despoiled bythe French, according to the immemorial custom of that most Christiannation upon its campaigns, and only the most used dishes were now ofsilver or silver gilt. All the rest were of homely pewter silveredover--which, as the confessor said, resembled most men's characters, inthat they looked well enough from a distance, and on the whole servedjust as well. He surveyed the company of young men so meaningly as hesaid this, that the Scot was only restrained from challenging him on thespot, by the pressure of John Mortimer's arm upon one side, and analmost tearful expression of entreaty on Brother Hilario's face upon theother.
The Confessor selected two keys from the bunch and inserted them into acouple of locks in a small iron door at the foot of certain gloomysteps.
The Scot who was imaginative, thought that he could discern some faintstirrings of life about his feet. Accordingly he stamped once or twice,having an instinctive hatred of little creeping vermin, which (withwasps) were the only things he feared in heaven or earth.
But the faint stirring ceasing, he grew interested in watching FatherAnselmo and the novice bearing simultaneously on the keys, which turnedtogether quite suddenly. Then the Confessor touched a spring concealedbehind some drapery and the door opened.
A former visitor, Marshal Souchy, had obtained the same privilege bytying the late Abbot up by the thumbs till he gave the order for thetreasury to be opened. In the despatches which he forwarded to hisimperial master this fact appeared in the following form: "After half anhour's persuasion the Abbot of Montblanch decided to give up histreasures to your officers, and to celebrate a solemn service inthanksgiving for the arrival in Aragon of the delivering armies of hisMajesty the Emperor."
The paucity of treasures of silver and gold in the treasury ofMontblanch was, however, more than made up for by the extraordinarynumber of relics of saints which the monastery possessed. It was at thispoint that the novice, who appeared to act as a kind of showman inordinary to the vaults, took up his tale.
"Brother Atanasio, do your duty!" the Confessor had said with a solemnvoice, precisely as if he had been ordering the first turn of the greatwheel of the garotte.
And in words that fairly tumbled over each other with haste thecustodian began his enumeration.
"Here we have a bud from the rod of Aaron--also the body of Aaronhimself; the clasp of the robe of Elijah, the prophet, which Elisha didnot observe when he picked up the mantle--also the aforesaid Elijah andElisha; the stone on which the angel sat in the holy sepulchre; thestone on which holy St. Peter stumbled when he let John outrun him; thewords he said on that occasion, which are not included in Holy Writ, butwere embroidered on a handkerchief by his mother-in-law, probably out ofspite; the stone on which the Sainted Virgin was sitting when the angelsaluted her, the stone on which she sat down to watch the crucifixion;the stone from Mount Sinai upon which St. Joseph prayed going down toEgypt; a stone from the house of St. Nicholas, and another from hissepulchre----"
Athanasius the rosy had only proceeded so far with his enumeration whena groan came as it were from the ground, and the Scot leaped violentlyaside.
"Good God!" he cried, "there is some one suffering down here--throughthat door, I think! Open it, you black-a-vised sweep of darkness! I am atrue-blue Presbyterian, I tell you, and I will have no Torquemadabusiness where Rollo Blair is."
But the dark monk only shook his head, and for the first time smiled.
"The exclamatory stranger is misled by a curious echo, which has giventhis place its name. It is called 'The Gate of the Groans,' and our wisepredecessors chose the place for the entrance of their treasure-chamber,as giving ignorant men the idea that the properties of the Abbey wereprotected by demons! I had not, however, hoped that the ingenious littlearrangement would deceive one so wise and experienced as the _caballero_with the long sword. Our novice, Brother Hilario, will inform his friendthat what I have said is well known in the monastery to be the case!"
"I have heard it so stated," said Etienne, with some reluctance, andspeaking not at all as his monastic name would import.
The groans came again and again, apparently from the earth, and Rollo,not yet fully convinced, stamped here and there with his foot andbattered the walls with the basket of his sword, till he added a dint ortwo to the tasselled hilt of "Killiecrankie." All in vain, however, forthe walls were solid, and the floor beneath his feet rang dull and true.
"Firm as the Rock of Peter," said the Confessor grimly, "on which HolyChurch is built. _Tu es Petrus, et super hanc petram----!_"
"I know that verse," cried the Scot, getting quickly in front of him;"but I can show you in a quarter of an hour that the Romanist argumentfrom these words proceeds upon a misconception--if you will do me thehonour to follow me----!"
