CHAPTER VIII
TO CHARING
Chris had something very like remorse after Ralph had left Overfield,and no words of explanation or regret had been spoken on either side. Herecognised that he had not been blameless at the beginning of theirestrangement--if, indeed, there ever had been a beginning--for theirinflamed relations had existed to some extent back into boyhood as faras he could remember; but he had been responsible for at least a sharein the fierce words in Ralph's house after the death of the Carthusians.He had been hot-headed, insolent, theatrical; and he had not written toacknowledge it. He had missed another opportunity at Lewes--at leastone--when pride had held him back from speaking, for fear that he shouldbe thought to be currying favour. And now this last opportunity, thebest of all--when Ralph had been accessible and courteous, affected,Chris imagined, by the death of his mother--this too had been missed;and he had allowed his brother to ride away without a word of regret ormore than formal affection.
He was troubled at mass, an hour after Ralph had gone; the distractioncame between him and the sweet solemnity upon which he was engaged. Hissoul was dry and moody. He showed it in his voice. As a younger brotherin past years; as a monk and a priest now, he knew that the duty of thefirst step to a reconciliation had lain with him; and that he had nottaken it.
It had been a troubled household altogether when Ralph had gone. Therewas first the shock of Lady Torridon's death, and the hundred regretsthat it had left behind. Then Beatrice too, who had helped them all somuch, had told them that she must go back to town--her aunt was alone inthe little house at Charing, for the friend who had spent Christmasthere was gone back to the country; and Margaret, consequently, had beenalmost in despair. Lastly Sir James himself had been troubled; wonderingwhether he might not have been warmer with Ralph, more outspoken in hisgratitude for the affair of the mummers, more ready to welcome anexplanation from his son. The shadow of Ralph then rested on thehousehold, and there was something of pathos in it. He was so muchdetached now, so lonely, and it seemed that he was content it should beso.
* * * * *
There were pressing matters too to be arranged; and, weightiest of all,those relating to Margaret's future. She would now be the only womanbesides the servants, in the house; and it was growing less and lesslikely that she would be ever able to take up the Religious Life againin England. There seemed little reason for her remaining in the country,unless indeed she threw aside the Religious habit altogether, and wentto live at Great Keynes as Mary preferred. Beatrice made an offer toreceive her in London for a while, but in this case again she would haveto wear secular dress.
The evening before Beatrice left, the two sat and talked for a couple ofhours. Margaret was miserable; she cried a little, clung to Beatrice,and then was ashamed of herself.
"My dear child," said the other. "It is in your hands. You can do as youplease."
"But I cannot," sobbed the nun. "I cannot; I do not know. Let me comewith you, Beatrice."
Beatrice then settled down and talked to her. She told her of her dutyto her father for the present; she must remember that he was lonely now.In any case she must not think of leaving home for another six months.In the meantime she had to consider two points. First, did she considerherself in conscience bound to Religion? What did the priest tell her?If she did so consider herself, then there was no question; she must goto Bruges and join the others. Secondly, if not, did she think herselfjustified in leaving her father in the summer? If so, she might eithergo to Great Keynes, or come up for at least a long visit to Charing.
"And what do you think?" asked the girl piteously.
"Do you wish me to tell you!" said Beatrice.
Margaret nodded.
"Then I think you should go to Bruges in July or August."
Margaret stared at her; the tears were very near her eyes again.
"My darling; I should love to have you in London," went on the othercaressing her. "Of course I should. But I cannot see that King Henry hisnotions make any difference to your vows. They surely stand. Is it notso, my dear?"
And so after a little more talk Margaret consented. Her mind had toldher that all along; it was her heart only that protested against thisfinal separation from her friend.
Chris too agreed when she spoke to him a day or two later when Beatricehad gone back. He said he had been considering his own case too; andthat unless something very marked intervened he proposed to follow DomAnthony abroad. They could travel together, he said. Finally, when thematter was laid before their father he also consented.
