Chapter XI Breathing-Time
As Aliva entered the little chapel on the bridge, she saw, in the uncertain twilight, two figures kneeling before the altar. One was that of a stalwart young man in the garb of a lay-brother of the Benedictine order, and the other that of an elderly woman in the dress of a peasant.
Both rose from their knees, disturbed by the hurried entrance of Aliva, and were surprised to see before them a lady of the upper classes so damp and bedraggled and hoodless. The heart of the woman was touched.
“Lack-a-day, lady!” she exclaimed; “hast thou been in Ouse water?” she added, with a slight shudder.
“I have come here for rest,” replied Aliva, not wishing to reveal her story to peasant strangers. “I have indeed, as you say, suffered somewhat by mishap in a stream, and I have lost my horse.”
As she spoke, the sound of her voice, and a closer scrutiny of her features, increased the astonishment of the two listeners.
“Gramercy on us!” cried the woman; “if this is not our lady from Bletsoe!”
Aliva looked more narrowly at her, and then at the lay-brother.
“Our Lady be praised!” she murmured faintly; “I find friends. Are you not the wife of Goodman Hodges; and is this not your son, the lay-brother from St. Alban’s?”
Mother and son both made a deep obeisance, and Aliva continued:—
“My friends, I am in sore plight. But I know ye to be faithful to your lord, and I trow ye will aid his daughter. I have ridden far and fast, at peril of my life, to escape De Breauté and his men, who even now follow hard upon my track. But I trust I am safe in this holy house, and with—”
But here exhausted nature gave way, and the brave girl, now that she found herself in comparative safety, fell senseless on the chapel floor.
Mistress Hodges, though but a peasant, was a woman of resource and energy.
“Alack, alack! she will die of chill in this cold chapel,” she exclaimed. “Son, we must bear her hence!”
“But what if De Breauté’s men be without, mother?” replied the cautious lay-brother.
“In good sooth, you speak true,” replied the woman, casting an anxious gaze round the chapel, while she supported the head of the unconscious Aliva in her arms. Then she noticed a gleam of light shining through a half-open door on the south side of the altar.
“See, my son,” she exclaimed, “whither that door leads. There may be help near at hand.”
The lay-brother opened the door and looked into the apartment within.
“’Tis a sacristy, or priest’s room,” he replied, with his knowledge of ecclesiastical arrangements. “There is no one within,” he added, glancing hastily around, “and there is a fire on the hearth, and a settle with cushions.”
The mother and son lifted up Aliva’s senseless form, and carrying her into the sacristy, laid her on the couch.
“Go thou now,” said the Mistress Hodges, “and guard the chapel door, and I will see to the young lady. Praise be to our Lady, with warmth and care I shall yet bring her round.”
The young man shut the door of the sacristy behind him, and crossing the chapel to the entrance, closed the heavy door and drew its strong oaken bar across it. He then took up his position against it, keeping a careful and patient watch.
The woman, left alone with Aliva, proceeded to treat her with maternal care; for had not the young lady herself once tended her when the fever ravaged the peasants’ huts round Bletsoe Manor House?
She removed her wet garments and chafed her cold hands and feet. As she undressed her, she found, fastened round her waist, a wallet containing a small flask of cordial and some food, with which the good abbess of Elstow had provided Aliva for her journey. Mistress Hodges poured some of the wine down Aliva’s throat, and she revived.
Delighted that her efforts had so far succeeded, the good woman redoubled her care. She even stripped herself of some of her rough but warm clothing, and wrapped it round Aliva, as she lay on the settle. Then she busied herself in drying and cleaning the soiled and dripping garments, for fortunately, in this room prepared for the priest who served the chapel, there was a good store of firewood.
Aliva lay watching her feebly, with the half-dazed gaze of returning consciousness.
“Thanks to our Lady and the blessed saints,” she murmured at last in such weak voice, “that I have happed on you, good mother; else methinks the cold of this chapel might have finished the work the stream began.”
“The saints forfend!” ejaculated the worthy woman. “But, lady,” she added, her curiosity getting the upper hand, “might I crave your pardon, and ask how comes it that you are in a woful plight? They said in the village you had gone to the retreat at Elstow, which the venerable archdeacon—”
“Ah!” cried Aliva, “selfish wretch that I am, I had well-nigh forgotten him in my own trouble! Know you, good mother, that it was even as he and I were leaving the abbey of Elstow, on our return home, that this fierce company of De Breauté and his men rode down upon us. They scattered us as a hawk scattereth a flight of doves. I escaped by the lucky chance that my good genet can be stopped by no fence or dike in all this countryside. When I last saw my uncle, he was surrounded and closed in upon by the horsemen. I wot not what became of him.”
“Alack, alack!” said Mistress Hodges, shaking her head. “These be evil days now in the which we live, when that terrible Frenchman from over the seas, Sir Fulke de Breauté (may the foul fiend fly off with him!), spares neither the ministers of Holy Church nor defenceless damsels—”
“Indeed, it would seem as if De Breauté had a grudge against me,” Aliva could not help interposing, with a half smile. “He owes me somewhat, by my faith. He asked for my hand; he cannot say he did not get it. How like to a drowned water-rat he looked, coated with our good honest English mud! A pretty dance I led him, I trow,” she added, with a ripple of laughter. “He’ll ne’er forgive me.”
