The Cloister and the Hearth: A Tale of the Middle Ages

by Charles Reade

  CHAPTER XLVIII

  "WHAT makes you here?" was Catherine's greeting.

  "I came to seek after Margaret."

  "Well, we know no such person."

  "Say not so, dame; sure you know her by name, Margaret Brandt."

  "We have heard of her for that matter--to our cost."

  "Come, dame, prithee tell me at least where she bides."

  "I know not where she bides, and care not."

  Denys felt sure this was a deliberate untruth. He bit his lip. "Well, Ilooked to find myself in an enemy's country at this Tergou; but maybe ifye knew all ye would not be so dour."

  "I do know all," replied Catherine bitterly. "This morn I knew nought."Then suddenly setting her arms akimbo she told him with a raised voiceand flashing eyes she wondered at his cheek sitting down by that hearthof all hearths in the world.

  "May Satan fly away with your hearth to the lake of fire and brimstone,"shouted Denys, who could speak Flemish fluently. "Your own servant bademe sit there till you came, else I had ne'er troubled your hearth. Mymalison on it, and on the churlish roof-tree that greets an unoffendingstranger this way," and he strode scowling to the door.

  "Oh! oh!" ejaculated Catherine frightened, and also a littleconscience-stricken; and the virago sat suddenly down and burst intotears. Her daughter followed suit quietly, but without loss of time.

  * * * * *

  A shrewd writer, now unhappily lost to us, has somewhere the followingdialogue:--

  _She._] "I feel all a woman's weakness."

  _He._] "Then you are invincible."

  Denys, by anticipation, confirmed that valuable statement; he stood atthe door looking ruefully at the havoc his thunderbolt of eloquence hadmade.

  "Nay, wife," said he, "weep not neither for a soldier's hasty word. Imean not all I said. Why your house is your own, and what right in ithave I? There now, I'll go."

  "What is to do?" said a grave manly voice. It was Eli; he had come infrom the shop.

  "Here is a ruffian been a-scolding of your womenfolk and making themcry," explained Denys.

  "Little Kate, what is't? for ruffians do not use to call themselvesruffians," said Eli the sensible.

  Ere she could explain, "Hold your tongue, girl," said Catherine; "Murielbade him sat down, and I knew not that, and wyted on him; and he wasgoing and leaving his malison on us, root and branch. I was never sobecursed in all my days, oh! oh! oh!"

  "You were both somewhat to blame; both you and he," said Eli calmly."However, what the servant says the master should still stand to. Wekeep not open house, but yet we are not poor enough to grudge a seat atour hearth in a cold day to a wayfarer with an honest face, and as, Ithink, a wounded man. So, end all malice, and sit ye down!"

  "Wounded?" cried mother and daughter in a breath.

  "Think you a soldier slings his arm for sport?"

  "Nay, 'tis but an arrow," said Denys cheerfully.

  "But an arrow?" said Kate with concentrated horror. "Where were oureyes, mother?"

  "Nay, in good sooth, a trifle. Which however I will pray mesdames toaccept as an excuse for my vivacity. 'Tis these little foolish triflingwounds that fret a man, worthy sir. Why, look ye now, sweeter temperthan our Gerard never breathed, yet, when the bear did but strike apiece no bigger than a crown out of his calf, he turned so hot andcholeric y'had said he was no son of yours, but got by the good knightSir John Pepper on his wife dame Mustard; who is this? a dwarf? yourservant, master Giles."

  "Your servant, soldier," roared the new-comer. Denys started. He had notcounted on exchanging greetings with a petard.

  Denys's words had surprised his hosts, but hardly more than theirdeportment now did him. They all three came creeping up to where he sat,and looked down into him with their lips parted, as if he had been somestrange phenomenon.

  And growing agitation succeeded to amazement.

  "Now hush!" said Eli, "let none speak but I. Young man," said hesolemnly, "in God's name who are you, that know us though we know younot, and that shake our hearts speaking to us of--the absent--our poorrebellious son: whom Heaven forgive and bless?"

  "What, master," said Denys lowering his voice, "hath he not writ to you?hath he not told you of me, Denys of Burgundy?"

  "He hath writ, but three lines, and named not Denys of Burgundy, nor anystranger."

  "Ay, I mind the long letter was to his sweetheart, this Margaret, andshe has decamped, plague take her, and how I am to find her Heavenknows."

  "What, she is not your sweetheart, then?"

  "Who, dame? an't please you."

  "Why, Margaret Brandt."

  "How can my comrade's sweetheart be mine? I know her not from Noah'sniece; how should I? I never saw her."

  "Whist with this idle chat, Kate," said Eli impatiently, "and let theyoung man answer me. How came you to know Gerard, our son? Prithee nowthink on a parent's cares, and answer me straightforward, like a soldieras thou art."

  "And shall. I was paid off at Flushing, and started for Burgundy. On theGerman frontier I lay at the same inn with Gerard. I fancied him. I said'Be my comrade.' He was loth at first: consented presently. Many a wearyleague we trode together. Never were truer comrades: never will be whileearth shall last. First I left my route a bit to be with him: then hehis to be with me. We talked of Sevenbergen, and Tergou, a thousandtimes; and of all in this house. We had our troubles on the road: butbattling them together made them light. I saved his life from a bear; hemine in the Rhine: for he swims like a duck and I like a hod o' bricks;and one another's lives at an inn in Burgundy, where we two held a roomfor a good hour against seven cutthroats, and crippled one and slew two;and your son did his devoir like a man, and met the stoutest champion Iever countered, and spitted him like a sucking-pig. Else I had not beenhere. But just, when all was fair, and I was to see him safe aboard shipfor Rome, if not to Rome itself, met us that son of a ---- the LordAnthony of Burgundy, and his men, making for Flanders, then ininsurrection, tore us by force apart, took me where I got some broadpieces in hand, and a broad arrow in my shoulder, and left my poorGerard lonesome. At that sad parting, soldier though I be, these eyesdid rain salt scalding tears, and so did his, poor soul. His last wordto me was 'Go comfort Margaret!' so here I be. Mine to him was 'Think nomore of Rome. Make for Rhine, and down stream home.' Now say, for youknow best, did I advise him well or ill?"

