CHAPTER XXX
The wold hung November grey. “Snow in that cloud,” quoth the old smith.“Elf of the world wants a white flower!”
“Snowy night a year ago!” said Morgen Fay.
Emmy spoke. “A many are coming by, hurrying, for they want to getacross the wold before air is white and ground is white.”
So the smiths somewhat looked for many, but that day passed and thenight and part of the next day and none came. Snow, too, held off. Skypallid grey, earth grey, and all unearthly still. Then a packman cameby, going from a town south of the wold to a town north of it, and hehad news. He had ridden ahead of thirty who would stop for rest at theGood Man. “Prior and his monks and so many lay brothers stoutly armedand mounted. Great church folk changing visits.”
“Beyond-Wold Abbey?”
“Aye, going there. Have come a long way, they say, stopping atfriaries and castles. They’re Blackfriars. Ah, it is policy for mento visit now and then, getting away from home, changing stories andlearning a bit! Prior’s a man like the rest of us! Tail man told mewhen I walked beside him a bit. They’ve got a saint’s bone with them,and a many poor souls have been healed in this town and that castle.”
“What like is the prior?”
“Tall bent man, thin as paper, very pale, with black eyes.”
“That is not Westforest!” said Godfrey the smith, and looked over thegrey wold to see if they were coming.
Morgen answered, “No, not Prior Matthew. But it hath a sound of anotherI have seen going down High Street and by town cross.”
“Saint Leofric’s Friary,” said the packman. “Other side England. Aye,bone of Saint Leofric. Prior Hugh.”
Through grey air a flake fell, then another and another. “Thirty withhim, do you say? Is there by chance a giant of a friar--you could notmiss him if he were there--Friar Martin?”
“Oh, aye, I think I saw him,” said the packman. “There was a hugebrother bestriding the strongest horse! Well, I say, say I, blackfriars, white friars, grey friars and brown friars are at times illas they’re sung, and at times good as they’re sung, and most times inbetween the two! But I say for the most part England’s had good ofthem. In the most and for the long run!”
He was speaking to the brown-gold smith. That one agreed with him. “Ithink so, too, brother--though I’ve had my buffets--for the most partand in the long run!”
The packman had his pony shod and was ready to depart. Snowflakes werefew; he would reach the end of the wold, the sea and his small havenbefore night. He looked at the gold-brown smith, hesitated, then, “Comeye apart for a word!” They moved out under the hill. “You’ve got a fairwoman with you. Do you remember a carter yesterday morn?”
“Yes, I do.”
“Well, he saith at the Good Man that he saw you in London, you and thewoman there, though you did not see him. He saith a black friar raisedthat quarter of London against you and the woman, but especially thewoman for she was a sorceress. But when they came to the house and beatin the door, you were gone, the two of you. There was one Jankin, buthe knew naught. Well, Harry the carter told all that at the Good Manyestereve. I thought you might like to know. I might not have told, butshe hath a great look of a sister of mine who’s dead. It is easy to crysorcery, and hard to down the cry!”
“Aye, it is. Take our thanks, friend!”
The packman mounted his pony and went away through the grey day, thefew flakes of snow.
“Are you going, too?” asked Emmy. “I see you over wold and you do notcome back. But I wish you to come back and I must weep!”
“We are pilgrims--we cannot stay! Some one has set us a pilgrimage.”
In an hour they had parted with the old smith and with Emmy. Englefieldand Morgen Fay went over the wold, not by the road, but by a shepherds’path, running hereabouts over and between low hills. From the first ofthese they looked back. They could see, almost closely, the smithy andthe hut under the hill. They had loved this place, loved the wold.
“Love it still and take it with us! So I have the rose tree and Ailsaand the garden. All things we love go with us, nor can we ever helpthat.”
“So who loveth most hath most treasure!”
They looked back to the smithy and then to the road that ran almostbeneath them on this hill top. Now they could see approaching a mountedcompany, thirty at least, still a good way off but growing larger witha steady pacing movement.
“Let us watch. They do not dream we are here. Move yonder and the furzewill hide.”
