Yet old Antony's tale carried conviction. Her abject fear was now explained.
That the Dead should come again, and walk and move among the haunts of men, seeking out the surroundings they have loved and left, seems always to hold terror for the untutored mind, which knows not that the Dead are more alive than the living; and that there is no death, saving the death of sin.
But to the Reverend Mother, guarding her flock from sin or shame, a visitor from the Unseen World held less of horror than a possible intruder from the Seen.
A rapid glance as she sounded the bell, had shown her that the passage was empty.
Which cell now sheltered two, where there should be but one?
The Prioress walked across to a recess near the south window, touched a spring, and slid back a portion of the oak panelling. Passing her hand into a secret hiding place in the wall, she drew forth a beautifully fashioned dagger, with carved ivory handle, crossed metal thumb-guard, blade of bevelled steel, polished and narrowing to a sharp needle point. She tested the point, then slipped the weapon into her belt, beneath her scapulary. As she closed the panel, and turned back into the chamber, a light of high resolve was in her eyes. Her whole bearing betokened so fine a fearlessness, such noble fixity of purpose that, looking on her, Mary Antony felt her own fears vanishing.
"Now listen, dear Antony," said the Prioress, holding the old woman with her look. "I must make sure that this twenty-first White Lady of thine is but a trick played on thee by thy peas. Should she be anywhere in the Convent I shall most certainly have speech with her.
"Meanwhile, go thou to thy kitchens, and give thy mind to the preparing of the evening meal. But ring not the Refectory bell until I bid thee. Nay, I myself will sound it this evening. It may suit me to keep the nuns somewhat longer at their devotions.
"Should I sound the alarm bell, let all thy helpers run up here; but go thou to the cell of Mother Sub-Prioress and persuade her not to rise. If needful say that it is my command that she keep her bed. . . . Great heavens! What a crash! May our Lady defend us! The lightning inclines to strike. I shall pass to each cell and make sure that none are too greatly alarmed."
"Now, haste thee, Antony; and not a word concerning thy fears must pass thy lips to any; no mention of a twenty-first White Lady nor"the Prioress crossed herself"of Sister Agatha, to whom may our Lord grant everlasting rest."
Mary Antony, kneeling, kissed the hem of the Prioress's robe. Then, rising, she saidwith unwonted solemnity and restraint: "The Lord defend you, Reverend Mother, from foes, seen and unseen," and, followed by another blinding flash of lightning, she left the cell.
CHAPTER IX
THE PRIORESS SHUTS THE DOOR
The Prioress waited until the old lay-sister's shuffling footsteps died away.
Then she passed out into the long, stone passage, leaving her own door open wide.
Into each cell the Prioress went.
In each she found a kneeling nun, absorbed in her devotions. In no cell were there two white figures. So simple were the fittings of these cells, that no place of concealment was possible. One look, from the doorway, sufficed.
Outside the cell of Sister Seraphine the Prioress paused, hearing words within; then entered swiftly. But Sister Seraphine was alone, reciting aloud, for love of hearing her own voice.
The Prioress now moved toward the heavy door in the archway leading into the cloisters. It opened inwards, and had been left standing wide, by Mary Antony. Indeed, in summer it stood open day and night, for coolness.
As the Prioress walked along the dimly lighted passage, she could see, through the open door, sheets of rain driving through the cloisters. The storm-clouds had burst, at last, and were descending in floods.
The Prioress stood in the shelter of the doorway, looking out into the cloisters. The only places she could not view, were the entrance to the subterranean way, and the flight of steps leading thereto. She would have wished to examine these; but it seemed scarcely worth passing into the driving rain, now sweeping through the cloister arches. After all, whatever possible danger lurked down those steps, the safety of the Convent would be assured if she closed this door, between the passage and the cloisters, and locked it.
Stepping back into the passage, she seized the heavy door and swung it to, noting as she did so, how far too heavy it was for the feeble arms of old Mary Antony, and deciding for the future to allot the task of closing it to a young lay-sister, leaving to Mary Antony merely the responsibility of turning the key in the lock.
This the Prioress was herself proceeding to do, when something impelled her to turn her eyes to the angle of wall laid bare by the closing of the door.
In that dark corner, motionless, with shrouded face, stood a tall figure, garbed in the dress of the nuns of the Order of the White Ladies of Worcester.
Perhaps the habit of silence is never of greater value than in moments of sudden shock and horror.
One cry from the Prioress would have meant the instant opening of many doors, and the arrival, on flying feet, of a score of frightened nuns.
