CHAPTER XXXII
In the refectory allusion was made, at the table where Gerard sat,to the sudden death of the monk who had undertaken to write out freshcopies of the charter of the monastery, and the rule, etc.
Gerard caught this, and timidly offered his services. There was ahesitation which he mistook. "Nay, not for hire, my lords, but for love,and as a trifling return for many a good night's lodging the brethren ofyour order have bestowed on me a poor wayfarer."
A monk smiled approvingly; but hinted that the late brother was anexcellent penman, and his work could not be continued but by a master.Gerard on this drew from his wallet with some trepidation a vellum deed,the back of which he had cleaned and written upon by way of specimen.The monk gave quite a start at sight of it, and very hastily went upthe hall to the high table, and bending his knee so as just to touch inpassing the fifth step and the tenth, or last, presented it to the priorwith comments. Instantly a dozen knowing eyes were fixed on it, and abuzz of voices was heard; and soon Gerard saw the prior point more thanonce, and the monk came back, looking as proud as Punch, with a savourycrustade ryal, or game pie gravied and spiced, for Gerard, and a silvergrace cup full of rich pimentum. This latter Gerard took, and bowinglow, first to the distant prior, then to his own company, quaffed, andcirculated the cup.
Instantly, to his surprise, the whole table hailed him as a brother:"Art convent bred, deny it not?" He acknowledged it, and gave Heaventhanks for it, for otherwise he had been as rude and ignorant as hisbrothers, Sybrandt and Cornelis.
"But 'tis passing strange how you could know," said he.
"You drank with the cup in both hands," said two monks, speakingtogether.
The voices had for some time been loudish round a table at the bottomof the hall; but presently came a burst of mirth so obstreperous andprolonged, that the prior sent the very sub-prior all down the hall tocheck it, and inflict penance on every monk at the table. And Gerard'scheek burned with shame; for in the heart of the unruly merriment hisear had caught the word "courage!" and the trumpet tones of Denys ofBurgundy.
Soon Gerard was installed in feu Werter's cell, with wax lights, and alittle frame that could be set at any angle, and all the materials ofcaligraphy. The work, however, was too much for one evening. Then camethe question, how could he ask Denys, the monk-hater, to stay longer?However, he told him, and offered to abide by his decision. He wasagreeably surprised when Denys said graciously, "A day's rest will doneither of us harm. Write thou, and I'll pass the time as I may."
Gerard's work was vastly admired; they agreed that the records of themonastery had gained by poor Werter's death. The sub-prior forced arix-dollar on Gerard, and several brushes and colours out of the conventstock, which was very large. He resumed his march warm at heart, forthis was of good omen; since it was on the pen he relied to makehis fortune and recover his well-beloved. "Come, Denys," said hegood-humouredly, "see what the good monks have given me; now, do try tobe fairer to them; for to be round with you, it chilled my friendshipfor a moment to hear even you call my benefactors 'hypocrites.'"
"I recant," said Denys.
"Thank you! thank you! Good Denys."
"I was a scurrilous vagabond."
"Nay, nay, say not so, neither!"
"But we soldiers are rude and hasty. I give myself the lie, and I offerthose I misunderstood all my esteem. 'Tis unjust that thousands shouldbe defamed for the hypocrisy of a few."
"Now are you reasonable. You have pondered what I said?"
"Nay, it is their own doing."
Gerard crowed a little, we all like to be proved in the right; andwas all attention when Denys offered to relate how his conversion waseffected.
"Well then, at dinner the first day a young monk beside me did open hisjaws and laughed right out and most musically. 'Good,' said I, 'at lastI have fallen on a man and not a shorn ape.' So, to sound him further,I slapped his broad back and administered my consigne. 'Heaven forbid!'says he. I stared. For the dog looked as sad as Solomon a better mimesaw you never, even at a Mystery. 'I see war is no sharpener of thewits,' said he. 'What are the clergy for but to fight the foul fiend?and what else are the monks for?
"The fiend being dead, The friars are sped."
You may plough up the convents, and we poor monks shall have nought todo--but turn soldiers, and so bring him to life again.' Then there was agreat laugh at my expense. 'Well, you are the monk for me,' said I. 'Andyou are the crossbowman for me,' quo' he. 'And I'll be bound you couldtell us tales of the war should make our hair stand on end.' 'Excusez!the barber has put that out of the question,' quoth I, and then I hadthe laugh."
"What wretched ribaldry!" observed Gerard pensively.
The candid Denys at once admitted he had seen merrier jests hatched withless cackle. "'Twas a great matter to have got rid of hypocrisy. 'So,'said I, 'I can give you the chaire de poule, if that may content ye.''That we will see,' was the cry, and a signal went round."
