CHAPTER XXIV
London folk went up and down. Palace where sat a strong king, Towerwhere traitors lay in ward, wall maintained through the centuries uponthe base the Romans laid, Aldgate, Newgate, Ludgate, Bishopsgate.London Bridge, London Stone, Baynard Castle, old Temple without theTemplars, with the lawyers. Blackfriars, Whitefriars, Greyfriars,Austin Friars, Crutched Friars, crowd of monasteries and nunneries,great buildings of stone, lesser buildings of wood, churches andchurches, and a good way out of town Westminster, where the king wasbuilding his great chapel with the wonderful roof. Sixty thousand,maybe seventy thousand people in London. Learned men were there,artists were there, merchants there, men of the Church, of the law, ofthe sword. Hidden Wickliffites, hidden Lollards were there. Astrologersand alchemists were there and men of the rosy cross. Navigators anddiscoverers were there, striving to show Henry what to do to balanceor counter Ferdinand of Spain and Emmanual of Portugal. Mechanics andartisans were there, many and many men of many crafts. Guilds andguilds. London of the bells, of the Wall and the Thames; London outer,London inner.
Near the Old Jewry ran a narrow street where dwelled many workers inmetal--ironsmith, coppersmith, silversmith, goldsmith--not the greatknown workers but the lesser ones that the great hired. A narrow streetof poor houses, dark and noisy, or dark and still. The children werepoured into the street, the women sat in the doors or clacked up anddown. From some houses came always the clink of metal upon metal, fromothers the workers went away to other places of work. At night theyreturned. Now the sun cleansed all, now the fog came dull-footed intothe street and the houses and stayed.
Jankin, a worker for an armourer, opened the door of an old house. Alarge room, which was a workshop, and four small rooms, and out ofthe house had recently been carried a bier. The man who died had beenan old, independent metal worker. Here still were his furnace and histools. Whatever had been his family it was gone; apprentices who haddwelled with him were away to other masters. “But his custom would comeback,” said Jankin. “The whole thing for so many pounds. Somethingdown, but the most could be worked out. ’Tis said there’s a ghost inthe house, and so they don’t sell or rent it easily.”
The man with him said, “I rent it and buy the tools.”
Jankin answered, “If you do the work you used to do, master, ’t will belike planting a tree in a flowerpot!”
“No. And ‘master’ me no more, Jankin!”
“_Diccon Dawn._ It comes strange! But many a man and a great man isin danger. Well, you were never much in London, master, and you’rechanged. Eh, those days I was with you in Paris! I hear them stillbetween hammer strokes, and they come around me like fairies. Andyou’ll live here?”
“Aye.”
“The great vase you made for the cardinal! Tall as a man, and a wreathof silver dancers! And he would have you to sup with him--and even I inthe hall had venison pasty and marchpane and such wine as Saint Vulcandrinks!”
“Let us go to the owner.”
_Five days ago Wander Forest._
Owner of the house, heir of the dead man’s furnishings, was found.Yes, yes! let and sell on easy terms, Jankin, who was responsible,answering for Richard or Diccon Dawn, and the latter’s gold pieces alsoanswering. The long June day saw the whole completed, key in the handof Diccon Dawn, and still two hours lacking of sunset.
Quoth Jankin, “I can get you plain work to start on.”
He stood a middle-aged, surly, doggedly faithful man. “If you chose towork with me again, Jankin--?”
Jankin regarded workroom, regarded street through wide, low window.“Well, I will! I’d like to watch tree break flowerpot!”
Through the street alone, into the outer street near the river, a poorstreet also, filled with a great clanging noise. Men-at-arms pouredby, going for some reason to the Tower. When they were passed he met acountry cart, two girls, sisters, seated and a boy walking beside thehorse. They had strawberries and they were crying them. “Strawberries!Strawberries! Make you young again! Strawberries!”
Down a cross street he saw the river and it was running sunset goldwith beds of violets. He entered a poor house where lodged sailors’wives, and here he sought and found Morgen Fay. “Come with me! I wantto show you something.”
After a moment of silence she moved toward him and they went outtogether. They went through the street, a tall man and a woman verypoorly clad, tall almost as he, and of a rich beauty. There was a greatsunset this eve, bathing London and Thames and these two.
Diccon Dawn opened the door. They entered the workshop. “This place isnow mine. I do not know if you know it, but I am a smith in gold andsilver.”