"I shall do very well," he said. "Mary spoke to me of it; and Nicholashas asked me to make my home at Great Keynes; so if you go, my son, withMeg in the summer, I shall finish matters here, lease out the estate,and Mr. Carleton and I shall betake ourselves there. Unless"--hesaid--"unless Ralph should come to another mind."
* * * * *
As the spring and early summer drew on, the news, as has been seen, wasnot reassuring.
In spite of the Six Articles of the previous year by which all vows ofchastity were declared binding before God, there was no hint of makingit possible for the thousands of Religious in England still compelled bythem to return to the Life in which such vows were tolerable. TheReligious were indeed dispensed from obedience and poverty by the civilauthority; it was possible for them to buy, inherit, and occupyproperty; but a recognition of their corporate life was as far as everaway. It was becoming plainer every day that those who wished to pursuetheir vocation must do so in voluntary exile; and letters were alreadybeing exchanged between the brother and sister at home and therepresentatives of their respective communities on the Continent.
Then suddenly on the eleventh of June there arrived the news ofCromwell's fall and of all that it involved to Ralph.
They were at dinner when it came.
There was a door suddenly thrust open at the lower end of the hall; anda courier, white with dust and stiff with riding, limped up the mattingand delivered Beatrice's letter. It was very short.
"Come," she had written. "My Lord of Essex is arrested. He is in theTower. Mr. Ralph, too, is there for refusing to inform against him. Hehas behaved gallantly."
There followed a line from Mistress Jane Atherton, her aunt, offeringrooms in her own house.
* * * * *
A wild confusion fell upon the household. Men ran to and fro, womenwhispered and sobbed in corners under shadow of the King's displeasurethat lay on the house, the road between the terrace and the stablebuzzed with messengers, ordering and counter-ordering, for it was notcertain at first that Margaret would not go. A mounted groom dashed upfor instructions and was met by Sir James in his riding-cloak on theterrace who bade him ride to Great Keynes with the news, and entreat SirNicholas Maxwell to come up to London and his wife to Overfield; therewas not time to write. Sir James's own room was in confusion; hisclothes lay tumbled on the ground and a distraught servant tossed themthis way and that; Chris was changing his habit upstairs, for it wouldmean disaster to go to town as a monk. Margaret was on her knees inchapel, silent and self-controlled, but staring piteously at thecompassionate figure of the great Mother who looked down on her with HerSon in Her arms. The huge dog under the chapel-cloister lifted his headand bayed in answer, as frantic figures fled across the court beforehim. And over all lay the hot June sky, and round about the deeppeaceful woods.
A start was made at three o'clock.
Sir James was already in his saddle, as Chris ran out; an unfamiliarfigure in his plain priest's cloak and cap and great riding bootsbeneath. A couple of grooms waited behind, and another held the monk'shorse. Margaret was on the steps, white and steadied by prayer; and thechaplain stood behind with a strong look in his eyes as they met thoseof his patron.
"Take care of her, father; take care of her. Her sister will be hereto-night, please God. Oh! God bless you, my dear! Pray for us all. Jesukeep us all! Chris, are you
mounted?"
Then they were off; and the white dust rose in clouds about them.
* * * * *
It was between eight and nine as they rode up the north bank of theriver from London Bridge to Charing.
It had been a terrible ride, with but few words between the two, andlong silences that were the worst of all; as, blotting out the richcountry and the deep woods and the meadows and heathery hills on eitherside of the road through Surrey, visions moved and burned before them,such as the King's vengeance had made possible to the imagination. Fromfar away across the Southwark fields Chris had seen the huddledbuildings of the City, the princely spire that marked them, and hadheard the sweet jangling of the thousand bells that told the Angelus;but he had thought of little but of that high gateway under which theymust soon pass, where the pikes against the sky made palpable thehorrors of his thought. He had given one swift glance up as he wentbeneath; and then his heart sickened as they went on, past the housesand St. Thomas's chapel with gleams of the river seen beneath. Then ashe looked his breath came sharp; far down there eastwards, seen for amoment, rose up the sombre towers where Ralph lay, and the saints hadsuffered.