Instead of screaming, the Prioress stood silent and perfectly still; while every pulse in her body ceased beating, during one moment of uncontrollable, cold horror. Then, with a leap, her heart went on; pounding so loudly, that she could hear it in the silence. Yet she kept command of every impulse which drove to sound or motion.
Before long her pulses quieted; her heart, beating steadily, was once again the well-managed steed upon which her high courage could ride to victory.
And, all the while, her eyes never left the white figure; knowing it knew itself discovered and observed.
Her hand was still upon the key.
She turned it, and withdrew it from the lock.
A deafening crash of thunder shook the walls. A swirl of wind and rain beat on the door.
When the last echo of the thunder had died away, the Prioress spoke; and that calm voice, sounding amid the storm, fell on the only ears that heard it, like the Voice of Power on Galilee, which bid the tempest cease, and the wild waves be still.
"Who art thou, and what doest thou here?"
The figure answered not.
"Art thou a ghostly visitor come back amongst us, from the Realm of the Unseen?"
The figure made no sign. "Art thou then flesh and blood, and mortal as ourselves?"
Slowly the figure bowed its head.
"Now I adjure thee by our blessèd Lady to tell me truly. Art thou, in very deed a holy nun, a member of our sacred Order? Answer me, yea or nay?"
The figure shook its head.
The Prioress advanced a step, passed the key into her left hand and, slipping her right beneath her scapulary, took firm grip of the dagger at her girdle.
"Then, masquerader in our sacred dress," she said, "to me you have to answer for double sacrilege: the wearing of these robes, and your presence here, unbidden. I warn you that your life has never hung by frailer thread than now it hangs. Your only hope of safety lies in doing as I bid you. Pass before me along this passage until you reach a chamber on the right, of which the door stands open. Enter, and place yourself against the wall on the side farthest from the door. There I will speak with you."
With the shuffling steps of a woman, and the bent shoulders of the very old, the figure moved slowly forward, stepped upon the front of the white robe, stumbled, but recovered.
The Prioress watching, laugheda short scornful laugh, holding more of anger than of merriment.
With an abrupt movement the figure straightened, stood at its full height, and strode forward. The Prioress marked the squaring of the broad shoulders; the height, greater than her own, though she was more than common tall; the stride, beneath the folds of the long robe; and she knit her level brows, for well she knew with whom she had to deal. She was called to face a desperate danger. Single-handed, she had to meet a subtle foe. She asked no help from others, but she took no needless risks.
The Prioress watching, laugheda short scornful laugh, holding more of anger than of merriment.
With an abrupt movement the figure straightened, stood at its full height, and strode forward. The Prioress marked the squaring of the broad shoulders; the height, greater than her own, though she was more than common tall; the stride, beneath the folds of the long robe; and she knit her level brows, for well she knew with whom she had to deal. She was called to face a desperate danger. Single-handed, she had to meet a subtle foe. She asked no help from others, but she took no needless risks.
As she passed the cell of Mary Seraphine, using her master-key, she locked that lady in!
CHAPTER X
"I KNOW YOU FOR A MAN"
Entering her cell, the Prioress saw at once that her orders had been obeyed.
The hooded figure stood on the far side of the chamber, leaning broad shoulders against the wall. Under the cape, the arms were folded; she could see that the feet were crossed beneath the robe. The dress was indeed the dress of a White Lady, but the form within it was so obviously that of a mana big man, at bay, and inclined to be defiantthat, despite the strange situation, despite her anger, and her fears, the contrast between the holy habit and its hidden wearer, forced from the Prioress an unwilling smile.
Closing the door, she drew forward a chair of dark Spanish wood, the gift of the Lord Bishop; a chair which well betokened the dignity of her high office.
Seating herself, she laid her left hand lightly upon the mane of one of the carved lions which formed, on either side, the arms of the chair; but her right hand still gripped unseen the ivory hilt; while leaning slightly forward, with feet firmly planted, she was ready at any moment to spring erect.
"I know you for a man," she said.
The thunder rumbled far away in the distance.
The rain still splashed against the casement, but the storm had spent itself; the sky was brightening. A pale slant of sunshine broke through the parting clouds and, entering the casement, gleamed on the jewelled cross at the breast of the Prioress, and kindled into peculiar radiance the searching light of her clear eyes.