Denys then related, bursting with glee, how at bedtime he had been takento a cell instead of the great dortour, and strictly forbidden to sleep;and to aid his vigil, a book had been lent him of pictures representinga hundred merry adventures of monks in pursuit of the female laity;and how in due course he had been taken out barefooted and down to theparlour, where was a supper fit for the duke, and at it twelve jollyfriars, the roaringest boys he had ever met in peace or war. How thestory, the toast, the jest, the wine-cup had gone round, and somehad played cards with a gorgeous pack, where Saint Theresa, and SaintCatherine, etc., bedizened with gold, stood for the four queens; andblack, white, grey, and crutched friars for the four knaves; and hadstaked their very rosaries, swearing like troopers when they lost. Andhow about midnight a sly monk had stolen out, but had by him and othersbeen as cannily followed into the garden, and seen to thrust his handinto the ivy and out with a rope-ladder. With this he had run up onthe wall, which was ten feet broad, yet not so nimbly but what a russetkirtle had popped up from the outer world as quick as he; and so tobilling and cooing: that this situation had struck him as rather felinethan ecclesiastical, and drawn from him the appropriate comment of a"mew!" The monks had joined the mewsical chorus, and the lay visitorshrieked and been sore discomforted; but Abelard only cried, "What, areye there, ye jealous miauling knaves? ye shall caterwaul to some tuneto-morrow night. I'll fit every man-jack of ye with a fardingale." Thatthis brutal threat had reconciled him to stay another day--at Gerard'srequest.
Gerard groaned.
Meantime, unable to disconcert so brazen a monk, and the demoisellebeginning to whimper, they had danced caterwauling in a circle, thenbestowed a solemn benediction on the two wall-flowers, and off tothe parlour, where they found a pair lying dead drunk, and othertwo affectionate to tears. That they had straightway carried off theinanimate, and dragged off the loving and lachymose, kicked them allmerrily each into his cell.
"And so shut up in measureless content."
Gerard was disgusted: and said so.
Denys chuckled, and proceeded to tell him how the next day he and theyoung monks had drawn the fish-ponds and secreted much pike, carp,tench, and eel for their own use: and how, in the dead of night, he hadbeen taken shoeless by crooked ways into the chapel, a ghost-like place,being dark, and then down some steps into a crypt below the chapelfloor, where suddenly paradise had burst on him.
"'Tis there the holy fathers retire to pray," put in Gerard.
"Not always," said Denys; "wax candles by the dozen were lighted, andprincely cheer; fifteen soups maigre, with marvellous twangs of venison,grouse, and hare in them, and twenty different fishes (being Friday),cooked with wondrous art, and each he between two buxom lasses, and eachlass between two lads with a cowl; all but me: and to think I had to wooby interpreter. I doubt the knave put in three words for himself andone for me; if he didn't, hang him for a fool. And some of the weakervessels were novices, and not wont to hold good wine; had to be coaxedere they would put it to their white teeth; mais elles s'y fai
saient;and the story, and the jest, and the cup went round (by-the-by, they hadflagons made to simulate breviaries); and a monk touched the cittern,and sang ditties with a voice tunable as a lark in spring. The posiesdid turn the faces of the women folk bright red at first: but elles s'yfaisaient."
Here Gerard exploded.
"Miserable wretches! Corrupters of youth! Perverters of innocence! butfor your being there, Denys, who have been taught no better, oh,would God the church had fallen on the whole gang. Impious, abominablehypocrites!"
"Hypocrites?" cried Denys, with unfeigned surprise. "Why, that is what Iclept them ere I knew them: and you withstood me. Nay, they are sinners;all good fellows are that; but, by St. Denys his helmeted skull, nohypocrites, but right jolly roaring blades."
"Denys," said Gerard solemnly, "you little know the peril you ran thatnight. That church you defiled amongst you is haunted; I had it fromone of the elder monks. The dead walk there, their light feet have beenheard to patter o'er the stones."
"Misericorde!" whispered Denys.
"Ay, more," said Gerard, lowering his voice almost to a whisper;"celestial sounds have issued from the purlieus of that very crypt youturned into a tavern. Voices of the dead holding unearthly communionhave chilled the ear of midnight, and at times, Denys, the faithful intheir nightly watches have even heard music from dead lips; and chords,made by no mortal finger, swept by no mortal hand, have rung faintly,like echoes, deep among the dead in those sacred vaults."
Denys wore a look of dismay. "Ugh! if I had known, mules and wain-ropeshad not hauled me thither; and so" (with a sigh) "I had lost a merrytime."
Whether further discussion might have thrown any more light upon theseghostly sounds, who can tell? for up came a "bearded brother" from themonastery, spurring his mule, and waving a piece of vellum in his hand.It was the deed between Ghysbrecht and Floris Brandt. Gerard valued itdeeply as a remembrance of home: he turned pale at first but to think hehad so nearly lost it, and to Denys's infinite amusement not only gave apiece of money to the lay brother, but kissed the mule's nose.
"I'll read you now," said Gerard, "were you twice as ill written;and--to make sure of never losing you"--here he sat down, and taking outneedle and thread, sewed it with feminine dexterity to his doublet, andhis mind, and heart, and soul were away to Sevenbergen.
They reached the promised land, and Denys, who was in high spirits,doffed his bonnet to all the females; who curtsied and smiled in return;fired his consigne at most of the men; at which some stared, somegrinned, some both; and finally landed his friend at one of thelong-promised Burgundian inns.
"It is a little one," said he, "but I know it of old for a good one;Les Trois Poissons.' But what is this writ up? I mind not this;" and hepointed to an inscription that ran across the whole building in a singleline of huge letters. "Oh, I see. 'Ici on loge a pied et a cheval,'"said Denys, going minutely through the inscription, and lookingbumptious when he had effected it.
Gerard did look, and the sentence in question ran thus:
"ON NE LOGE CEANS A CREDIT; CE BONHOMME EST MORT, LES MAUVAIS PAIEURSL'ONT TUE."
The Cloister and the Hearth Page 32