The old Religious Houses, stretching in a splendid line upwards, fromthe Augustinian priory near the river-bank, along the stream that floweddown from Ludgate, caught the last rays of sunlight high against therich sky as the riders went along towards Charing between thesedge-brinked tide and the slope of grass on their right; and the monk'ssorrowful heart was overlaid again with sorrow as he looked at them,empty now and desolate where once the praises of God had sounded day andnight.
They stopped beneath the swinging sign of an inn, with Westministertowers blue and magical before them, to ask for Mistress Atherton'shouse, and were directed a little further along and nearer to thewater's edge.
It was a little old house when they came to it, built on a tiny privateembankment that jutted out over the flats of the river-bank; of plasterand timber with overhanging storeys and windows beneath the roof. Itstood by itself, east of the village, and almost before the jangle ofthe bell had died away, Beatrice herself was at the door, in herhouse-dress, bare-headed; with a face at once radiant and constrained.
She took them upstairs immediately, after directing the men to take thehorses, when they had unloaded the luggage, back to the inn where theyhad enquired the way: for there was no stable, she said, attached to thehouse.
Chris came behind his father as if in a dream through the dark littlehall and up the two flights on to the first landing. Beatrice stopped ata door.
"You can say what you will," she said, "before my aunt. She is of ourmind in these matters."
Then they were in the room; a couple of candles burned on a table beforethe curtained window; and an old lady with a wrinkled kindly facehobbled over from her chair and greeted the two travellers.
"I welcome you, gentlemen," she said, "if a sore heart may say so tosore hearts."
There was no news of Nicholas, they were told; he had not been heard of.
* * * * *
They heard the story so far as Beatrice knew it; but it was softened fortheir ears. She had found Ralph, she said, hesitating what to do. He hadbeen plainly bewildered by the sudden news; they had talked a while; andthen he had handed her the papers to burn. The magistrate sent by theCouncil had arrived to find the ashes still smoking. He had questionedRalph sharply, for he had come with authority behind him; and Ralph hadrefused to speak beyond telling him that the bundles lying on the floorwere all the papers of my Lord Essex that were in his possession. Theyhad laid hands on these, and then searched the room. A quantity ofashes, Beatrice said, had fallen from behind a portrait over the hearthwhen they had shifted it. Then the magistrate had questioned her too,enquired where she lived, and let her go. She had waited at the cornerof the street, and watched the men come out. Ralph walked in the centreas a prisoner. She had followed them to the river; had mixed with thecrowd that gathered there; and had heard the order given to thewherryman to pull to the Tower. That was all that she knew.
"Thank God for your son, sir. He bore himself gallantly."
There was a silence as she ended. The old man looked at her wonderingand dazed. It was so sad, that the news scarcely yet conveyed itsmessage.
"And my Lord Essex?" he said.
"My Lord is in the Tower too. He was arrested at the Council by the Dukeof Norfolk."
The old lady intervened then, and insisted on their going down tosupper. It would be ready by now, she said, in the parlour downstairs.
They supped, themselves silent, with Beatrice leaning her arms on thetable, and talking to them in a low voice, telling them all that wassaid. She did not attempt to prophesy smoothly. The feeling againstCromwell, she said, passed all belief. The streets had been filled witha roaring crowd last night. She had heard them bellowing till long afterdark. The bells were pealed in the City churches hour after hour, intriumph over the minister's fall.
"The dogs!" she said fiercely. "I never thought to say it, but my heartgoes out to him."
Her spirit was infections. Chris felt a kind of half-joyful recklessnesstingle in his veins, as he listened to her talk, and watched her blackeyes hot with indignation and firm with purpose. What if Ralph werecast? At least it was for faithfulness--of a kind. Even the father'sface grew steadier; that piteous trembling of the lower lip ceased, andthe horror left his eyes. It was hard to remain in panic with that girlbeside them.
They had scarcely done supper when the bell of the outer door rangagain, and a moment later Nicholas was with them, flushed with hardriding. He strode into the room, blinking at the lights, and tossed hisriding whip on to the table.
