Silver Cross by Mary Johnston
CHAPTER XVIII
Said Master Eustace Bettany to Thomas Bettany, his son:
“Idle--thou art idle! Hadst as well be in the new Indies as in mycountinghouse! Paper costs--and there thou goest scrawling, scrawling,and never a sum adding nor thinking out market!” He snatched thewhitey-brown sheet. “Waste makes want! What are you scribbling there?‘I saw it in a flash--I saw it in a flash!’ What is it, prithee, thatyou saw in a flash?”
Thomas Bettany rubbed his eyes. “That the world’s a great merchant,father, selling herself to herself and buying herself from herself.”
The elder glanced suspiciously. “Will you be turning monk?”
“No, though I think there be good monks, good abbots and good priors.”
“Of course there be good monks, good abbots and good priors! God forbidthat you go believing witch’s story and mad monk’s tale!”
“What would happen if I did, father?”
“Madman’s whip and bread and water and a chain! Go to, Thomas, what iswrong?” Suspicion sat in his eyes. “That’s a new thought and one Ilike not! Were you among the reachers for flowers that grew by harlothouse? Were you?”
Thomas Bettany shook his head. “I’ve told you I wanted Cecily.” He rosefrom chair and desk. “Eh, father, also I would like a ship that sailsand sails away--with me, and Cecily! Now let me be going, for I toldMartin Adamson that I would come myself for his monies.”
“Aye? Then go--and do you remember, Thomas, that you’re all the son Ihave, and that I have been good to you!”
Thomas Bettany went afoot through Middle Forest. “‘All the son I have,and I have been good to you.’ ‘_All the life I have and I would notburn. All the life I have and I would not burn._’ That’s Morgen Fay inprison yonder.”
The day was hot with a cloud drawing over. Hot and still with a greenlight. Folk in the street looked upward. “Rain coming!” Thomas Bettanymeant to go to the house of the debtor. But there was no hurry. It wasa long day. Long day and short day. “Prison day must be long day, OSaint John, long day! But short day, seeing that it pulleth and hastethtoward death day--Friday. And now it is Monday.”
Fascination drew him by the town cross. They would not set stake andfagot till Thursday. “How doth it feel when the iron hoop goes round?How doth the heart strive and choke when the torch comes to the straw?I feel it in myself! Doth Somerville feel it in himself? Doth Montjoy?”
Persons spoke to him in the market square. He was young and big andgay and well liked. He answered enough to the point, and went on;and now here was the prison, tall and black among ruinous, ancient,steep-roofed houses, set under the castle hill with tower and wallabove, and over these and all that slate sky with greenish light. Deeparchway and iron door and men lounging. He went by Morgen Fay alonein the dark, and he knew that what she had told to burgher and lordand churchman was true--he had seen it in a flash--and a terrible andwicked act had she done, meriting hell where she would burn forever!But then, Somerville, but then the Abbot and the Prior?
Thomas Bettany, who had owned a young, clean, gay heart, perceived thatthe world had taken plague.
He wandered. He would not go home, nor yet to the debtor’s house. Rainheld off, but the sky was covered, the light green, the air still andhot. He went down to the river. The bridge,--there were pilgrimsupon it, a double line of them, chanting, coming from Saint Leofric.To-morrow they would go to Silver Cross, and Holy Well would heal oneat least, maybe two or three.
It made no difference what the monk of Silver Cross had cried nor whatMorgen Fay. Was healing then within one’s own mind and heart? Was therethe Holy Well?
Thomas Bettany went down the watersteps, found boatmen and their craftand hired a row-boat for an hour. He would row himself. “Storm coming,master!” “Aye.” “If it were Friday now, it might put out fire, andthat would be sore pity! Saint Christopher knoweth the boats on thisriver that have rowed to Morgen Fay’s house! Well, it used to be a fairsight, her window and her garden, and all the time she was witch anddevil’s paramour! They do say Montjoy will walk barefoot to Canterburybecause in old times he was her fere!”
Bettany rowed away. “She is a human being. Say it, and I think that yousay all.”
River, river, and houses standing up, and on the other side willows.“River, I wish you would drown fire. Fire is good where it should be,but at times it acheth to be drowned. And then again water acheth forthe fire.”
He rowed with long, slow strokes. Houses went by under the dull skyand they seemed to look with menace. “That only can truly help thathath not been truly harmed. That, too, I see,” said Thomas Bettany, “ina flash.”
A house by an old wall, brooding to it. Small houses and small garden.The garden was turned wilderness. He caught colours that might beflowers, but the weeds were thick and high. A window--and casementslowly turning outward. All the garden trim, but shrouded in mist, thehouses shrouded in autumn mist, the river--and Morgen Fay looking out.
Rowing away fast from that he shot up river and then to the other side,and beneath willows shipped oars and sat head on hands, thinking firsthow all impossible it was, and then, very wretchedly of Somerville.
Sky darkened still further. With a long sigh, he took up his oars androwed slowly back to the bridge. Going up the water steps he had it nowin mind to ride, storm over, to Somerville Hall. It did not need, forin High Street he came upon Somerville on his big bay horse. Somervillesaw him and waited until he crossed to bridle. “Aye, Thomas?”
“I was going to ride to the Hall. Where can we speak together?”
“Come to the Maid and Garland. And look more blithe! The Turks havenot entered England.”
The Maid and Garland had a parlour for Sir Robert--oh, always! Theywent into a little panelled room, and Somerville turned upon theyounger man, the burgher’s son. “Well?”
“I saw it in a flash.”
“Saw what?”
“Much, Somerville! You held Morgen Fay in your hand there at the ruinedfarm. Plotters to become as great at least as Saint Leofric could nothave gotten at her, she could not have joined with them without yourknowing! Oh, and I saw, too, that land that you got at last withouttrouble, after years and years of trouble!”
“Let me alone!” said Somerville hoarsely. “You young fool!”
“From all that I can hear she has not said your name, not once! It wasof her own movement, once Abbey and Priory would promise her safetyand London town and gold. ‘Thou monstrous witch! Thou daughter of theFather of Lies!’ crieth Silver Cross and Westforest and Middle Forest;aye, even, I hear now, Saint Leofric. But for all that, Robert--”
“‘Robert’?”
“Sir Robert Somerville. But for all that I know, I think, where mostlying lies. Save for the Great Lie that she acted and made, and wickedit was to do it! But if she is the wicked one, who else beside? Andthough she be made of evil is she to burn without a word, who says noword herself?”
Somerville answered him. “Are you mad? What do you mean? When theystoned her out of town I made it possible for her to hide at the ruinedfarm. I am badly repaid, and I close my mouth, and if they ask methere I will lie to them, pardie! Put her at the ruined farm, not I!But who asketh? It is enough that she be pure Satan with Satan. Witchfound here, why easily found there! Who believes but what they wish tobelieve? Who can save her from her burning? God, perhaps, if He choseto do it!”
“Then I will go pray,” said Thomas Bettany. “I was not her lover.”
“Psha!” said Somerville. “She was a common lover.”
The young merchant turned red. “Only great fright could make you saythat, Somerville!”
“Were you noble,” answered Somerville, “I would take that up. As it is,let us be better strangers.”
“That bargain is made, merchant with ‘Sir’ to your name!”
Somerville opened the parlour door. “Reckoning, host--and a cup ofsack!” When the younger man had gone, as he did go immediately, heturned back to the room to sit at
Storm over, he left the Maid and Garland, mounted his big bay and rodeout of town.
“Who can tell The weird he drees? Who can read His shield that hangs In hall above? Parcel gilt, pied white and black. Alas!”