Jankin had brought and left upon the table a loaf and cheese, a pitcherof ale and a platter heaped with strawberries. Moreover there was waterprovided and candles in the stand and he had swept the room. All thetools of this trade were about; at the back stood the furnace. Theroom faced the south and the west, and through the window streamed theglowing light. They entered, they drank a little water, then stood andfaced each the other.
She spoke. “We came away upon the ship together, two mortals in themost merciless danger. ‘That cannot be helped!’ I thought, after thefirst astounding when all the blood went from my heart and my kneesbent under me. The _Vineyard_ shook us down together like two leavesin London. ‘That cannot be helped,’ I thought, ‘but now the wind willdrive the one north and the other south!’ ‘Lodge at the Old Anchor,’says _Vineyard_ master. I go there, and I find you there before me.Still the wind does not rise. But now it must!”
“You have gold,” said the other. “I saw him to whom we owe more thangold give it to you. There is still lodging at the Old Anchor. Returnthere if you choose. I will walk with you. You shall lodge as you havelodged, and I as I have lodged. But this house is now mine. Lodge here,Morgen Fay!”
“No! Now at last we speak together! Now at last!”
“Now at last!”
She stood away from the table, he nearer window. Gold and red sunsetwas behind him, a gold and red pool upon the floor between them, and arosy light struck her--face, head and throat.
It was again--it was again!
She cried, “Cell at Silver Cross, and you on your knees before heaven,and I the ape!”
He put his hands before his face. “All heaven was mine!”
“Dressed so, like the great picture, and with my fingers drawing orslackening cords that made the blue mantle to wave and lights tobrighten. Oh, God--oh, God!”
“It is so, yet they brighten.”
She leaned against the wall, clasping her hands above her forehead.“Through wickedness and mire and hell and silly paradises I could comeat times to her garden gate and feel her within, though ever was afence between us! Her the Blessed, Her the Mother, Mother of All! Asweet song of her, a bright picture of her is that one who moved inBethlehem and went down into Egypt and came back to Nazareth! A littlesong, a little story of her is the great picture in Silver Cross. Allsongs and all stories have her in them! But what _I_ did, because Ithought I was in danger and because there was mire in me, was to chooseto clip the gold coin and take it from where it was needed and buyperdition with it! I chose to lie and cheat, to mock and perjure, tomake her small and ugly--Her the Blissful, Her the Wholly Pure, Her theStrong and Beautiful!”
Richard Englefield turned to the window. Fiery light! The moon on thecoasts of Italy! Fiery light!
Moments dropped, far apart, slowly, one after the other. Morgen Fayspoke again, in a changed tone. “I am not going back to the old life.To please myself I learned to make lace and I can make it rarely. Thereis here a guild of sewing women and lace-makers. A sailor’s wife toldme.”
“Work if you will, Morgen. But do you lodge here!”
“Why--why?”
They moved. Light seemed to pour over them, red light. A horn was blownin the street. Again she cried out. “It is heaven that you love andseek, far above this and all sinning! When I was ape I saw that, thelight falling on your face
!”
“Heaven, yes--heaven grown small maybe, but heaven that manunderstands! Give me heaven!”
She cried, “Oh, the ape has done murder!”
“No! No murder was done. I thought so at first, and indeed it mightseem so, but it was not. _Diccon and Alice Dawn._ Lodge here, Morgen,lodge here!”
The fiery light, the music in the street. The brown-gold figure, thesmith in gold and silver, tall, like King David in the window of SaintEthelred. “Decide! It is for you to decide!”
All her life seemed to come around her. All her life up to the ruinedfarm and Wander forest, and then and for a long time Wander forest,ruined farm. And then in full, sounding and lighted, Silver Cross. Fourtimes in all. Prison, the _Vineyard_ ship and the Old Anchor. Fire-redand brown-gold and shreds and lines of blue. Horns in the street,but somewhere a lute and a viol. _Build as build you can!_ _Vineyard_ship, Old Anchor, fiery street, house of the smith, colour and odour ofroses, viol, lute. She moved, she sat down by the table and buried herface in her arms. Presently he lighted the candles. “Come, Morgen, comeand see the whole of it!”
“No!” said Morgen Fay and rose to her height. She stood up. “No! It isnot little me thou art seeking--little me, little thee. Perhaps--it isgreat daring to say it--perhaps I also who have been ape am seeker!At any rate, I’ll not give thee tinsel who needeth gold! And now I amgoing back to Old Anchor.”