"Follow _me_!" said the sepulchral monk curtly, and pointing upwards asthe sound of a bell was wafted down to them faintly. "That is the hourof midnight. Let us attend the call!"
So for that time Rollo's argument against the Romanist doctrine of theRock of Peter was shut within him. It was not long, however, before hehad other matters to think of.
They followed their guide through a maze of dark passages, till, with asudden "Attention!" he halted them before a door, from the other side ofwhich came a sound of voices.
The door opened and all the world seemed suddenly filled with clearsinging and glorious light.
Without the least preparation or preface Father Anselmo ushered thethree young men into the great chapel of the order of the Virgin ofMontblanch.
To Rollo it seemed almost an indecency to be thus transported fromstuffy cases of doubtful relics and the chill darkness of earth-smellingpassages, to this place where unseen suppliant voices assailed the Deitywith a perpetual song.
The three youths blinked at the sudden light as they stepped within, andeach of them glanced at their dress, apprehending with the instinctcommon to those who find themselves unexpectedly in crowded places, thatit must be disordered. They followed their guide mechanically to theHoly Water laver. Etienne made the necessary signs and a low reverencetowards the altar. Rollo's devotion to the Presbyterian form of worshipdid not prevent his imitating his companion with the easy adaptabilityof youth to place and circumstance, but quite unexpectedly they ran upona rock in the matter of John Mortimer.
"Do as I do, you obstinate ass!" hissed Rollo in his ear. "Take some ofthe water on one finger and make the sign of the cross--that is, if youwant to sleep in an unpricked skin this night!"
"Be hanged if I do," muttered John Mortimer, between his teeth. "I amnot much given to religion myself, but my father is a PrimitiveMethodist, and built them a church in Chorley. And I never could lookthe old man in the face again if I dotted myself all over with theirheathen holy water!"
"It's little of the Abbot's Priorato you'll ever ship then, my goodfriend," muttered Rollo; "but please yourself!"
The Englishman had rooted his heels to the pavement and squared hishands by his sides as one who would in nowise be dislodged from hisresolve.
"I do not care if I never put a drop of wine into cask," he said,doggedly. "I won't go back to Chorley after having denied my father'sbrand of religion, even if my own vintage is of the poorest."
"There's more ways of killing a cat than choking her with cream!"growled Rollo; "take this, then, you stiff-necked English deevil!"
And bowing towards the altar, and again towards the Father Confessor,who had been regarding them with a sinister curiosity, with the utmostgravity Rollo made certain gestures with
his hands, and dipping hisfingers again in the laver, he made the sign of the cross on hisfriend's forehead and breast, before the Englishman had time to protest.
"In fulfilment of a vow!" he exclaimed in a whisper to Father Anselmo."My companion has promised to St. Vicente Ferrer of Valencia that hewill not make the sign of the cross upon his person till he can do it atthe Basilica of holy St. Peter at Rome. He hath a mortal sin still uponhis conscience."
"Then let him come to me," said the Confessor. "I will deal with him ina more summary fashion!"
* * * * *
It was the season of pilgrimage, and many were the penitents who availedthemselves of the monks' three days statutory hospitality. These wereseated about the dark church on chairs and stools supplied them by thesacristans, and on two of the latter John Mortimer and Rollo presentlyfound themselves, while Brother Hilario went off to the gallery reservedfor novices of his standing. Now and then a woman would steal forwardand add a tall candle to the many thousands which burned upon the altar,or a man kneel at the screen of golden bars beyond which were theofficiating priests and their silently-moving acolytes.
The church lay behind in deep shadow, only the higher lights shininghere on a man's head, and there on a woman's golden ornament. The Abbotsat to the right in his episcopal robes, with his mitre on a cushionbeside him. A priest stood by this chair with the crozier in his hand.
The brethren of the Order could be seen in their robes occupying thestalls allotted to them. There was another organ and choir far down thechurch, high to the right of the pillar by which the young men sat. Thepresence of this second choir was betrayed by a dim illuminationproceeding from behind the fretted balustrade of the loft.