Mistress Hodges grinned good-humouredly, pleased to see the lady’s spirits rising again.
“In good sooth, lady, but young knights find it hard to forgive fair ladies who will have none of them when they come a-wooing.”
The conversation was becoming too personal. Aliva flushed slightly, and tried to turn it.
“And now, prithee goody, it seems to me that I too may well ask, how comes it that you and your son come so far from Bletsoe this evening?”
The smile faded from the woman’s face.
“I am on a weary errand, fair lady,” she replied. “I have come thus far in company with my son, who is on his journey back to the abbey of St. Alban, where he is a lay-brother. I have come but to say a prayer with him, in this the wayfarer’s chapel, to good St. Nicolas, who protects all travellers. Alas! he will return to St. Alban’s; he says it is his duty. I have dissuaded him sore with tears and prayers, but it is of none avail. In these bad times there is no peace even in the religious houses, nothing but wars and rumours of wars.”
“Certes, I did hear from Dicky Dumpling—(ah, poor Dickon! how fares it with him, I wonder? He presented a broad surface to the horsemen’s charge)—that your son had barely ’scaped with his life from that fearful St. Vincent’s Eve at St. Alban’s!”
“Gramercy, lady,” replied the woman, wiping her eyes, “’twas a hairbreadth ’scape, in good sooth! But, thanks to our Lady and the good St. Benedict—who, my son says, preserved the humblest of his servants to serve him further—he got off scot-free from the fire and the sword, yea, and the water too!”
“The water! how mean you?” asked Aliva.
“Marry, lady, he was weary and worn, and he mistook the ford at Milton as he was fleeing homewards. The Ouse was in full flood, and but for that noble knight Sir Ralph de Beauchamp, whom the saints preserve—”
“Sir Ralph de Beauchamp!” murmured Aliva, now deeply interested. “Ah,” she added, with a blush, “I mind me how soaked he was with water!”
“Ay, a fair gallant he is,” the other proceeded. “He thought naught of riding boldly into the Ouse at full stream, and saving my poor lad in the very nick of time, when he was being swept down the river like a truss of hay in a midsummer flood!”
Aliva lay listening, her large eyes fixed dreamily on the speaker.
“It sounds like a bold deed, and a truly marvellous turn of luck for your son. Tell on, good mother, I prithee. I would fain hear more of the fishing out of the worthy lay-brother—thine only son, too—tell on,” added the astute maiden, playing on maternal feeling.
Mistress Hodges’ tongue was unloosed by the evident interest the young lady of the manor evinced. His recent dangers and escapes had made the lay-brother somewhat of a hero in the village of Bletsoe. His mother was nothing loath to fight his battles over again, and prattled on with maternal pride for some time ere she perceived that her fair charge had sunk into a sound and healthful slumber, lulled by the account of her lover’s daring.
Meanwhile De Breauté and his men had hurried up. They passed Aliva’s riderless palfrey.
“Ah, pardie! the fair hare has run to ground, and cannot be far distant.—Lady, thy pride is nigh unto a fall,” murmured William to himself, chuckling.
But the rustic in charge of the horse was either naturally or intentionally stupid. De Breauté could make nothing of him.
Riding eagerly to the bridge-foot, he scanned its length. But he saw no sign of Aliva’s retreating figure in the fast-falling twilight, and heard no sound save the swirl of the rushing river as it swept beneath the arches.
Had she escaped him?
Leaving one of his men to guard the bridge, he proceeded to search the cottages round. But from the trembling peasants he could only gather that they had indeed seen a lady, in soiled and damp clothing, pass down the village.
But as he was thus cross-questioning and searching, he was approached by a personage clad in ecclesiastical garb. He was a coarse-looking individual, the expression of whose features showed a mixture of greed and cunning.
“William de Breauté,” he asked, “thou seekest a bird? Shall I show thee the nest where that bird is hidden?”
“If thou meanest that thou canst tell whither the lady has escaped who but now made her way through the village,” replied De Breauté, not much relishing the tone of familiarity in which he was addressed, “thou shalt be well rewarded if thou dost direct me thither. And understand,” he added, trying to speak with dignity, “no harm is intended to the lady. It is simply needful for her own protection that I conduct her to my brother’s castle at Bedford.”
“Ay, in good sooth, all are in safe keeping there!” muttered the priest with a sneer, not brooking haughty patronage from a soldier of fortune. “But, perchance, my secret will remain with me, and she will not take the road to Bedford.”
William de Breauté saw that he was not going the right way to work, and altered his tone. He had a shrewd guess that a bribe would both be expected and received.
“Certes, reverend father,” he replied, “but I mean a reward to Holy Church in the person of one of her ministers.”
“Knightly sir,” answered the priest, “we understand each other. I am but a minister, as you rightly say, and humblest, you would more rightly have said, of Holy Church. Whatever her ministers receive, it is really the Church who receiveth and benefiteth.”
And if winking were the fashion in the thirteenth century, doubtless he winked at De Breauté as he spoke.
“Follow me,” he added.
And he led him to the door of the chapel on the bridge.