  "Soldier, take my hand," said Eli. "God bless thee! God bless thee!" andhis lip quivered. It was all his reply, but more eloquent than manywords.

  Catherine did not answer at all, but she darted from the room and badeMuriel bring the best that was in the house, and returned with wood inboth arms, and heaped the fire, and took out a snow-white cloth from thepress, and was going in a great hurry to lay it for Gerard's friend,when suddenly she sat down and all the power ebbed rapidly out of herbody.

  "Father!" cried Kate, whose eye was as quick as her affection. Denysstarted up; but Eli waived him back and flung a little water sharply inhis wife's face. This did her instant good. She gasped, "So sudden. Mypoor boy!" Eli whispered Denys, "Take no notice! she thinks of him nightand day." They pretended not to observe her, and she shook it off, andbustled and laid the cloth with her own hands; but, as she smoothed it,her hands trembled and a tear or two stole down her cheeks.

  They could not make enough of Denys. They stuffed him, and crammed him:and then gathered round him and kept filling his glass in turn, while bythat genial blaze of fire and ruby wine and eager eyes he told all thatI have related, and a vast number of minor details which an artist,however minute, omits.

  But how different the effect on my readers and on this small circle! Tothem the interest was already made before the first word came from hislips. It was all about Gerard, and he, who sat there telling it them,was warm from Gerard and an actor with him in all these scenes.

  The flesh and blood around that fire quivered for their severed member,hearing its struggles and perils.

  I shall ask my reade
rs to recall to memory all they can of Gerard'sjourney with Denys, and in their mind's eye to see those very matterstold by his comrade to an exile's father, all stoic outside, all fatherwithin, and to two poor women, an exile's mother and a sister, who wereall love and pity and tender anxiety both outside and in. Now would youmind closing this book for a minute and making an effort to realize allthis? It will save us so much repetition.

  * * * * *

  Then you will not be surprised when I tell you that after a while Gilescame softly and curled himself up before the fire, and lay gazing at thespeaker with a reverence almost canine; and that, when the rough soldierhad unconsciously but thoroughly betrayed his better qualities, andabove all his rare affection for Gerard, Kate, though timorous as abird, stole her little hand into the warrior's huge brown palm, where itlay an instant like a teaspoonful of cream spilt on a platter, thennipped the ball of his thumb and served for a Kardiometer. In otherwords Fate is just even to rival story-tellers, and balances matters.Denys had to pay a tax to his audience which I have not. Whenever Gerardwas in too much danger, the female faces became so white, and their poorlittle throats gurgled so, he was obliged in common humanity to spoilhis recital. Suspense is the soul of narrative, and thus dealtRough-and-Tender of Burgundy with his best suspenses. "Now, dame, takenot on till ye hear the end: Ma'amselle, let not your cheek blanch so,courage! it looks ugly: but you shall hear how we wond through. Had hemiscarried, and I at hand, would I be alive?"

  And I called Kate's little hand a Kardiometer, or heart-measurer,because it graduated emotion, and pinched by scale. At its best it wasby no means a high-pressure engine. But all is relative. Denys soonlearned the tender gamut; and when to water the suspense, and extractthe thrill as far as possible. On one occasion only he cannilyindemnified his narrative for this drawback. Falling personally into theRhine, and sinking, he got pinched, he Denys, to his surprise andsatisfaction. "Oho!" thought he, and on the principle of the anatomists,"experimentum in corpore vili," kept himself a quarter of an hour underwater; under pressure all the time. And even when Gerard had got hold ofhim, he was loth to leave the river, so, less conscientious than I was,swam with Gerard to the east bank first, and was about to land, butdetected the officers, and their intent, chaffed them a little space,treading water, then turned and swam wearily all across, and at last wasobliged to get out, for very shame, or else acknowledge himself a pike;so permitted himself to land, exhausted: and the pressure relaxed.

  * * * * *

  It was eleven o'clock, an unheard-of hour, but they took no note of timethis night; and Denys had still much to tell them, when the door wasopened quietly, and in stole Cornelis and Sybrandt looking hang-dog.They had this night been drinking the very last drop of their mysteriousfunds.

  Catherine feared her husband would rebuke them before Denys: but he onlylooked sadly at them, and motioned them to sit down quietly.

  Denys it was who seemed discomposed. He knitted his brows and eyed themthoughtfully and rather gloomily. Then turned to Catherine. "What sayyou, dame? the rest tomorrow? for I am somewhat weary and it waxeslate."

  "So be it," said Eli. But when Denys rose to go to his inn, he wasinstantly stopped by Catherine.

  "And think you to lie from this house? Gerard's room has been got readyfor you hours agone: the sheets I'll not say much for, seeing I spun theflax and wove the web."

  "Then would I lie in them blindfold," was the gallant reply.

  "Ah, dame, our poor Gerard was the one for fine linen. He could hardlyforgive the honest Germans their coarse flax, and, whene'er my traitorsof countrymen did amiss, a would excuse them saying, 'Well, well; bonnestoiles sont en Bourgogne:' that means 'there be good lenten cloths inBurgundy.' But indeed he beat all for bywords and cleanliness."

  "Oh Eli! Eli! doth not our son come back to us at each word?"

  "Ay. Buss me, my poor Kate. You and I know all that passeth in eachother's hearts this night. None other can, but God."