"I have been to the Lieutenant of the Tower," he said; "I know him ofold. He promises nothing. He tells me that Ralph is well-lodged. Mary isgone to Overfield. God damn the King!"
He had no more news to give. He had sent off his wife at once onreceiving the tidings, and had started half an hour later for London. Hehad been ahead of them all the way, it seemed; but had spent a couple ofhours first in trying to get admittance to the Tower, and then ininterviewing the Lieutenant; but there was no satisfaction to be gainedthere. The utmost he had wrung from him was a promise that he would seehim again, and hear what he had to say.
Then Nicholas had to sup and hear the whole story from the beginning;and Chris left his father to tell it, and went up with Beatrice toarrange about rooms.
Matters were soon settled with the old lady; Nicholas and Chris were tosleep in one room, and Sir James in an another. Two servants only couldbe accommodated in the house; the rest were to put up at the inn.Beatrice went off to give the necessary orders.
Mistress Jane Atherton and Chris had a few moments together before theothers came up.
"A sore heart," said the old lady again, "but a glad one too. Beatricehas told me everything."
"I am thankful too," said Chris softly. "I wonder if my fatherunderstands."
"He will, father, he will. But even if he does not--well, God knowsall."
It was evident when Sir James came upstairs presently that he did notunderstand anything yet, except that Beatrice thought that Ralph hadbehaved well.
"But it is to my Lord Essex--who has been the worker of all themischief--that my son is faithful. Is that a good thing then?"
"Why, yes," said Chris. "You would not have him faithless there too?"
"But would he not be on God's side at last, if he were againstCromwell?"
The old man was still too much bewildered to understand explanations,and his son was silent.
* * * * *
Chris could not sleep that night, and long after Nicholas lay deep inhis pillow, with open mouth and tight eyes, the priest was at the windowlooking out over the river where the moon hung like a silver shieldabove Southwark. The meadows beyond the stream were dim and colourless;here and there a roof rose among trees; and straight across t
he broadwater to his feet ran a path of heaving glory, where the strong rippletossed the silver surface that streamed down upon it from the moon.
London lay round him as quiet as Overfield, and Chris remembered with astir at his heart his moonlight bathe all those years ago in the lake athome, when he had come back hot from hunting and had slipped down withthe chaplain after supper. Then the water had seemed like a cool restfulgulf in the world of sensation; the moon had not been risen at first;only the stars pricked above and below in air and water. Then the moonhad come up, and a path of splendour had smitten the surface into sight.He had swum up it, he remembered, the silver ripple washing over hisshoulders as he went.
And now those years of monastic peace and storm had come and gone,sifting and penetrating his soul, washing out from it little by littlethe heats and passions with which he had plunged. As he looked back onhimself he was astonished at his old complacent smallness. His figureappeared down that avenue of years, a tiny passionate thing,gesticulating, feverish, self-conscious. He remembered his serenecertainty that he was right and Ralph wrong in every touch of frictionbetween them, his own furious and theatrical outburst at the death ofthe Carthusians, his absurd dignity on later occasions. Even in thosefirst beginnings of peace when the inner life had begun to well up andenvelop him he had been narrow and self-centred; he had despised thecommon human life, not understanding that God's Will was as energetic inthe bewildering rush of the current as in the quiet shelteredback-waters to which he himself had been called. He had been awakenedfrom that dream by the fall of the Priory, and that to which he openedhis eyes had been forced into his consciousness by the months at home,when he had had that astringent mingling of the world and the spirit, ofthe interpenetration of the inner by the outer. And now for the firsttime he stood as a balanced soul between the two, alight with a tranquilgrace within, and not afraid to look at the darkness without. He wasready now for either life, to go back to the cloister and labour therefor the world at the springs of energy, or to take his place in the newEngland and struggle at the tossing surface.
He stood here now by the hurrying turbulent stream, a wider and moreperilous gulf than that that had lain before him as he looked at themoonlit lake at Overfield and yet over it brooded the same quiet shieldof heaven, gilding the black swift flowing forces with the promise of aPresence greater than them all.
He stood there long, staring and thinking.