With the quick sympathy of his nature, Rollo, forgetting his sometimedevotion to his native Presbytery, which indeed was chiefly of thecontroversial sort, permitted himself to be carried away by themagnificent swing of the music, the resonance of the twin organs, nowpouring their thunder forth so as to shake at once the hearers'diaphragms and the fretted roof of blue and gold above them, now sweetand lonesome as a bird warbling down in Elie meadows in the noonsilences. Anon Rollo shut his eyes and the Chapel of the Virgin ofMontblanch incontinently vanished. He was among the great Congregationof all the Faithful, he alone without a wedding garment. The place wherehe stood seemed filled with surges of aureate light, but the night laybanked up without, eager and waiting to envelop him, doomed to be forever a faithless wandering son of the great Father. Snatches of hisearly devotions came ramblingly back to him, prayers his mother hadtaught him, Psalms his old nurse had insisted on his learning, or mayhapcrooned about his cradle. Such were the first words which came to him--
"That man hath perfect blessedness, Who walketh not astray, In counsel of ungodly men, Nor stands in sinners' way."
The impressions, hitherto vivid, blurred themselves at this point. RolloBlair was kneeling at his mother's knee. He thought of his firstsweetheart who had nearly made him a minister, and, perchance, a betterman. The night that was waiting imminent outside, silently overleapt thebarriers of golden light. Rollo Blair's head fell forward against apillar--and, while the music thundered and wailed alternate, and thegreat service swept on its gorgeous way, the wild unhaltered Scot,soothed by a lullaby of sound, slept the sleep of the young, the tired,and the heart-free.
How long he slumbered he could not tell, but he was awakened by aviolent thrust in the ribs from the elbow of John Mortimer.
"Great jimminy! what's that? Look, man, look!"
Rollo opened his eyes, bleared with insufficient sleep, and for a longmoment all things danced weirdly before them, as gnats dance in thelight of the moon. He saw dimly without understanding the swinging altarlamps in a blur of purple haze, the richly-robed priests, the myriadcandles, the dark forms of the worshippers. But now, instead of all eyesbeing turned towards the brilliance of the golden altar, it was towardsthe door at the dark end of the chapel that they looked.
He could distinguish a tumult of hoarse voices without, multitudinousangry cries of men, the clatter of feet, the sharp clash of arms. A shotor two went off quite near at hand.
"Seize him--take the murderer! Hold him!"
The shoutings came clear now to Rollo's brain, and rising to his feet hehalf drew his sword, as though he himself had been the hunted man. Butwith a smile he let the blade slide back, which it did as easily as astone slips into water. For though Killiecrankie's hilt might bebattered, without ribbon or bow-knot, Rollo saw to it that RobinFleeming's blade played him no tricks. His life had depended too oftenupon it for that, and might again.
Within the chapel of the monastery the service went on almost unheeded,save by a few of the elders, faithful women whom piety and deafness keptto their reverence. The men crowded unanimously towards the door outsidewhich the turmoil waxed wilder and wilder.
Then, shedding to either side a surge of men, as the bow of a swift shipcasts a twin wave to right and left, a man with only scraps of ragsclinging to him rushed up the aisle of the nave. His hair was red-wetand matted about his brow. There was a gash on one shoulder. His rightarm hung useless by his side. He was barefooted, but still in his lefthand he held a long knife, of which the steel was dimmed with blood.
"El Sarria! El Sarria!" cried the voices behind him. "There are ahundred duros on his head! Take him! Take him!"
And in a moment more the whole church was filled with the clangour ofarmed men. Bright uniforms filled the doorways. Sword bayonets glintedfrom behind pillars, as eager pursuers rushed this way and that aftertheir prey, overturning the chairs and frightening the kneeling women.
Straight along the aisle, turning neither to right nor left, rushed thehunted man. On the steps which lead up to the gilded railing he threwdown his knife, which with a clang rebounded on the marble floor of thechurch.
A priest came forward as if to bar the little wicket door. But with abound El Sarria was within, and in another he had cast himself down onthe uppermost steps of the high altar itself and laid his hands upon thecloth which bore _Su Majestad_, the high mystery of the Incarnation ofGod.
At this uprose the Abbot, and stepping from his throne with a calmdignity he reached the little golden gate through which the hunted manhad come one moment before the pursuers. These were the regularGovernment troops, commanded by a Cristino officer, who with a nakedsword in his hand pointed them on.
Blind with anger and the loss of many comrades, they would have rushedafter the fugitive and slain him even on the holy place where he lay.
But the Abbot of the Order of the Virgin of Montblanch stood in thebreach. They must first pass over his body. He held aloft a cross ofgold with a gesture of stern defiance. The crozier-bearer had movedautomatically to his place behind him.
"Thus far, and no farther!" cried the Abbot; "bring not the strife ofman into the presence of the Prince of Peace. This man hath laid hishands upon the horns of the altar, and by Our Lady and the Host of God,he shall be safe!"