Prior Hugh of Saint Leofric, with him a dozen monks and the rest stoutlay Brothers, rode thoughtfully, mounted on his white mule. Out of greyday, athwart the gathering snow, pictures formed for him. The man andwoman above him, hidden on the hill brow, also saw pictures, vivid,defined, one after the other. Friar Martin, huge on huge horse, lookedupward as he passed. They saw his great tanned face, his black beardwagging ever for Saint Leofric. Loyalties--loyalties!
There passed Prior Hugh and his following. Reaching the smithy theyhalted and dismounted.
Richard Englefield and Morgen Fay went on over the wold, taking faint,broken paths of shepherds. The sky was grey and came close, they sawnot a living thing on the wold before them, the flakes began to fall alittle more thickly. An hour passed, and now they talked together andnow they were silent.
Down came the flakes; the flakes came down. Now they were white andmany, steadily, steadily falling. Before long they seemed to quicken,they became a soft vast multitude, they hid as with curtains the woldall around.
“This is the path?”
“Aye, but there will be a great snow.”
They walked as fast as they might, but the path ran up and down orwound in the trough of the low waves of whitened earth. They could noteat the leagues. And ever the snow came faster. “Three hours yet ofdaylight. Time enough to reach Brighthaven. But if the snow covers thepath--”
The snow covered it. An hour went by.
“We have all the wold for path! But eastward there lies the sea. And bymy reckoning Grey Farm should be near.”
“The snow cometh so we cannot be sure--”
“Art warm?”
“Aye.”
Another hour and it was dusk and the snow came steadily, hugely, andwhere was sea or east or west or north or south could no longer be toldwith assurance. No house or hut, and now at last cold, great cold andweariness.
“Grey Farm may be yonder or yonder, but we cannot see. Lost is butlost--never forever lost!”
Night! Cold now and ever falling snow, and no path or all path. Nolight, no shape other than the wold shape and the snow shape and thenight shape.
“Art very weary?”
“Yes, weary!”
“If we lie down here and sleep it will be to part with life. Let ustry awhile longer. Just a fold of land may keep from us Grey Farmlight.”
They tried, but no house or light arose. Only they heard somethingafter a time.
“Hark to that! What is it?”
“It is the sea!”
It came to sound louder. No lights of haven, nor could they have seenthem, perhaps, behind the great moving veils and under woldside andcliff.
“I fear to go farther this way for the cliffs! We may fall--”
“It roars, the sea, and there are lights in my eyes and a singing afar.I must lie down. I cannot go farther.”
“A little more--a little more. See! I can help thee so.”
“Ah, I love thee! But I cannot--Do you not hear music playing?”
“Here are bushes bent from the sea. Creep under--so! There--now if wedie we die together.”
The falling, falling, falling snow, and at the base of rock thesounding sea.
“What art thou doing? Take thy cloak again!”
“No, I am warm, warming thee.”
The snow fell ceaselessly.
“I am not afraid nor suffering now. No fear, no pain! And thou hastnone?”
“None!”
Snow falling--sno
w falling. The great sea sounding and sounding.
“Richard, there are violets. It is Wander forest, but so changed.”
In the night the snow ceased to fall. Dawn came like a white rose, theshredded petals covering all the earth.
A small and humble House of Carmelites, set upon a cliff a league fromBrighthaven, kept a goodly habit. After tempest, after snow on wold,it sent out so many Brothers seeking if there were any harmed. So onthis morning as of fine white wool these at last came upon the cliffbrow and to a line of furze bushes mounded white. They would havepassed them by, for all the earth was heaped with snow and no footprintanywhere save their own deep ones. But a young Brother saw a bit ofblue mantle. “Oh, here!”
With their hands they beat away the snow and with their arms theylifted. The man and woman moved feebly. They lived, though in an hour,maybe, they would not have lived. The Brothers bore them to the Houseand made for them warmth and cheer. Life flowed again, red came to thelip, light to the eyes, strength to the frame. They rested throughthat day and night in the guest house of the monastery.
The Prior was a saintly man, big of frame, simple and wise. The secondmorning the two stood before him to give him thanks and say farewell.He looked at them somewhat long before speaking. “You are goodly tolook upon,” he said. “I see that you have been through much and will gothrough more before heaven is complete. But you are bound for heavenand Who dwells therein. Take and give blessing!”
The wold was silver, the sea blue, the sky blue crystal. The roadshown, they went forth from the Carmelites to come to Brighthaven. Theywalked hand in hand. “How beautiful is the world!”