"I know you for a man," she said again. "You stand there, revealed; and surely you stand there, shamed. By plotting and planning, by assuming our dress, you have succeeded in forcing your undesired presence into this sacred cloister, where dwells a little company of women who have left the world, never to return to it again; who have given up much in order to devote themselves to a life of continual worship and adoration, gaining thereby a power in intercession which brings down blessing upon those who still fight life's battles in the world without.
"But it has meant the breaking of many a tender tie. There are fathers and brothers dear to them, whom the nuns would love to see again; but they cannot do so, save, on rare occasions, in the guest-room at the gate; and then, with the grille between.
"Saving Bishop or Priest, no foot of man may tread our cloisters; no voice of man may be heard in these cells.
"Yetby trick and subterfugeyou have intruded. Methinks I scarce should let you leave this place alive, to boast what you have done."
The Prioress paused.
The figure stood, with folded arms, immovable, leaning against the wall. There was a quality in this motionless silence such as the Prioress had not connected with her idea of Mary Seraphine's "Cousin Wilfred."
This was not a man to threaten. Her threat came back to her, as if she had flung it against a stone wall. She tried another line of reasoning.
"I know you, Sir Wilfred," she said. "And I know why you are here. You have come to tempt away, or mayhap, if possible, to force away one of our number who but lately took her final vows. There was a time, not long ago, when you might have thwarted her desire to seek and find the best and highest. But now you come too late. No bride of Heaven turns from her high estate. Her choice is made. She will abide by it; and so, Sir Knight, must you."
The rain had ceased. The storm was over. Sunshine flooded the cell.
Once more the Prioress spoke, and her voice was gentle.
"I know the disappointment to you must be grievous. You took great risks; you adventured much. How long you have plotted this intrusion, I know not. You have been thwarted in your evil purpose by the faithfulness of one old woman, our aged lay-sister, Mary Antony, who never fails to count the White Ladies as they go and as they return, and who reported at once to me that one more had returned than went.
"Do you not see in this the Hand of God? Will you not bow in penitence before Him, confessing the sinfulness of the thing you had in mind to do?"
The shrouded head was lifted higher, as if with a proud gesture of disavowal. At the same time, the hood slightly parting, the hand of a man, lean and brown, gripped it close.
The Prioress looked long at that lean, brown hand.
Then she rose slowly to her feet.
"Shew methyface," she said; and the tension of each word was like a naked blade passing in and out of quivering flesh.
At sound of it the figure stood erect, took one step forward, flung back the hood, tore open the robe and scapulary, loosing his arms from the wide sleeves.
Andas the hood fell backthe Prioress found herself looking into a face she had not thought to see again in lifethe face of him who once had been her lover.
CHAPTER XI
THE YEARS ROLL BACK
"Hugh!" exclaimed the Prioress.
And again, in utter bewilderment: "Hugh?"
And yet a third time, in a low whisper of horror, passing her left hand across her eyes, as if to clear from her outer vision some nightmare of the inner mind: "Hugh!"
The silent Knight still made no answer; but he flung aside the clinging robes, stepped from out them, and strode forward, both arms outstretched.
"Back!" cried the Prioress. But her hand had left the hilt of the dagger. "Come no nearer," she commanded.
Then she sank into her chair, spreading her trembling hands upon the carven manes of the lions.
The Knight, still silent, folded his arms across his breast.
Thus for a space they gazed on one anotherthese two, who had parted, eight years before, with clinging lips and straining arms, a deep, pure passion of love surging within them; a union of heart, made closer by the wrench of outward separation.
The Knight looked at the lips of the noble woman before him; and as he looked those firm lips quivered, trembled, parted
Thenthe years rolled back
* * * * * *It was moonlight on the battlements. The horses champed in the courtyard below. They two had climbed to the topmost turret, that they might part as near the stars as possible, and that, unseen by others, she might watch him ride away.
How radiant she looked, in her robe of sapphire velvet, jewels at her breast and girdle, a mantle of ermine hanging from her shoulders. But brighter than any jewels were the eyes full of love and tears; and softer than softest velvet, the beautiful hair which, covered her, as with a golden veil. Standing with his arms around her, it flowed over his hands. Silent he stood, looking deep into her eyes.
Below they could hear Martin Goodfellow calling to the men-at-arms.
Her lips being free, she spoke.
"Thou wilt come back to me, Hugh," she said. "The Saracens will not slay thee, will not wound thee, will not touch thee. My love will ever be around thee, as a silver shield."
She flung her strong young arms about him, long and supple, enfolding him closely, even as his enfolded her.
He filled his hands with her soft hair, straining her closer.